Delhi’s Hippest New Restaurant to be Steered by Masterchef South Africa Contestant

By Sourish Bhattacharyya

THE NEXT chef in the city who’ll surely have the women eating out of his hands (and maybe land a couple of Bollywood roles) is the South African Guy Clark, a former property broker who was unanimously voted the ‘cutest’ contestant and '

Guy Clark, seen at the first season of Masterchef South
Africa, has cooked for Analjit Singh and is now opening
the Uzuri restaurant at the M-Block Market, Greater
Kailash-II, New Delhi. (As seen on vimeo.com)

Mr Nice Guy' in the first season of Masterchef South Africa last year. Since then, he has had a busy, busy year, which took off when he cooked for Max Healthcare founder-chairman Analjit Singh at Franschhoek, a small town in the Western Cape Province that is today South Africa’s most sought-after residential addresses studded with wineries and chic restaurants.

Singh was so impressed with Clark that he got him over to New Delhi to redesign his private kitchens and then cook at his daughter Tara’s A-List wedding this year whose high point was a performance by pop and R&B star Lionel Ritchie that left the privileged invitees dancing ‘All Night Long’. One thing led to another and now Clark, who stood 11th in the first season of Masterchef South Africa and got eliminated because his soufflé wasn’t right, is busy with the pre-opening rituals of what promises to be Delhi’s hippest new restaurant, Uzuri (the word means ‘goodness’ in Swahili), which will serve up ‘European food with a touch of Africa’ at the M-Block Market, Greater Kailash-II. And yes, there will be the famous bunny chow, or hollowed-out loaf of bread filled with curry, a Durban Indian invention which at the moment is being served only in Kush Nagrath’s Firefly bar at New Friends Colony.

Leading the show with Clark in the kitchen is a young man named Rishim Sachdeva, who was a sous chef at Heston Blumenthal’s celebrated Fat Duck restaurant. My source, the man about town and (when he’s not being one) management consultant Shaun Lobo, who attended one of the trial dinners on Saturday night, said the duo cooked up quite a memorable meal. “Delhiites are looking for something new and South Africa is a sought-after destination,” Clark was quoted by the South African publication, Weekend Argus, as saying. “Delhi is all about the bling. This is the first African-European fusion restaurant in India.”

Clark, who started cooking when he was 14 to impress his then girlfriend, had said in the Weekend Argus interview that he’s in a “serious relationship with food right now”. We’ll get to sample it very soon when Uzuri opens its door.