Dad ka dabba

Representation Pic

Long before Harish Closepet became the 2023 MasterChef India finalist, we followed him on Instagram. On his handle, Harry's Lunchbox, the 58-year-old showed off the mouth-watering lunches he whipped up for his daughters Isha and Vibha.

Think dabbas, and the image of a steaming variety of nutritious homemade delicacies packed neatly together in a plastic or steel tiffin immediately comes to mind. The highlight of our school days was the much-longed-for recess bell ringing and the excitement of being greeted by our favourite dish made lovingly, and thoughtfully, by a family member. What Closepet did - crafting tempting preparations to ensure his daughters ate everything - is what most parents struggle with daily.

"I started experimenting with different types of pasta, Mexican dishes, and Chinese food, and they started enjoying their lunchboxes… even their friends started snatching their dabbas!" says Closepet, on a phone call from Bengaluru. His love for packing lunchboxes remained long after his daughters were done with their education. He continued the obsession on social media platforms with a series - Pack a Lunchbox With Me - featuring unusual yet healthy dishes such as watermelon rice, garlic mayo crepes, and chickpea gold coins.

Pasta is a favourite in his family. By experimenting with ingredients and researching how the chemistry of food impacts taste, he came up with over 20 unique pasta sauces, including spinach pesto, coconut curry, and vegan white sauce. "I replace the creamy, buttery sauces with nut pastes such as cashew or walnut, or cauliflower or bell peppers, which give the same richness but with less fat." Various rice meals also find their way on to the dinning table at the Closepet household: Mexican spinach rice, tofu fried rice, and lemon basil rice.

Chartered accountant Dilkhush Shah packs lunch for his two children every day, and the lunchboxes are loved equally by friends and teachers at school. Pics/Satej Shinde

Closepet recalls standing behind his mother in the kitchen in their Karnataka home and watching her cook: "Understanding how food is all about balance is the key to creating healthy meals," he quips. For these responsible dads, cooking for their families is an extension of their duty as a parent, and a labour of love. And it's also a way to connect with their children. "My oldest daughter, who's married, still comes home whenever I mention I'm making something special," Closepet concludes. "It's not just packing a lunchbox. It's a huge social entry into your kid's network of friends."

Product manager Abhimanhu Lodha's children, aged 13 and eight, also have their dad's lunchbox to look forward to every day. The Wadala-based family does it together - often, his daughter and son help him cook the dish they've requested he make. "They enjoy cooking as much as eating the final product," he adds.

Because they like pizza so much, Abhimanyu dedicatedly learned how to make it from scratch: Making the dough, rolling it out, and creating sauces. But that's a weekend activity. "My speciality is making batter-based dishes out of pre-made mixes such as pancakes, dosas, chilas, and uttapams," he says. "You can make five or six dishes with one batter." He also makes fresh-pressed juices and fruit-based mocktails, their favourite. "My wife, Munmun, is a great cook, and I learned much about cooking from her. Her work schedule doesn't allow her time to cook, so I took over," he shares. During the week, he's the one cooking, and on weekends, it's her turn with the meals, while he writes poetry in Hindi and attend community reading sessions at BandraReads, which he founded.

While he used to cook on and off before the pandemic, it was transitioning to a work-from-home role that gave him the space to share the responsibility. Lodha says that teaching the importance of nutrition has helped his children appreciate healthy food. "They've also become comfortable with the essential life skill, " he says.

Dad of two Abhimanyu Lodha whips up snack-sized pancakes and paneer pakoras for their lunchboxes. He preps batters to make meals in under 30 minutes. Pics/Shadab Khan

For Vashi resident Dilkhush Shah, ensuring his wife could sleep longer in the morning spurred him to take on lunchbox responsibilities. The dad of two introduces himself as a "chartered account by profession, traveller by vocation, and a cook by passion". His experiments with food started with transforming meals he didn't like into a new version. "I used to cut tomatoes, onions, and garlic, and convert the bhaji my mother made into pav bhaji," he recalls.

Ask him what he likes to make for his children's dabbas, and he says, "Non-alcoholic mojitos, onion uthappams, appams, tomato rice, and lemon rice." His daughter, aged 11, likes to eat pasta in white sauce and cheese fondue, while his son, who's all of four, loves dal-rice.

What he likes best is creating innovative meals with leftovers: If his children are craving nachos, for example, he'll cut up chapatis into triangles, fry the pieces up with masala, and pass it off as a healthy substitute.

The 2023 MasterChef India finalist Harish Closepet, Harry's Lunchbox on Instagram, started making healthy, delicious meals such as soya upma when his daughters were young

"Cooking comes from the heart," he shares when asked what tips he would give men who need to learn the life skill to care for their children. "It's essential to ask them what they wish for every morning so that they can choose what they eat. Anyone can become a chef, he feels, by listening to their intuition while crafting a dish rather than always depending on the precise measurements of a recipe.

Paneer bread pakora

Ingredients
6-8 slices of bread
200g sliced paneer
1 cup gram flour
2 tbsp rice flour
Water (as needed)
½ tsp ajwain
1 tsp red chilli powder
1 tsp chaat masala
Salt (to taste)
Green chutney
Oil for frying
Coriander leaves, chopped for garnish

Method
Cut the paneer into squares. Mix gram flour, rice flour, ajwain, red chilli powder, and salt. Add water to make a thick batter. Spread chutney on bread, add a slice of paneer, and cover with another slice of bread. Cut into halves or quarters. Heat the oil, dip the sandwiches in batter and fry until golden brown. Drain excess oil, sprinkle chat masala, and garnish with coriander leaves. Serve with tamarind chutney or ketchup.

Nacho rotis

Ingredients
Leftover rotis
Oil for deep frying or airfryer
Basic masalas for seasoning

Method
Cut roti into triangles, and deep fry or air fry them with a brush of oil.
Place the these fried chip/triangles in a bowl, and sprinkle either peri peri masala or a mix of red chilli powder, turmeric, coriander powder, chat masala, and salt.

Curd salsa dip:

Ingredients
1 cup hung curd or mayonnaise
2 tbsp red pizza or pasta sauce
1 tomato
1 onion
Green chillies (as required)
Coriander (for garnishing)

Method
Create a salsa by dicing the tomato, onion, and green chilli, and garnishing with coriander. Fold hung curd and pizza sauce into the salsa mix. Mix well, and your dip is ready. You can replace the hung curd with mayonnaise. Serve the rotis with the dip, and enjoy.