Mahomed not only opened London's first Indian restaurant, he did business with royalty, was the first Indian author published in English, and popularised the practice of shampooing across the continent.Īfter reading about his remarkable life this year, I decided to follow Mahomed’s trail. That description, in itself, is an inadequate one for Sake Dean Mahomed, a Muslim who left a sizeable imprint on Europe in the late 1700s to mid-1800s.Ī plaque marks the site of London's first Indian restaurant, opened by Mahomed. It seemed like such an insignificant tribute for the man who pioneered Indian cuisine in the capital. Which is why I was not impressed by the small plaque I found in central London in September. Indian food is so intrinsically linked to London that, each October, the city celebrates Curry Week. Not only is it enormously popular, with more than 100 Indian restaurants across the English capital, but this Asian cuisine represents the wide spectrum of influences in one of the world’s most ethnically diverse cities. After high tea, the cuisine most embedded in London’s identity may well be Indian food.
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