From Instagram @the FinelyChopped 24/3/25
I had an amazing Awadhi meal cooked by Sameer Sewak this afternoon.
We had first connected years back through Twitter. His handle is @naa_cheese This is a play on the Lucknowi self deprecatory way of referring to oneself as na cheez (insignificant, unimportant). He didn’t post much about food back then. Light hearted humour was his thing.
One day he tweeted saying that he was going to the Canada to train to be a pilot.
Sameer resurfaced after a while and tweeted that he had moved to Dehradun to join his parents who had settled there. He had finished his training and was a qualified pilot.
The COVID 19 pandemic broke out soon after. Sameer began to put up pictures of delicious looking food that he had cooked. Turned out that he had become a home chef specialising in Awadhi food! The last thing you would expect a pilot to do, but stranger things had happened during that period. Still, imagine being on a flight where the pilot announces, ‘don’t eat the crappy food being served. I am making biryani and kebabs and will bring it to you while we fly over Lucknow which will be on your left.’
What started off as a lark, became a hit and orders poured in. Sameer decided to slow down and look for a bigger kitchen so that he could service the demand.
Sameer stays in a beautiful bungalow called Lal Kothi. It is located in a scenic place which is half an hour’s drive from Dehradun on the way to Mussoorie. He has converted the upper floor into a home stay.
I went to Dehradun the day before. I had been invited to be a speaker at the first Dehradun Food Literature Festival. Sameer was part of the organising committee and was moderating a panel. That’s where we met in person for the first time after being ‘Twitter friends’ for years.
I stayed back for a day after the festival to go to Landour. Sameer invited me to have lunch at his place which was on the road to Landour.
My fellow guests were food writer Sourish Bhattacharya and food blogger Pawan Soni, who had were planelists at the festival too.
Sameer had cooked delectable mutton shammi kebabs, piping hot puris, sensuous mutton qorma, rather poetic mutton Yakhni pulao, ‘surprisingly’ nice kathal shammi kebab and gajar ka halwa for us.
The shammi was near galawat kebab- life soft; without being as oily. It had lightly fried finely chopped onions in it which added a lovely bite to the soft kebabs.
The mutton in the qorma was very tender. The gravy was thick and flavourful, but neither spicy nor oily. I paired it with the puri to partially recreate a Bengali luchi kosha mangsho- like experience.
The mutton in the biryani was tultule (Bengali for tender). The rice, as Sameer promised it would be, was so melodiously flavoured that one could have it by itself. I would have packed some for home if it was possible.
I over-ate even though I was headed to Landour after lunch. Landour is located further up in the hills. I had been warned by my friends in Dehradun to go easy on the food as travelling up on a full stomach could cause motion sickness.
The food was too good to do so. I threw caution to the wind and took seconds, thirds and fourths of everything.
I survived the ride without throwing up, in case you were wondering.
You can connect with Lal Kothi here.
Sitting under crisp, blue skies, surrounded by the hills, gossiping (yes, boys can gossip too), meeting his parents, playing with his dog, Lisa, inhaling the grand meal….it was the recipe for an idyllic couple of hours, far from the madding crowd.
(Home chef, pulao, Awadhi food, shammi kebab, pulao, mutton, dog person)
