By Tara Narayan

IF YOU haven’t discovered the legendary restaurant of O’Coqueiro yet you have missed out on something! You can’t miss it. It’s right there flush on the highway to Mapusa at Porvorim …a single line of golden bulbs running around the twin-bungalow complex of Portuguese vintage. Low and inviting, it has a cool open courtyard set within and set off by this beautiful frangipani tree…I always want to sit at the table near the tree naturally! For this is the original frangipani of clusters of lush white blooms with scented yellow centres, a fragrance to fill the senses, it’s also the pagoda or temple tree and the Chinese see it as a "tree of immortality".

I’m very fond of O’Coqueiro for old and new times sake. Discovered it a long time ago in the early 1980s when the late Gines Viegas turned it into a cause celebre of a Goan food restaurant…now it’s owned by entrepreneurial Anil Counto who’s restored the complex and given it a fresh lease of life, also a free hand to Chef Peter Fernandes to continue with the restaurant’s famed traditional Goan Portuguese cuisine. They were celebrating some French occasion there and the hubby - who can’t tell fois gras from truffles or oioli from croissants (no, no, that’s not true, I’ve already introduced to him to the best croissants of Goa at Lila Café (Baga) some time ago!) said, "I’m taking you for a romantic French meal, come on!"

A pity that it wasn’t quite a week-long French food festival but Chef Peter had put out a menu listing some French temptations for the who’s who of Goa; there’re quite a few high priests and high priestesses of the French language, French cuisine, French haute couture and quite a few social celebrations for Goan French aficionados now! What did you cook? I asked Chef Peter a day later and he said, come and see, they’re still doing the menu. The weekend evenings can be quite pleasant out at the O’Coqueiro courtyard and I met up with young Sushant Sanzgiri who’s a chef out at the Hilton in London…the Sanzgiri family of Sailesh (works for Mr. Anil Counto), Lakshmi (works with a housekeeping agency) and son Sushant are friends, and I asked Sushant if he was having fun in London.

He grinned, Yeah, the pubs in London are becoming gastronomic pubs serving better and better food and amongst other things he’s been catching up with a platter of kangaroo, crocodile and ostrich meat served at an Australian restaurant called "Naked Turtle" - priced at a hundred English pounds! It’s all part of the experience and business of discovering new food, he said. He’s also worked for culinary maestro Gordon Ramsay who cooked for Nelson Mandela on his 90th birthday…now, he’s with the Hilton though, there’re two Hiltons in Delhi and one may come up in Goa some time soon.

Sushant’s loves his holidays back in Goa. He tells me that French cooking is really about sauces and if one is interested in cooking French one must first become a master or mistress of sauces. The French menu card propped up on every table listed a table d’hote menu priced at Rs.350, VAT included. The menu: Crème d’Asperges (or cream of asparagus soup) or Tomatoes a la Provencale (grilled tomato Provencale-style) or Salade Nicoise (Mediterranean salad)…Coq au Vin (braised chicken cooked with wine) or Poisson Grille Beurre Blanc (grilled fish fillet with white butter sauce), Pommes Dauphinoise (scalloped potatoes with cheese), rice pilaf, salad vert, and for dessert crème brulee or mousse au chocolat, and salade de fruits frais…fresh fruit salad, except that I think it’s always better to start rather than end a meal with a fruit or veggie salad! In urban India we haven’t caught up with the sensibility of eating au naturale yet!

French cuisine is considered as the crème de la crème of all European cuisines (although I don’t know why… I prefer Italian, Spanish, Greek food which has a lot of comfort to offer!) and a lot of effort goes into fine presentations. It takes an experienced chef to turn out soups, seafood and meat dishes, without smothering them in oodles of butter or cheesy sauces. But this is to say I enjoyed my Poisson Grille Beurre Blanc and the hubby enjoyed his Pommes Dauphinoise and Mousse au Chocolat!

Actually, an occasional European menu makes for a refreshing and welcome change from our masala-laden Indian cuisines. Hey, Chef Peter! It’s a good idea to standardise and offer a French menu occasionally at O’Coqueiro as an option on the main menu!