Punjabi men can cook - and prove it too

Chandigarh, Oct 24 (IANS) Punjabi men take pride in being macho, but a clutch of them proved they were equally good in the kitchen by rustling up some mouthwatering dishes in record time - while the ladies sat back and smiled!

Six men, including celebrities in various fields, took part in the Carlsberg 'Men Can Cook' here contest this week.

Champion motor-rallyist Hari Singh may have seen the thrill of speed and dodged the sharpest of curves on the track but he showed he was not slow in cooking either.

Hari Singh, who is a five-time national rally champion, negotiated this one quite fast - turning out to be the first contestant to prepare his dish - mouth-watering garlic prawns at the Taj Hotel here.

Though he was the first to finish, Hari Singh was pipped to the third spot. 'The event was so much fun,' he said.

The winner was golfing professional Amrit Inder Singh, who has coached India's best-known golfer Jeev Milkha Singh. He showed that his birdies were not limited to the golf course but also to chicken.

His chicken dahiwala got him the first prize - free beer for a full year.

The second spot went to leading horticulturist Bhagwant Singh who showed with his spicy lemon chicken why men were still the top chefs around the world. He named his dish chhauni chicken after his village in Punjab.

'The best cooks around the world are men. What I did here today was nothing different from what I do when I cook at home,' Bhagwant Singh told IANS.

Also competing were well-known artist-sculptor Shiv Singh (Chicken Kebab), industrialist Jesse Grewal (Iranian Allo Cuckoo) and NRI Amit Ahuja (Iranian Prawn).

All contestants got 30 minutes to prove their cooking skills.

Spice-queen Karen Anand and two other judges chose the winners.

Anand said: 'The programme Men Can Cook has been to eight cities. Each one has been a spectacular success and each city has offered a delightful response.'

The event has earlier been held in Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Indore, Goa, Jaipur and Delhi.

(Jaideep Sarin can be contacted at [email protected])