Chef’s Table: An exclusive chat with Poonam Ball

My grandfather was from an affluent Indian family, so there was never any pressure for him to actually do anything. He was passionate about cooking though. He found out from his uncle, who was trading silks and cloths, that there was an opportunity in East Africa for caterers. So my grandfather travelled to Nairobi, where the Brits had taken over a skilled workforce to build the railway from Mombasa to Nairobi and there was already a settled community of Asians. Turns out there was such an enormous demand for catering services there at the time, that it didn’t take long for my grandfather to set up his own restaurant. Pretty soon the rest of his family joined him out in Nairobi because the weather was better, it was more settled and everyone could join him in the catering business.

My dad was one of 10 children. He learned to cook from my grandfather and how to change the ingredients slightly because it’s East Africa. That’s where Madhu’s unique fusion style was born. Then in the 70s, the Ugandan coup with Idi Amin hit Nairobi and everything started affecting the Asians there. They started nationalising big businesses and by that time, my grandfather had a hotel called the Brilliant Hotel. When he passed away, my father decided to move us all to Britain. My brothers and I were all born in Nairobi, so we were considered British overseas citizens and told that Britain would be the safest place for us.

I was three when we moved to Southall in West London, which has a large Asian community. Word got around pretty quick that Madhu from Brilliant Hotel had moved to the area and that allowed us to begin catering to the locals from our garden shed. But it wasn’t enough and my dad had to work. He had to work under somebody for the first time in his life. So from having hundreds of employees to suddenly working in the freezer section of a factory was a complete shock to him. He hated it and ended up developing a drinking problem. I’m a lot younger than my brothers, Sanjay was 17 and Sanjiv was 16 at the time. Sanjay gave up his studies to help the family. And it was their push, with my mum, that eventually got us Madhu’s in Southall – our first restaurant in Britain.

Dad had all the recipes and mum was a complete workhorse. I was 10 when Madhu’s opened in Southall. I helped out in the kitchen because I had to be with my family, whilst still going to school and studying. It was Sanjay who really took the forefront of leading the team, while my mum was the driving force. We started doing catering initially in town halls and schools, and Sanjay realised this was not the way forward. So he began knocking on the doors of five star venues and telling them we wanted to cater for them. The response from all of them was ‘no way are we having Asian food in our establishment.’ But Sanjay wouldn’t take no for an answer and kept on. We opened Madhu’s in 1980 and after about five years, eventually we got our first opening in Heathrow Park Hotel, which is now Thistle. It just snowballed from there and took off.

Out of the 10, my dad was the only one that followed my grandfather into the kitchen and luckily had his recipes passed down to him. My dad made sure that all three of us – my brothers and me – could cook. Thanks to my dad’s point we’ve since been able to work in Clarence House, twice in Windsor Castle and twice in Buckingham Palace. I’ve done all the menus for His Royal Highness, Prince Charles. We’ve also been the first caterers at the House of Lords and at the House of Commons. Name all the top hotels here in London, we’re contracted caterers or we’re exclusive caterers. It could have turned out very differently though. I decided from a young age that even though I was brought up in a kitchen, I didn’t want to do this as a career. So I went off and did a law degree, and then worked with a free legal advice centre to do my charity work and I hated it. I did a diploma in counselling and started working with alcohol and drug abuse victims, and victims of domestic violence. I guess because of the situation with my dad, I wanted to give back and understand what was going on. Then one day my brother called me and said, look I really need you to head up our sales and marketing. He needed someone he could trust in the office, so I agreed and went back but the truth is I hate anything to do with money, I even hate talking about it! The more I became involved, the more I found myself drawn back into the kitchen. I found myself so happy in there I would start looking for more reasons to go back in. I enjoyed that more than I did dealing with contracts. I realised I loved it.

Madhu’s Machi is my dad’s fish [a signature whole seabass in an onion and carom seed marinade], I’ve just presented it in a different way. It’s revealed with a puff of smoke when the lid is lifted from it. I enjoy taking my parents’ recipes and presenting them in different ways, to show how I perceive them. I’ve created the menus at The Grove and at The Dilly, and for the catering clients who want that little bit extra they will come to me.

I train all the chefs on the recipes and presentation. In the five star hotels for example we’d have a head chef, a number two head chef, a sous chef on the grill, a curry chef, a tandoori chef and two cold counter chefs. And there’s a team of porters as well, so there’s a team of 10 altogether. In Southall it’s a smaller kitchen, so around half the size of the team, and we also have a huge unit where we do all our production and there’s around 20-odd chefs there. Then when we do outside catering we’d have a team of 150. And I’m the only female in the kitchen! With Asian cuisine it’s usually Asian men that do all the cooking. So I have to deal with a lot of male ego, but don’t worry I’m my dad’s daughter and I keep them all in check. That’s one of the biggest challenges. Having two older brothers is another challenge, I’m always fighting with them too!