Moveable Feast Humphrey Tyler
THERE just has to be a rather special atmosphere about a really good curry restaurant. No, no — not sleazy. But often fairly ordinary chairs, for example, and generally inexpensive tables. Like the sort you find in cafes. Hopefully you will also see determined women in saris striding out of the kitchen every so often, and maybe hear people talking Hindi or
The Sea Belle Restaurant on the north coast, about half an hour from Durban by car, is rather like that. It could be the best curry place in the whole of Natal. It is a big concrete block of a building with huge sea-view windows on the ground floor. Beware weekends at night; the place is rigged with dazzling disco strobes and multi-megawatt speakers. But at lunch time it is quiet, though there is a TV near the bar for soccer matches and no doubt the rugby.
Travelling up the north coast road, past Umhlanga Rocks and Umdhloti, you cross a bridge near the Tongaat boundary and sweep left at the sign-post that says La Mercy. Some of the houses are as big as palaces.
Drive carefully: the municipality controls crazies here by digging ditches across the road instead of bulding speed humps. If you hit them fast you bounce through the roof. The sign on the post at the corner is quaintly Italianate: it says Sea Bella. Don’t worry, it is the same place.
You park round the side of the building and go in past the bar. It is capacious. The restaurant is also very big. There is not much attention to decor. A poster says: drink Mainstay. But you are not here to look at pictures.
The Sea Belle is famous for its curried prawns. The waiter will ask you mild or hot. If you are used to curry, say hot. If you are new to the coast, try mild. Even mild is likely to raise a certain flush, tingle the tongue and tickle your nose. If you are not used to curry you may need a glass of milk. Have papadums on the side. Atchar — a plate of assorted, cold, pickled vegetables — comes without asking. Rice comes with the meal, also a plate of salad: grated carrot, some tomato. Very fresh.
Your plate of prawn curry is brimming over. The aroma is delicious. Spoon it on to your plate over some rice. Crack a papadum between your teeth. The papadums are made in the mysterious back room where women are talking volubly. Everything is made on the spot. The papadums are fresh and crisp, not oily. Then try your prawns.
No proper Indian cook buys “curry powder”; she (it is usually she) mixes her own according to ritual, selecting spices and mixing them almost secretively. Then sliced onions are tosssed into a pan; after they turn golden the marsala is added and cooked, and garlic, crushed ginger, then meat. Along the way there is a bay leaf, also dhanya.
The prawns are in a delicious sauce. Alas, popularity and inflation have sent up the price. Prawn curry is now R40.
Mutton curry is less expensive, at R27,50. It is also a benchmark of Indian curries. At the Sea Belle it is tender. There are few bones and little, if any, fat. The meat comes with some potatoes and a few peas in the sauce. The servings at the Sea Belle are so generous that many patrons take home the food they cannot finish. Bingo for breakfast. Heaven is a cold curried potato.
The connoisseur will notice the subtly different flavouring of the marsala mixes used for the mutton and for the prawns; it is different again for line fish.
There is also chicken curry, and vegetable, and also bean curry. The bean curry is an aromatic gift at R7,50.
There was a sudden shadow cast over the Sea Belle a few weeks ago. Late at night a gang stormed Sonny Govender, one of the brothers in the family business, and robbed him of
R1 000 and his gold watch. Then they forced him upstairs to his brother Loga’s flat. The gang demanded money. Loga, a big man who ran the bar downstairs like a Turkish pasha, said no. The gang shot him dead.
It was a tragedy that shattered the family and their huge clientele. There were rumours the Sea Belle might close. But no. This week it was open as usual. The family is carrying on. But everybody misses Loga.