Introduction

Kirpal Singh is on his way back to Kashmir. He has just received two important pieces of news. First, he has been hired by his former boss, the governor of Kashmir, to cater his daughter’s wedding. Secondly, he has a brain tumor that will end his life in a matter of months. Watching India slide by from his second-class train seat, Kirpal reflects on the circumstances that forced him to leave Kashmir and quit the army fourteen years ago.

Kirpal never intended to join the Indian army, but his father, a decorated major, died in a plane crash on the Siachen glacier above Kashmir, and Kirpal yearns to see his father’s frozen gravesite. He joins the kitchen of General Kumar, a powerful leader who will soon be elected governor of Kashmir. Kirpal’s mentor in the kitchen is Chef Kishen, a radical cook of all kinds of international cuisine. But the army has big plans for Kirpal, and he soon replaces Kishen as head chef. Kishen is exiled to the army base atop the Siachen glacier, where his revolutionary impulses soon come to a drastic climax.

Lonely in the picturesque valley, Kirpal finds himself falling for an enemy woman: a suspected Pakistani terrorist named Irem. When Irem disappears mysteriously, Kirpal discovers the dark underbelly of Indian politics and abruptly quits the army. Now, returning to Kashmir to cook one last meal for the state’s military elite, Kirpal will learn of Irem’s surprising fate, and face the waning days of his own life.

By turns comic and gravely poetic, Chef reveals the taste of corruption within the rich, seductive flavors of Kashmir.

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Excerpt

For a long time now I have
stayed away from certain people.
I was late getting to the station and almost missed the
Express because of the American President. His motorcade
was passing the Red Fort, not far from the railway terminal.
The President is visiting India to sign the nuclear deal. He
is staying at the Hotel Taj and the chefs at the hotel have
invented a new kebab in his honor. All this in today’s paper.
Rarely does one see the photo of a kebab on the front page.
It made my mouth water.
Not far from me, a little girl is sitting on the aisle seat.
A peach glows in her hand. Moments ago she asked her
mother, What do we miss the most when we die? And I
almost responded. But her mother put a thick fi nger on
her lips: Shh, children should not talk about death, and
she looked at me for a brief second, apologetically. Food,
I almost said to the girl. We miss peaches, strawberries,
delicacies like Sandhurst curry, kebab pasanda and rogan
josh. The dead do not eat marzipan. The smell of bakeries
torments them day and night.
Something about this exchange between mother and
daughter has upset me. I look out the window. The train is
cutting through villages. I don’t even know their names. But
the swaying yellow mustard fi elds and the growing darkness fi lls me with disquiet about the time I resigned from the
army. I fi nd myself asking the same question over and over
again. Why did I allow my life to take a wrong turn?
Fourteen years ago I used to work as chef at the General’s
residence in Kashmir. I remember the fruit orchard by the
kitchen window. For fi ve straight years I cooked for him in
that kitchen, then suddenly handed in my resignation and
moved to Delhi. I never married. I cook for my mother. Now
after a span of fourteen years I am returning to Kashmir.
It is not that in all these years I was not tempted to return.
The temptation was at times intense, especially when I heard
about the quake and the rubble it left behind. But the earth
shook mostly on the enemy side. During my fi ve years of service
I was confi ned to the Indian side – the more beautiful side.
The beauty is still embedded in my brain. It is the kind that
cannot be shared with others. Most important things in our
lives, like recipes, cannot be shared. They remain within us
with a dash of this and a whiff of that and trouble our bones.
The tumor is in your brain, said the specialist. (Last week
exactly at three o’clock my CAT scan results came back to
the clinic. The dark scan looked quite something inside that
box of bright light.) His fi nger pointed towards an area which
resembled a patch of snow, and next to it was a horrifying
shape like the dark rings of a tree. Three months to a year
maximum, he said. Suddenly I felt very weak and dizzy. My
voice disintegrated. The world around me started withering.
I walked the crowded street back home. Cutting through
my own cloud, stepping through the fog. My mother
greeted me at the door. She knew. My mother already
knew. She (who cooked every meal for me when I was
young) knew what I did not know myself. She handed me
a letter, and slowly walked to her bed.
... view entire excerpt...

Discussion Questions

From the publisher:

1. Discuss the setting of Chef. If Kashmir is considered a “shadow of paradise” (13), why does Kirpal sense “a mingling of sadnesses here” (41)? Whose sadness is evident in Kashmir? How does the mood of the state relate to its natural beauty?

2. Explain Kirpal Singh’s reasons for returning to Kashmir after a fourteen-year absence. What does Kirpal seek in the valley city of Srinagar? What does he ultimately find there and what disappointments await him at the end of his journey?

3. What does the army expect of Kirpal when he first arrives to serve General Sahib? How does Kirpal, in turn, meet and thwart the army’s expectations? What role does Kirpal’s father, Major Iqbal Singh, play within the army’s expectations and Kirpal’s ambitions?

4. What are Kirpal’s first impressions of Chef Kishen? How does Kirpal’s relationship with Kishen change over the course of the novel? What important lessons does Kirpal learn from Kishen, and where do the two chefs radically diverge?

5. Much of the action of Chef takes place in memory, as Kirpal looks back on past events during his journey back to Kashmir. What is the effect of this retrospective view? What attitude does Kirpal seem to have toward his memories of Kashmir?

6. Several love interests cross Kirpal’s path: Patsy Chowdhry, the Kashmiri woman washing apples; the nurse; and Irem. Why is Kirpal attracted to each of these women? Why has Kirpal remained single all these years?

7. Discuss the differences between Kishen and Kirpal’s styles of cooking. What are the signature dishes of each chef? What techniques and philosophies of food does Kirpal learn from Kishen, and what styles does he develop independently of his mentor? How does Irem also influence Kirpal’s approach to cuisine?

8. What emotional and physical effect does the Siachen glacier have on Chef Kishen? Discuss his scene of violence and suicide on the glacier. What is Kishen protesting? How does Kirpal react to Kishen’s revolutionary actions? Was Kishen’s protest effective in the end? Why or why not?

9. Rubiya grows up in the years of Kirpal’s absence from Srinagar. How has Rubiya’s life changed over the past fourteen years? What realizations does she have about the political situation between Pakistan and India? How does her poetry and journalism express these realizations? Whose form of political protest seems more effective: Rubiya’s or Kishen’s? Why?

10. What effects from the brain tumor does Kirpal begin to see and feel on his journey from Delhi to Kashmir? How does he seem to be dealing with his illness? How does General Sahib’s death affect Kirpal’s chances of recovery?

11. Rubiya writes, “I feel the story of Soofiya [Irem] and little Naseem is the story of the whole of Kashmir” (233). How does Irem’s story represent the beauty, troubles, and conflicts of Kashmir? Is Irem a terrorist, as accused? Why or why not?

12. Thinking about his ailing mother, Kirpal realizes, “Cooking was her way to say how she felt towards people close to her” (246). How does Kirpal also use cooking as a means of communication? In which scenes does Kirpal attempt to express his feelings through food?

13. Discuss General Kumar’s leadership in Kashmir. What sort of leader is he? What relationship did he have with Major Iqbal Singh, Kirpal’s father? How does he fare during military scandals, such as Colonel Chowdhry’s “coffin scam”? How have politics affected his personal and family life?

14. Chef includes a hand-drawn map of the Siachen glacier, a complete recipe for Rogan Josh, and lines of Arabic script that depict Kirpal and Irem’s first conversation. What do these extra elements add to the experience of reading Chef?

15. Discuss Jaspreet Singh’s writing style. What passages of Chef are particularly poetic? How does he bring the landscape of the Kashmiri valley and the Siachen glacier to life? What foods are described in particularly lush detail?

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