Spice apart

"I am convinced my parents used to put masala in my baby formula to add flavor! Naturally I favor dishes full of spices,” jested Jimmy Seervai, among the 16 finalists vying for the MasterChef Australia title. About 1.5 million Australians have been watching this culinary MasterChef program on Channel-10 TV six days a week for the last few weeks.

"I have a bold aim and am determined that my hot Indian cooking will influence the notoriously chilli-shy judge George Calom­baris into adding a spicy Parsi curry in one of his Greek restaurants! I really wanted to work his taste buds,” mentions Seervai who describes himself as "the clown of the pack,” reverting to Parsi humor to cope with stressful situations. "Life is about having fun and I won’t forget that in this competition,” he states.

The 8,000 cooking enthusiasts who auditioned for this competition were whittled down to 50, then 24, and eventually 16. Seervai has wowed the judges — Gary Mehigan, Calombaris and Matt Preston — so far with his spicy and elegantly presented dishes and remains in this elite group of top 16. It is exciting to watch his sensational culinary creations — a spicy Parsi crab curry, prawn patio, goat vindaloo, French dishes and Japanese delicacies. After 10 gruelling weeks of cooking challenges, one person will eventually be named as Australia’s new MasterChef, winning a huge amount of prize money and gaining national renown and publicity.

Jimmy Seer-vai: culinary challenges

The 32-year-old chef was born in India and now resides in Sydney. His father Mehernosh, endearingly called Manny, owned a popular spice shop in Sydney and people flocked there not only to buy spices but also to obtain juicy recipes from his wife Christine who is a wonderful cook herself and generously helped interested customers. Manny now prepares his own brand of masalas, attractively bottles them and sells them in spice shops around Australia. Very popular with the Aussie buyers are his dried dhansak spices as also his green masala, other delectable pastes and the incomparable peri-peri which only he can conjure up. As a young lad Jimmy loved helping his parents at their family spice shop, learning and appreciating the spicy condiments. It is only natural that his love of spices led to his career as a food ingredient researcher.

Having been overweight since his childhood, he lost 60 kg about six years ago. After losing that weight "I’ve never looked back,” he says proudly. Engaged to Jem for over five years, their wedding has been put on hold to allow him to concentrate on the competition. "I drive her nuts with my cooking talk. But she is actually the one who recommended that I enter MasterChef,” he clarifies. "I do all the cooking at home and I know she wants me to come back with a whole stack of new recipes.”

Realizing that he needed to broaden his culinary horizons before MasterChef Jimmy turned to Jem’s family for help. "Jem’s mum spent time helping me with cakes and soufflés and other western dishes you don’t find in Indian cooking. Plus I remember all of my mum’s tips because she is the best cook...

"I’d like to set up educational classes for kids to get them to appreciate sweet, sour and salty notes in food,” he states. "It would broaden their palates. Flavors are like languages, that is why people eat things that they did when they were kids because it reminds them of happy times and memories.” Whether he wins or loses in this prestigious competition, his long-term goal is to write a cookbook and open a restaurant in Sydney.

Kersi Meher-Homji