Mohammad Islam would make a first-rate mother. The executive chef of the Capital Club (which as the name suggests is a rather exclusive club for the rich and famous in Dubai) keeps telling us about the ingredients he's using in his seared tuna salad (a name he makes up on the spur of the moment when I ask him what it's called!), and also urging us to taste it even as he's preparing it. "Try these," he urges us in his gentle soothing baritone, handing a small bowl of candied ginger. "I made these myself." It tastes delicious, and from that moment we are slaves to Islam's cooking.
A passion for cooking
Like a doting mother he keeps describing the ingredients of each dish he's preparing in the kitchen, coaxing us to taste them all. "See these mangoes, strawberries and passion fruit?" he says, never missing a beat with his preparation of the second dish of the day - a very succulent-looking fruit salad. "I bought them from the market yesterday, they are fresh." And then the words we will come to associate with Islam in future: "Try some." He's always urging you, very gently, yet persuasively to try some.
Yet, there's no let up in his preparation. His moves are those of a trained ballet dancer, precise and graceful. There are no flourishes, no fanfare.
Which can very well describe his cooking too. His tuna salad, has just pieces of tuna over-laid with hikma (radish) and garnished with cumin-infused citrus fruit, candied ginger and ponzu sauce. It tastes out of this world.
The way he slits the strawberry is pure art; he scoops out the flesh of the passion fruit on top of it, adds a sprig of pomegranate, and tops it off with cherry syrup dripping from it artistically. You don't feel like digging into it and spoiling the pretty picture. And yet you can't resist it.
From IT to high tea
After seeing him cook up to three delicious dishes in half an hour it's hard to believe that Islam first trained to be a computer engineer in the US. A Bangladeshi immigrant, Islam moved to Chicago in 1986 when he was 17 to attend college. "I was very bad at it," he confesses. "So I took a year off to see what I wanted to do. I took off to Montana." After the soul-searching trip, he decided to do "what I liked to do." The question was, what? He had been cooking at home, but it took him about two and a half years to find out that's what he wanted to do in life. And then began the grind. "When I decided I wanted to be a cook, I applied to three schools," says Islam. "I wanted to join a school in Switzerland, but most students in that school tended to be around 17 years of age. I was already 24. It also cost almost $150,000 in fees. I didn't have that kind of money, so I figured I would work for people in the business. I apprenticed in many different places such as Europe, and for a few chefs in Chicago. For a while I was in France, and then came back to New York."
What is remarkable about Islam's cooking is his experimentation with styles as well as ingredients. "My experimenting depends on the quality of the produce I am working with," he reveals. "The other thing of course are my taste buds, how the marriage between a few components works. I don't put too many things in my dishes - usually not more than five or six ingredients. I believe that if you layer too many flavours then you don't taste anything. I like my customers to taste everything that I put into my dishes. Nothing's superfluous."
Experimentation matters
What he does experiment with are the ingredients. "The ingredients can be rather challenging," he says. "You can get meat and fish anywhere. Even on an island I can get overnight the best meat and fish in the world. The biggest challenge is produce. Produce is like the colour that you use in your painting. With quality produce you can create many things, the possibilities are endless."
He is a minimalist in that sense. "I believe that if you have great produce you really don't need to do much [with the dish]. That's half the battle won. Just cook it right and serve."
He calls his cuisine contemporary American, but a lot of it is inspired by his mother's cooking. Ask him for his most commonly used ingredient and you'll know the roots of his cuisine. "My most favourite ingredient? Tough to choose, as I use so many things. From my Bangladeshi background, I love cumin and ginger. These are the two basic ingredients I tend to use in most dishes. I love ginger, lemon grass and galangal (blue ginger). Yes, I do tend to lean towards my Eastern influences for the flavours."
Closer to the goal
He looks very laid-back, but obviously looks are deceptive. He has his own restaurant in Chicago called Aigre Doux (which means sweet and sour in French). "It doesn't always depend on the car," he grins. "A lot also depends on the driver. I do have an ambition, and a goal to achieve. I want to achieve certain things within a certain period. I believe in learning, and I spent 27 years of my life in the US, and have been travelling to the Middle East, India and China for the last six years. I am fascinated by the cuisine in these parts. I believe that I will learn a lot more here. I also want to give back something - my knowledge."
For a boy who came from a privileged Bangladeshi family, Islam is remarkably down to earth. "When I told my dad I wanted to be a cook, he said, ‘Khansama (cook in Urdu)? You can have one'!" he grins. "I had to convince him, as my parents are old school. For them, if you don't study to be a doctor or an engineer you are not too smart. They still tell me I can always go back to engineering so that I have something to fall back on! But now they feel good about my success. They even love my cooking!"
What keeps him inspired is the learning part.
"I travel a lot - just last month I was in Singapore and I was in and out of restaurant kitchens and learnt so much from them. It's the learning experience that keeps me going."
Promoting local produce
The secret to his cooking is locally-grown produce. In the UAE that is minimal but Islam still manages to get some in.
"I use a lot of the locally grown pomegranates," he explains. "I also love the local peaches and dates. During winter locally-grown vegetables are available and we tend to use them a lot. I believe in helping the local growers. I have my own small garden where I grow the herbs we require. I am also looking at a bit of land here on which I plan to set up my own organic farm. I am talking to an Australian expert for this."
For all his experimenting with cuisines and styles, Islam does not believe in tampering with classic food. "I think the classic food should always remain classic," he demurs. "I wouldn't want to experiment with them. It shouldn't disappear. For example, [Bangladeshis] they have this dish called pitha which they eat in winter which has almost completely disappeared from there. It is a kind of cuisine, 30 varieties of dishes that has slowly disappeared. So when I visited Bangladesh recently, I went to different areas to document the pithas they make as each area has its own version of pitha. They are delicious and it would be a shame if they were to disappear. I plan to put all the original recipes together and publish a book."
Then the caveat. "But I also feel, that people who like to experiment, like me, should use their classic knowledge to create the next generation of food. I did. I was trained in French classic cuisine for six years, and I took that knowledge and created my own style of food." Islam is also working on a book of his recipes.
What is it that stays with him after all these years? "My guru Jean-Georges-Vongerichten taught me that you eat with your eyes before you eat what's on your plate. That's something that's influenced me a lot. The food has to look good to taste good. You have to see, observe and understand before your palate is tickled."
Is it possible to visualise the flavour when conjuring up a new dish? His answer is an emphatic yes. "I tell my students it's the connection between your tongue and your brain. If you have a very sharp palate, you can reverse it and imagine what a dish will taste like just by looking at it in your mind. It's like the marriage between the julliene, and ginger and orange and hikma. You have to taste it to see which flavour dominates."
