Allen & Unwin - NZ$35, A$27.99
Paperback - 336 pages
It was reviewed in the New Zealand Herald by Kerri Jackson on 17 January:
I picked up this book based on the cover recommendation by travelling gastronome Anthony Bourdain: "Outstanding! Easily the best novel set in in the world of cooking ever. Absolutely thrilling from beginning to end."
As it turns out, that is a bit of an exaggeration. But had he said "some of the most mouth-watering descriptions of food ever written" he'd have been closer to the truth.
Morais, a long-time writer for Forbes magazine, begins his first novel in India where young Hassan Haji grows up in and around his family's modest but successful restaurant in Mumbai. When tragedy strikes, this colourful, rowdy family uproots and moves, first to England and then on, nomadically, through Europe to finally settle in the small French village of Lumiere.
There they take take up residence across the road from revered French chef Madame Mallory and her double-Michelin starred restaurant. To Mallory's horror, the family immediately opens a "cheap and cheerful" Indian restaurant, which soon finds fans among the locals.
The outraged master chef's attempts to outwit and thwart the Haji family's business and place in the village knows no bounds until, after another near-tragedy, she is forced to accept that young Hassan is that rarest of things - a chef who is born, not made.
Morais' knowledge of food and cooking, as well as the cut and thrust of restaurant life, is vast and he brings it to the reader in full technicolour, all dusted with a pinch of nostalgia and yearning for home.
The pages particularly come alive when he is describing Hassan's life in India with a devoted mother and a larger-than-life father.
You can practically smell the spices in the air and taste the incredible-sounding food.
Read Kerri Jackson's full review at New Zealand Herald.
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