Benne Dosa is now, for all practical purposes, a Bangalore dish

It’s both puzzling and a little gratifying.

Whenever you mention dosas to knowledgeable foodies, they look at you a little superiorly and ask, “But do you like benne dosa?”

 

A new restaurant serving benne dosa in Mumbai is jam packed, people look for the dosa in Delhi at Carnatic Cafe and hotels are rushing to put it on their menus. I realised how far the benne dosa’s fame had spread when Daniel Humm, chef-patron at the three Michelin star Eleven Madison Park in New York came to India last year. One of the first things he asked me was, “Where can I get a benne dosa?”

 

   Just as bragging about benne dosa has become a way for foodies to demonstrate that they are connoisseurs who will not be satisfied with a simple Udupi Masala Dosa, there is a new snobbery about biryani too. The days when people bragged about perfect Lucknow biryanis gave way to boasts about the biryanis of Kerala. But now, there is less snob value in talking about Malabar or Thalessary. Instead the biryani to mention is from another part of South India: Donne Biryani.

 

   I find all this slightly mystifying but am, nevertheless, gratified because both dishes are closely identified with a city I love: Bangalore.

 

   I am not sure though when these dishes suddenly became names to drop. I have been eating benne dosas in Bangalore for years and whenever I mentioned this, nobody really gave a damn or was at all impressed. Likewise with Donne biryani which I (perhaps wrongly) enjoyed mostly for the Bannur lamb with which it can be made.

 

   To take the benne dosa first. If you have not come across it then think of the set dosas of South India. These are smaller, thicker and spongier than the large thin dosas made famous by restaurateurs from Udupi all over India and are often home made.

 

   A benne dosa can look a little like them though these days people make benne dosas in all sizes. The difference is in the texture: benne dosas are crisp on the outside and tender in the centre. And they also taste different.

 

   The secret is in the name. Benne means butter.

 

   There are various competing origin stories but it is certainly not an ancient dish. The most commonly accepted version of its creation dates back to Devangere around 250 km from Bangalore where a woman called Chenamma is credited with inventing it in the 1930s. Her sons opened successful dosa outlets in the 1940s and it slowly spread from there to Bangalore and other places in Karnataka.

 

   Its defining characteristic was that it used white home made butter which suggests that a pan Indian restaurant cuisine may have emerged earlier than we realised; the closest parallel is with the butter rich breads of Punjab.

 

   Devangere is still a centre of the Benne Dosa tradition but the dosa is now, for all practical purposes, a Bangalore dish.

 

"The Donne Biryani story is a little more complex. There is no one single point of origin and the name is no help."

   While researching this piece I spoke to a variety of chefs and got a variety of recipes. The key point of difference is the batter. As Naren Thimmaiah, Karnataka’s greatest chef, told me, some cooks just use the normal dosa batter but others make a special batter. Praveen Anand, who set up the Dakshin restaurants for ITC says that some chefs add a little rava for crispness. Chef Kasi, the current chef at Bangalore’s Dakshin, sticks to the normal batter but increases the proportion of urad dal because, he says, a benne dosa needs to be softer in texture than a normal dosa. Ragi, said to be part of early recipes, is rarely mentioned.

 

   Ananya Bannerjee, the well-known chef and cook book writer, has also been following the benne dosa craze and her conclusions are broadly the same. Yes, there can be variations in the batter recipe but as the popularity of the dish has grown and more restaurants have begun serving it, convenience has led cooks to use one batter for all dosas.

 

   Often this is also true of the masala served with the dosa. This is a more serious matter because as Chef Naren explained to me, the dish should have its own masala potatoes, less spicy than the masala used in normal Udupi restaurants. Chef Kasi agrees. He makes what he calls ‘white potatoes’, a milder filling.

 

   But in the end, I am not sure how much any of this matters to most guests. For them, the appeal of the dish lies in the taste and texture imparted by the generous use of butter. These days benne dosas are cooked in Amul butter and are served with even more butter on top.

 

   The Donne Biryani story is a little more complex. There is no one single point of origin and the name is no help. Donne refers to the cups made from dried palm leaves in which street vendors often serve the biryani. As Praveen Anand points out such leaf-cups are used all over South India and are not restricted to this biryani.

 

   In most respects Karnataka’s Donne Biryani is not terribly different from other South Indian biryanis. It uses small grain rice not basmati and has none of the northern touches like saffron, or claims about layering and dum cooking.

 

   It may be a rice dish that is unrelated to the biryani tradition of the north (despite its current name) but as no one can point definitively to its origins we cannot be sure.

 

   Two theories are common. One is that it is a Maratha dish which Kannadigas accept with surprising equanimity unlike Tamils who get incandescent with rage when it is suggested that their sambar comes from the Marathas. If the Marathas did invent it then Donne biryani is even less likely to have a connection to the Mughal biryani tradition.

 

   A second theory is that it was the food of armies because it is often associated with the restaurants which are called military hotels in Karnataka, one or two of which even claim to have originated it.

 

   Either story (or both) may or may not be true but as Chef Naren points out, what makes it special is the spice mix (including mint) which gives it a green colour. Even Praveen Anand agrees when the biryani is cooked properly the spices give it ‘a fantastic flavour.’

 

   Apparently you can make a Donne biryani with meat or chicken but I have always had the version made with Bannur lamb. In my wilder moments I even think of the whole biryani as being no more than a vehicle to convey the brilliance of the lamb.

 

   Bannur is a district in Karnataka and its characteristic sheep are small and white with brown faces and long droopy ears. Their meat is terrific, perhaps the best lamb in India and is much prized by great chefs like Naren.

 

   In an ideal world all Donne biryani would be made with Bannur lamb but because the meat is so expensive it is normal to find chicken and goat biryani. A lot of people enjoy these versions but if you are going to give in to food snobbery then Bannur lamb is a must.

 

   Better still: forget about the snobbery and just enjoy the dishes.