Even one life is not enough to taste some of the best delicacies across the world, in fact every mile you travel the taste of food varies. The flavour, the make, the ingredients, everything is just mesmerizing to see how one creates a myriad of flavours with the available condiments and local ingredients around.
But most of these delicacies are not chalked out by the chefs of five star hotels they are inventions of many passionate home cooks who with their fervour invent some of the best recipes that leave a lingering taste of a lifetime.
Opening an avenue to such secreted culinarians is the Gourmet Bazaar, an open platform for all the food lovers to take a bite into some exotic viands prepared by home chefs whose recipes and cooking skills were never exposed.
Started with a simple initiative by three like-minded enterprising women, Shikha Bagaria, Kanika Khanna and Prema Goenka to create a platform for many such passionate home cooks to showcase their talent, The Gourmet Bazaar today is a much-awaited event in the city for every food fanatic in Coimbatore. This year, the Gourmet Bazaar is all set to enthrall the foodies starting from tomorrow at 'Whispering Stones', near Perks School.
A finely curated yet fun platform for home bakers, caterers, small businesses, organic producers and specialty cafes' to showcase their products, experiment with new recipes and different cuisines while providing the city two days of pure gastronomic delights.
With the completion of two years and back with its third edition the event has given rise to many chefs into becoming restaurant owners, popular home bakers and food entrepreneurs.
“I started off my career as a journalist, for the past 17 years I had been working with some of the most popular newspaper houses but my inert passion had always been cooking, I would usually cook at home or on special days, but when someone told me about The Gourmet Bazaar, I decided to give it a try. I brought in some whole wheat exotic topping pizzas and bao buns to the events. I didn’t know how people would react to my cooking, but I was taken by surprise to see everything exhausted in one day, the response was phenomenal; the platform gave me the confidence to start my own restaurant. It’s been less than a year that I started my restaurant Open Kitchen in Connoor with second one coming up in Ooty very soon. As quoted by Priyak Mitra, owner of Open Kitchen.
Reaping in the similar manner is the brand name Monsoon Harvest; a name synonym to healthy breakfast had their first start at The Gourmet Bazaar. Uma, the Founder of the brand Monsoon Harvest used to prepare her healthy muesli at home, her customised muesli preparation was a combination of many flavours with the fusion of healthy millets. It was during the first edition of the Gourmet Bazaar, Uma decided to share her healthy secret recipe at The Gourmet Bazaar. Uma was simply taken aback by the response of the people. Today, Monsoon Harvest is a fast selling Muesli product, the brand can be found in the shelves of leading departmental stores all over South India including Chennai and Bangalore.
“We scrutinise each of our vendors before letting them take a stall. Our concept is to create a benchmark of quality not quantity. Our stalls are not rendered to everyone who approaches us, only those who maintain hygienic conditions along with wholesome and healthy eating options can be a part of The Gourmet Bazaar” as quoted by Prema, one of the forerunners of the event.
"For the first time, we have participants with home made and farm produce from Orissa, cooking oil sprays from Nagpur and some tantalizing goodies from Kolkata", she added.
The 3rd edition fare includes gourmet desserts, savouries, home bakers' speciality breads, artisanal cheese, fine foods, hand crafted specialty teas, cold pressed juices, forest honey, fresh organic produce, gourmet chocolates, ice creams, traditional South Indian, North Indian, Manglorean, Rajasthani, Parsi foods, farm milk, traditional & fusion pickles, preserves, sauces & jams, millet & assorted grain recipes & world cuisine.
Apart from food items the bazaar also has a Wellness Zone with a dedicated serene area for relaxation with various wellness related activities such as reflexology, alternate healing & meditation techniques.
A specially designed eco-friendly grocery bag is provided to the shoppers which they can use to collect their purchases at the Bazaar, so as to reduce overall use of plastic.
What to lookout for this Gourmet Bazaar
1. Brown Sugar - Gourmet Desserts, Coimbatore
2. Upper Crust - Gourmet Food, Coimbatore
3. Caroselle Artisanal Cheese, Kodaikanal
4. V’s Café - Specialty Breads, Coimbatore
5. Chocolates & Such - Gourmet Chocolates, Coimbatore
6. Monsoon Harvest - Granola Bars, Muesli & Cookies, Coimbatore
7. Mirror White Hand made Silver Jewellery
8. Open Kitchen - Assorted burgers, Bao Buns, Coonoor
9. Amato Bakers - Gourmet Desserts & Hand made Cosmetics, Coimbatore
10. Good Aahar - Home made Pickles, Papads,Aampapad& home processed farm produce
11. Eat Alley - assorted food stuffs, Coimbatore
12. Sprig - Assorted Fine Food products, Kochi
13. CraftsySpark Studio - hand made paper products, Coimbatore
14. Meghala’s Baskets, Salem
15. Indian Vanilla - Pure Vanilla Pods, Pollachi
16. House of Kaurz - Table Décor &Plants, Coimbatore
17. Regal Chocolates - Gourmet Chocolates, Coimbatore
18. Brownie Points - Gourmet Desserts, Coimbatore
19. Made with Love by the Singhs - Designer trays & coolers, Coimbatore
20. Isha’sKrafts - hand made table décor & accessories, Coimbatore
21. Cake Bee, Fresh Cream Cakes, Trichy
22. CiGusta, Italian Gelato & Frozen yogurts
23. My Reflections - Zentangle Art, Coimbatore
24. Mlicious - Farm Fresh Milk, Coimbatore
25. Ela - The Earth Store - Farm Fresh Soft Cheeses & organic produce, Pollachi
26. Golden Oven - Granola Bars, Millets Brownies, Coimbatore
27. Dolcie - Desserts, Coimbatore
28. Eat More Cheese - Soft Cheese, Chennai
29. Vilvah Organic Store - Natural Skin Care, Coimbatore
30. Brand Puvi - Coconut Farm Products, Coimbatore
31. My Lil Garden - Herbs & Plants, Coimbatore
32. Pricol Gourmet & Retreats - Pure Parsi Food, Coimbatore
33. Ray’s Cooking Oil Sprays - Nagpur
34. Pristine Natural Products - Natural Personal Care, Chennai
35. Nectar Juice - Cold Pressed Fruit & Vegetable Juices, Coimbatore
36. Hoopoe on Hill - Wild Honey, Kodaikanal
37. The Upper Room - Linen & Hand crafted Accessories, Coimbatore
38. Home Made Happiness - Ornamental Plants, Coimbatore
39. Saimira Foods - Home made Pickles, Jams & Sauces, Palladam
40. Naturallement - Gourmet Spreads & Preserves, Pondicherry
41. The French Door - Fine European Cuisine, Coimbatore
42. Grandma’s Love - Natural Skincare, Chennai
43. Mycs - Millet Batters, Pollachi
44. Urbaniti - Fine Jewellery, Coimbatore
45. Creamwichs - Artisan Ice Cream, Coimbatore
46. Seed2Oil - Home Oil Extractor, Coimbatore
47. Punjabi Express - Traditional Kebabs & Rolls, Coimbatore
48. Totaram's Parathas - Ready-to-Eat Stuffed Parathas, Coimbatore
49. Lyf Spa - Wellness, Coimbatore
50. Isha Foundation - Natural Foods & Skin Care
51. Eden Go Fresh - Natural Ice Creams, Coimbatore
52. Culinary Art - Pickles & Relishes
53. Sarrvam Farm2Home - Natural Products, Coimbatore
54. Coco Tier Foods - Coconut Products, Coimbatore
55. Bayleaf Indian - Vegetarian Delicacies, Coimbatore
56. EcoTeas - HandRolled Teas, Kotagiri
57. Bird on Tree - Coimbatore
58. Zoo Outreach - NGO, Coimbatore
The 3rd edition of Gourmet Bazaar is much more spacious with over 60 participants from Coimbatore, Chennai, Kochi, Pondicherry, Kodaikanal, Coonoor, Kotagiri, Palladamand Pollachi.