Theenmura returns to KCK Chennai, loaded with duck mappas, Kerala plum cake and nostalgia

Chef Regi Mathew was nine when he was first introduced to theenmura at a wedding in Pala, Kottayam. He specifically remembers the cake and wine that was served. “But my mother took away the wine,” he laughs. Decades later, last year, the chef introduced this celebratory Christian feast from Kerala at his restaurant Kappa Chakka Kandhari. Given its success, theenmura is back for its second stint.

We brave the rains and flooded roads to tuck into a six-course menu featuring around 18 dishes. We are not the only ones.

The meal begins with a slice of cake and homemade non-alcoholic wine — the festive combination that heralds the beginning of the Christmas season. The cake — neatly wrapped in butter paper — is from an old bakery in Pala. This is followed by a chicken cutlet, crisp, with delicate flavours of ginger and curry leaf. The fluffy traditional wood-oven baked borma bread (sourced from Thrissur), with chicken roast is an instant favourite. The sweetness of the bread offsets the heat from the pepper in the chicken. This is also one of Regi’s favourites. “During my graduation days in Pala, the hostel would serve this every Sunday,” he says.

Chef Regi Mathew
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Special Arrangement

The meal features grilled king prawns, which may not be a fixture in traditional menus. “It differs from region to region. For example, people from Thrissur also include pork,” Regi explains. The avalanche of food continues with duck mappas, mutton stew, pulissery, thoran, appam, shards of poppadom that look like confetti, and beef fry. The meen vattichathu, a recipe that Regi borrowed from his mother is a comfortingly spicy, tangy fish curry that is cooked and stored in an earthen pot overnight allowing flavours to seep in.

We move on to a trio of dessert and get acquainted with churuttu, black halwa, and the pick of the lot: paniyum pazhavum — an unpretentious but fulfilling combination of humble banana topped with grated coconut soaked in paani (syrup made of palm sap).

Theenmura was a practice that was fading away, says Regi. But he is pleased to notice its revival. “I had guests in Chatti (his restaurant in New York), who said that they prepared theenmura by following my reel,” he smiles.

Reacquaint yourself with the elaborate traditional meal before Regi takes it to New York to introduce America to the pleasure of red fish curry, appams and stew for Christmas.

Theenmura is on at Kappa Chakka Kandhari in Chennai (10, Haddows Road, Nungambakkam) and Bengaluru till December 14. Priced at ₹1,690 plus taxes. For reservations, call 9858591010.