"Bombay is where you can get absolutely everything in terms of Indian cooking," says Sydney-based chef .
Roadside vendors charring northern-style kebabs, carts fragrant with roasted peanuts or fried potatoes, sellers offering and from India's south, and Indian-Chinese menus presenting triple Schezwan fried rice, packed with fried noodles, rice grains and gravy – you'll find all this and much, much more in the city that officially became in 1995.
"It's a pretty fun place to grow up," says Dsouza, who taps into these memories for , his new pop-up restaurant located at Hartsyard's former site in inner-west Newtown.
If there's a dish that rules the streets of Mumbai, it's probably the . "You'll have at least five a week," he says. "If you asked anyone from Mumbai, 'have you had a vada pav?', they'd say, '100 per cent'. It's a rite of passage."
Also known as the Mumbai burger, it's been called "India's favourite fast food" by , and was invented by street vendor to feed the many mill workers that passed by his stall at in the city's south.
"You can probably finish it in three bites if you're hungry," Dsouza says of the slider-sized snack. At its simplest, it's a potato fritter in a soft bun that you customise with various chutneys. If you like it sweeter, ask for more tamarind chutney. For a more garlic-charged taste, dial up the . Want a bit of firepower? Bring on the green chilli chutney.
"Tell them whether you want it spicy or sweet, and accordingly they put the chutneys," he says. "So no two vada pavs will ever taste the same."
It's an experience that the chef evokes with his 'Zucchini Flower A La Bombay' appetiser at Irene's Enmore. Here, the Mumbai burger gets a spring makeover and a zucchini flower silhouette. Its petals hide a jackpot of mashed roasted potato, spiced with black mustard seeds and turmeric. This deep-fried and panko-crusted parcel is then served on a mint-coriander mayonnaise that recalls the green chutney you'd get with vada pav.
The chef admits he was surprised by the success of his experiment – and the praise it's scored from diners.
"This is actually tasty," he says. "People are not lying about it."
You can probably finish it in three bites if you're hungry.
Irene's Enmore is named after his aunt in Mumbai, but she's not the only person who inspired the restaurant. "My aunt's the reason I'm cooking, but my grandmother also played an important role," he says. "She was like a second mum to me."
She looked after him while his mother was working and he learnt a lot about food from her. She'd serve him "soupy" two-minute noodles charged with masala, and tangy fermented-rice dosas paired with green coconut chutney. "I've been making them at work – it goes with the goat curry, these fermented-rice dosas," he says.
"My grandmother used to cook for my grandfather until the day he died. He was like 86," he says. "After the day he died, she just stopped cooking."
So now their roles are reversed when Dsouza returns to India. "She expects me to cook for her, even though she can't eat much," he says.
The generous Sunday feasts his aunt Irene regularly staged at her Mumbai apartment is a big influence on this Sydney restaurant. She'd welcome everyone over – family and friends – and there was no shortage of food, even if 20 people were crowded into her home.
"We'd have something called sannas, which are steamed rice cakes," he says. There were also dosas, salads, a mountain of rice and three kinds of curry: a dried chicken version, a pork sorpotel ("it's like death-metal vindaloo," he says, "it's thickened with the blood of the pig") and a curry rich with goat.
"I've eaten that so many times," Dsouza says, referring to the goat curry he first enjoyed two decades ago. "It's still the most flavourful thing I've ever eaten. It also takes me back to a time I don't want to forget."
It also takes me back to a time I don't want to forget.
At first, his aunt's goat curry wasn't going to appear at his restaurant. "I thought I'd just do my food," he says, referring to the zucchini flower appetiser, tamarind-glazed chicken, cucumbers with Kashmiri chilli and mango dessert spiced with chipotle oil he's created for the venue. But then he realised something was missing. "I have to her curry recipe on the menu. I had to."
He eventually found a hand-written version that had been passed on from her daughter. "I'd never made it before," the chef says. Dsouza put the curry on the menu anyway – and didn't attempt it until just before the restaurant opened. The smell of the spiced coconut transported him back in time, back to her apartment, back to his childhood.
"My first memory of my aunt was eating her curry," he says.
Dsouza credits Irene for his cooking career. The chef remembers when she was battling cancer for the fourth time.
"She was in a bedridden state and I had just started culinary school," he says. After learning that Dsouza had just made shepherd's pie, she requested he make her one.
"She had seven tumours at this stage. One of her tumours was in her brain. She was in and out [of consciousness, but] she was serious about me making shepherd's pie." So he found the ingredients and prepared the dish for her.
"She says, 'this is the best shepherd's pie I've ever eaten.' And she'd probably eaten two shepherd's pies in her life," he says. "That moment I consider to be a very life-changing experience. I know it's a bit dramatic, but for me it's very emotional."
He credits this moment with his late aunt for cementing his decision to become a chef.
Since arriving in Australia eight years ago, Dsouza has cooked at a variety of venues, from the former home of Banjo Patterson to acclaimed kitchens, such as , and . He remembers being asked to fill in at hatted restaurant for one short-staffed weekend. "And that weekend went on for four years," he says.
While his time here has influenced his restaurant menu, his Mumbai memories still shape what he's cooking.
This is like a candy store.
See the 'fruit salad' at Irene's Enmore, a description that undersells what actually comes out when you order the dessert. It's a : a large sundae glass jumbled with nutmeg custard, berry jelly, candied fennel seeds, bloomed nigella seeds soaked in rose water, sliced apples, bananas and more.
"This is like a candy store," Dsouza says. It's also a portal back to those Sunday feasts, and how he'd push through his full-with-curry status to enjoy the custard, jelly and fruit his aunt would portion out. The dessert at his restaurant is a next-level version of that memory.
"There's a lot of happiness in that small cup – well, it's not a small cup actually. It's pretty big. It's a massive cup," Dsouza says.
And even if falooda wasnt something you grew up with, its lottery of sweet flavours is bound to resonate.
"This is just everyone's childhood, no matter where you come from," he says.
33 Enmore Road, Newtown
Thursday: 6pm-10pm
Friday–Sun: 5pm–late
Monday: 6pm–10pm
