Adenwalla’s bill of fare

The sweet and the savory have been her forte for decades. "I am in the process of relocating to a new kitchen which will be centrally located between Opera House and Pedder Road. In terms of volume, it will allow me to do different areas related to cooking such as catering, desserts, food hampers, wedding and children’s cakes which we have not been doing a lot of, as well as add tableware to gift food,” says Shireen Adenwalla who has been catering under the name Truffles for 22 years. "And at the moment I’m going nuts!”

Adenwalla caters for up to 100 persons, for children’s parties, salad bars, dessert bars and gift packaging of food. "Being self-taught, I have a repertoire different from the normal catering college or cookery school repertoire. My menus are constantly changing every three to four months,” she says. Her new palate pleasers include goat’s cheese and pepper terrine, roast turkey breast with blueberry balsam sauce, honey pepper ham with raspberry pepper sauce, basil dressed melon and proscuitto salad with orange mascarpone dressing, chilly barbeque chicken bites with white barbeque sauce and more. Upside down strawberry cupcakes, Oreo and whisky trifle, chocolate torte with strawberry balsamic preserves, three-colored frangelico chocolate mousse gateau with ferrerro are some of her new sweet confections.

Shireen Adenwalla (left) and her delicacies: (clockwise) wedding cake, cupcakes and mille-feuille

Adenwalla attributes her fascination with food to her genes. Her grandmother Silloo Nariman owned a confectionery store in the building they reside in at Marine Lines and the aroma of baking wafting around the house is among her strongest childhood memories! Her schoolgirl hobby turned into a profession with the encouragement of her family. She tried her hand at savory tarts, brownies, cakes and other sweets, serving them to her mother Khatu and her mahjong-playing friends at their weekly meetings. Early experimentation resulted in successes, a few failures, all seasoned with loads of experience. Her first order was an orange cheesecake — price Rs 30, loss Rs 70! Initially she specialized in cakes and desserts and moved on to making different kinds of food — hors d’ouvres, canapés and starters, salad bars, entrée selections… From a single dish to an entire buffet, Adenwalla offers cuisines Continental, Oriental, Indian, Parsi and fusion. She has also done a food festival of her own signature dishes a few years ago at The Novotel Bangkok.

As far as sourcing is considered, Adenwalla is in food control! Vegetables and fruit are bought from the main market, as supermarkets are not for these, she asserts. Fish, meat and poultry are from selected suppliers, cheeses and specialty meats directly from importers. Her team of trained helpers enables her to take large orders. Work overload can never mean compromising on quality and the personal touch, she believes. Adenwalla can be contacted on 9820058792. Her new website (shirinadenwalla.com) is under construction and will soon be activated, she says.