Pastas, pates and presto!

But aesthetics apart, Rishad recommends different pastas for different dishes. Fusilli is a corkscrew-shaped pasta and is very easy to eat — unlike spaghetti which keeps sliding off your fork — and is best served in salads or in tomato sauce. Fettucine is best with a cream sauce, linguni goes well with seafood and spaghetti with what else but pesto sauce.

But if you are still confused after the chef’s recommendations, Rishad will make the sauces to go with the pastas. With Mediterranean food so popular with the Indian palate — spices and flavours are similar to desi masalas — sourcing the raw material and herbs is relatively easy. "Certain things are difficult but they can always be substituted. Cooking is meant to be creative," he says. Most of his herbs come from Pune and for the pesto sauce, a friend grows the basil in his garden.

But creativity in cooking does not come at the cost of quality. The finishing touch to any pasta dish is fresh parmesan cheese, and this is the one item Rishad does not believe can be substituted. And he should know. Rishad grew up on pastas as it was the first choice in his house — his father loves Italian food — and there was always a pesto being stirred on the kitchen fire. So, when he found himself at a bit of a lose end, after finishing college, he decided to attend a cordon bleu course in London. Then he took some time off and travelled which is his real passion as he is a wild-life enthusiast. This interest converted Rishad to vegetarianism and though he cooks both vegetarian and non-vegetarian food, it doesn’t pass his lips. "I even taste it but I do not swallow it," he says.

To complement his pastas he also does a range of salads and quiches and pates. The pastas cost Rs 200 a kilo, enough sauce for four people costs Rs 200 and his quiches start at Rs 175. Copa Cabana’s A D Singh has eaten his food many parties and on occasion even bought his pastas. He says, "His food is really very good but can be a little expensive."

Defending his prices, Rishad says that to make just three kilos of pasta takes him 45 minutes. And, in peak season, Rishad is handling upto three parties a week. Preparations begin about three days before the dinner and the day of the party, Rishad sometimes spends as many as 10 to 12 hours slaving in the kitchen. Also working from his Malabar Hill residence has its disadvantages. "It can be very isolating," he says. Which is why in a few years Rishad is going to clear his kitchen, pack up his pots and pans and get out of the home catering business. "I like to make a clear demarcation between home and work," he says. But he will not put down his chef’s hat and plans to remain in the food business.

And though, his mainstay is Italian cuisine, it only comes third in Rishad’s list of fine foods. The first place goes to Indian khana and then Japanese food. The traditional Parsi food that he also caters comes fourth in this list. "It is an interesting cuisine with the different mixes of spices though I find it a bit heavy," he says. With a Parsi father it is not surprising he has a taste for this cuisine. His next venture may be Sindhi food again a throwback from his growing years as his mother is from that region. He seems to have been weaned on diverse cuisine and from his early days Rishad recalls a passion for food that went beyond `What’s cooking?’. But a keen business sense also guides his foray into food. Rishad believes that there is a gap in the market for Sindhi food.

While he is aware that Mumbai’s taste buds are becoming more adventurous, Rishad is not sure he is adventurous enough to open a restaurant to cater to this change. For now, he’s content with bringing a slice of Italy to the city.