with it if its dum biryani it has to be dum but we could make it look beautiful in terms of protein and its presentation you can maybe put the chicken upright so that when you break open the rice you have the meat inside i am just forming images in my mind as we speakwhat was the first dish you mastered in the kitchenbarbecue food was my strength since my school days i used to cook with barbecue that is how i got into cookingany memories from your familys cafe in singapore and what are some of the dishes you have recreatedwe have a lot of good and funny memories while making parottas in the cafe i have recreated a lot of my familys recipes rendang curry was my aunts recipe rasam was also a household recipe as and when i do indian cooking i draw a lot of inspiration from my familywhat is a typical day in terms of food in your houseon a busy day we would make stir fried vegetables and chicken with rice at moms house there will definitely be sambar and curry there is a lot of vegetables at my mums place but at my place we have a lot of protein because i give importance to nutrition the boys are very active and i make it a point to make healthy meals with the right amount of carbs and proteinhow do you look at food differently after mastercheffrom a diners point of view my perception has changed a lot as a diner i didnt bother about how my food was prepared in restaurants i would just go there and buy the food while making sure it is flavourful but now i understand how difficult it is to prepare food getting the produce and training the staff there are a lot of things that go behind a business like this now when i dine at a place today i am a much more forgiving diner but i still cannot forgive bad servicelets speak about masterchef what was your secret behind ideating dishes within secondsi used to love mystery boxes it does not make you go all over the place there are limited ingredients and limited time you only get to focus on that but when you have an open pantry that is so big your ideas go wild mystery box was one of my strongest suits i also had a small strategy i would first look at the protein i would then look for root vegetables i would make the base with a protein and then further make a sauce or a puree after that i start looking for spices to complement the dish i keep it very simple protein vegetables and garnishing were the secretwhat would you guys eat when you were not cooking in the showwe had interesting food options the pantry in the masterchef house is filled up i love khanhs breakfast he would do a simple stir fry with poached