Chef Manav Tuli, Chaat
“My dad has always been fond of great food. He always described his love for food with this quote: ‘Most people eat to live, but there are few who live to eat; they are the ones who are in real love with food.’ That has always stuck with me.”
That unadulterated passion runs through the veins of father and son. Manav Tuli, the Chef de Cuisine of one Michelin-starred Chaat, only the second Indian restaurant in Hong Kong to achieve that status, remembers tagging alongside dad from one bustling market to the next in search of the best atom bomb chaats (his father’s favourite, and the “big brother” of Tuli’s own iteration Raj Kachori at Chaat), and being welcomed by his father’s freshly packed samosas and jalebis straight out of the frying pan every time he returned home.
Then, there was travelling around India as a young family whenever his father received an allowance, which opened the young Tuli’s eyes to faraway regions and flavours that fuelled his admiration for Indian cuisine’s extraordinary depth and diversity.
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“[To this day] my dad still remembers the goat’s milk paneer pakoda we had when we first went to Dalhousie when I was eight, or that whenever we went to Punjab he would have the malai doodh (saffron milk with cream) at Katra,” recalls Tuli. “He would plan and re-plan the itinerary to fit in so many food places, everyone would tease: we are visiting a new place and see new things, not just to eat food!”
Decades later, Tuli is now eager to pass that same love for his culinary heritage to his daughter, especially, he explains, as a non-resident Indian.
“I feel that myself and all Indian parents have a moral responsibility to teach their children the magic diversity plays in India, and to show them the cultural differences that define various festivals and food habits of people. With one of the oldest recorded histories, it’s a lot to take in, but the more we share the more they know our origins and evolution. If not, all of these foods, recipes, histories and traditions will be lost in time.”
What certainly won’t be lost are invaluable life lessons gleaned from his father, who migrated after the 1947 Partition of India and went days as a child without enough to eat (“So he says, now that I can, I will eat the food I love until my heart has been satisfied.”).
“He is one of the greatest inspirations of my life. He started from very humble beginnings and worked his way up just so his family would have a better life. He always told my sister and I growing up: There’s no substitute for hard work, and hard work done with good intent never, ever goes to waste. I really took this to heart. I was not one of the brightest in my class, but I was never shy of hard work.”
Jayson Tang, Man Ho Chinese Restaurant
From when he was 10, the young Jayson Tang could often be found toiling away at his parents’ dai pai dong street food stall – scrubbing dishes, bringing sandwiches and milk tea to customers and, when he was older, preparing ingredients.“At 15, I told my parents I wanted to be a cook. So every day from 8am to 5pm I attended the Chinese Culinary Institute, then after school I prepared hotpot ingredients until 11pm. I did not sleep much and had to clean two big bags of chicken intestines and cut up small fish before making thousands of fish balls, shrimp balls and beef balls. I wouldn’t call those days a fond memory,” Tang jokes. “But they indeed influenced my career a lot.”
Tang credits his dad for teaching him about the food business as well as gritty work ethic, a quality that certainly helped propel the 37-year-old Executive Chinese Chef at JW Marriott Hotel Hong Kong’s Man Ho Chinese Restaurant to become one of the youngest to helm a Michelin-starred establishment.
“My father’s pursuit of food quality, even though he did not own a fine dining restaurant, rubbed off on me as a chef now. If the ingredients from suppliers were not up to scratch, my father would rather just return the meat or vegetables and stop offering the dishes made with those ingredients, than sacrificing the quality. I have learnt that quality control of every dish is non-negotiable.”
Superior ingredients are on show in dishes like the braised South African dried abalone with goose web, tiger prawn with cognac and deep-fried lobster claw with shrimp mousse – all found on this year’s Father’s Day menu – yet nostalgic flavours from Tang’s childhood make an appearance too. Take the crowd-favourite fried flat rice noodles with sliced beef tenderloin, inspired by the Hong Kong-style stir-fried macaroni and beef he saw served piping hot and full of wok hei at his family’s dai pai dong.
And in the Tang household, food continues to be the glue that binds generations, which now includes Tang’s two children. “Now that I’m a father myself, I’m glad my kids love to eat. Even though I am busy at work, I spend time having meals with my kids and they are always excited about food and creating joyful memories together.”
Angelo Agliano, Tosca di Angelo
Sicily-born Angelo Agliano still remembers a particularly herculean 80kg swordfish – one of the largest his fisherman father ever caught. “I was 12 years old. You know the impressive way the fish came up with the sword and how dangerous that was? My father kept me inside the cabin to protect me, but I peeked out from the corner,” he recounts with a glimmer in his eye.With both his parents’ families coming from the fishing trade, there was no escaping the magnetic pull “in his DNA” the 47-year-old Director of one Michelin-starred Tosca di Angelo always felt towards the deep blue sea. Even today, it’s where he turns to, trading the Mediterranean coasts for vistas of the Victoria Harbour enjoyed from atop the Ritz Carlton Hong Kong, when in need of a dose of inspiration conjuring a new menu.
It makes sense; the water gifted Agliano his most special memories with his father and wisdom carried through all these decades. “When I was 4 or 5 I would cry and wake everyone up in the house because I couldn’t follow my father when he left at 4 in the morning to fish; he always worked double or triple [shifts] to support the family so my sisters and I wanted for nothing. On weekends, it gave me happiness just to be with him on a boat. We were forced to be patient – waiting and waiting for something to happen. His patience always impressed me.”
The lesson the chef will “keep with me forever”, however, was his father’s unwavering reverence for nature: he would never kill for the sake of killing, nor take back to shore more than what was needed, and fish was always killed in a specific way to minimise suffering. Today, in Agliano’s own kitchen, respect is the modus operandi extended to every single product, upheld even in the tiniest tasks like “properly” peeling an onion or cleaning asparagus.
“Vegetable, fish, meat, whatever it is – I think about the people who got the product. Someone woke up early in the morning or late at night to get this product for us,” says Agliano.
Nature’s treasures shine through in Agliano’s creations at Tosca di Angelo. A showstopper is the Red Star Grouper, featuring fresh local fish similarly caught from nearby waters, elevated with an abundance of oregano, peppers and green olives. Faithful to the original recipe, Sicily’s soulful essence and his family’s cooking techniques, Agliano calls the dish “a combination of memories”.
These days, Agliano finds himself a father figure to a new generation of chefs, just like the great Joel Robuchon (under whom he spent 8 years training) was to him. To these “younger sons”, the chef hopes that respect for nature as well as the heart and humanity behind the profession will never be forgotten. “I talk to a lot of young people to get this message across before it’s too late; I hope they understand how beautiful and unique it is, that through our jobs, we are able to give happiness to people.”
Happiness, for Agliano this summer, will be returning home and chartering the same boat his father used to fish in that Agliano now keeps. He will also be cooking for his father. “My father was the first fan I ever had in the world, for sure. He is 81 now so he doesn’t go fishing alone anymore; he is waiting for me to go with him. It’s really exciting that so soon we will go fishing on the boat together again.”
