Durban - In my food column last week I mentioned a brilliant chicken and prawn curry from Cindy’s Umhlali Fresh Produce. I wanted to treat two Australian friends to a truly authentic Durban style curry. And yes, they were suitably impressed.
This week I took a trip up the North Coast to find out more about Ballito’s best kept secret, and chatted to Cindy Valayadam, one of KZN’s true culinary stars.
Her shop is an Aladdin’s cave of culinary treats. There’s an array of fresh produce from the farm, a smallholding she and her husband Bala run. What can’t be grown at the farm is brought in from the market. There’s a range of her home-made pickles, chutneys and jams, her own ground spices and chilli powders, fresh flowers, and even fresh fish from local fisherman. And freezers full of boxes and boxes of her own samoosas. That’s before the takeaway bunnies and breyanis feature.
The Valayadams have run the shop for 43 years. “It’s a small community, and I know everyone here. That’s the best part of it,” she tells me as she greets another regular customer who pops in for samoosas. “And it’s a family business. My sisters help, my aunt helps. It’s all in the family,” she says.
They bought the shop when it was offered to them by a customer looking to retire. At the time she was working as an assistant at a pharmacy.
“It was a tiny little shop, we’ve added to it over the years,” she says. Initially the young couple worked part time and ran the shop part time. “Finally we took the plunge and things got better and better,” she says.
She introduced her cooking as her customers asked for it. “They were always asking me to make this or make that. Their support helped keep us going.”
The Valayadams are also movers and shakers behind the Ballito Farmers’ Market that opened this year. You’ll find Cindy, 75, at the market every weekend selling her range of pickles and spices, and fresh produce from the farm. That’s after a full week in the shop working from 6am to 5pm.
Cindy starts her mornings cooking in the kitchen. The staff may do a lot of the prep, but she does all the cooking herself. That’s the curries and breyanis needed for the day as well as orders that have come in from customers.
She has a team in the kitchen behind her, but the spicing is her own. She admits it’s done by feel. “Nothing is measured, it’s how I learnt to cook from my mom,” she said. “We were very poor and there were nine of us growing up on the farm, and she taught us the old way. As children, she would sit and watch us cooking on the fire. I learnt the old-fashioned way of cooking from her.”
Her mutton curry and mutton and chicken biryanis are the most popular. The chicken and prawn curry is another popular line, as is her butter chicken. Beans curry too. “Today it’s broad beans,” she says. “Sometimes it’s sugar beans.”
Cindy also makes her own curry powders which she sells in the shop. “Mom taught us how to do it. You don’t crush anything,” she says. She tells the story of a customer from Port Elizabeth who, whenever he’s in Durban, makes the trip to Umhlali and buys 5kg of her curry powder. “He says he can’t cook without it,” she laughs.
At 10am, she runs the front of the shop while Bala, 68, goes back to manage the farm. “He brings in fresh vegetables every day. The lettuce, cabbages, green beans and spinach are all from the farm. Now it’s winter, the veg is very nice,” she says.
At the farm, an 8ha plot, she also has a veritable home-industry where all the pickles and jams are made. She tells of a French customer who taught her how to make mazavaroo, a range of the Mauritian chilli condiments appearing on her shelves.
As we talk, plates of freshly fried samoosas keep coming from the kitchen, to restock those already sold.
The mother of three (one son has died), her son and daughter assist her in the shop and on the farm. Yet there’s no chance of her slowing down. “I enjoy my customers. Some come all the way from Ballito just for two samoosas. Another drives from Hillcrest for a curry order,” she says.
When she was featured on “Inside Africa” on CNN, she even had two customers from Switzerland pop in to try her food. “Initially everyone was excited because Aunty Cindy was on TV, but it was months later and just before Christmas, and the shop was so busy, that two Swiss tourists made a special visit to meet me. It was so special,” she says.
Asked what her secret is, she insists there isn’t one. “All your love goes into cooking and the food,” she says.
Cindy’s Fish and Baby Brinjal Curry.
This is one of Cindy’s favourite dishes which featured in Erica Platter’s book “Durban Curry So Much of Flavour”. It’s quick and easy to make and a great option when fresh fish is available. Her little shop has a selection of fresh fish on ice. Cindy also uses her own curry powder.
Ingredients
½ tsp mustard seeds
½ tsp jeera seeds
½ tsp fennel seeds
½ cup oil
1 tsp turmeric
2 tsp best curry powder
1 tbs ginger, grated
1 onion, diced
2 tbs tomato paste
1 tbs tamarind paste
1 cup crushed tomato
1 large sprig of curry leaves
1 large sprig of thyme
1 cinnamon stick
2 bay leaves
Baby brinjals, sliced lengthways
1kg fresh fish, sliced
Salt, pepper and sugar to taste
Method
Fry the seeds in oil until they start to pop. Stir in the turmeric, curry powder and ginger and fry for 1 minute. Add the onion and fry until soft.
Add the rest of the ingredients except the fish and seasoning, including as many baby brinjals as you prefer. Bring to a simmer.
Add fish only when the brinjals are soft and the sauce is thick and rich. Season. Cook until the fish is opaque.
Serve with rotis and rice.
The Independent on Saturday