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Life is the recipe

Photo: Rajeev Bhatt

Roll of honour Sameer Nair at The Oberoi’s Three Sixty restaurant in New Delhi

Talk of CEOs and your mind conjures up the image of a starched boss throwing his weight around at a huge table full of sugar and cholesterol-free delicacies. This one is different. He loves crossing the road in front of his Mumbai office to have beef chilli parotha from a roadside Malayali restaurant and recommends it to his colleagues. “I believe in hassle-free food,” declares Sameer Nair, settling for a quick lunch at the prim and proper Three Sixty restaurant of The Oberoi in New Delhi. The place is famous for its Japanese food and Sameer quickly orders sushi. “My mother is a Telugu who grew up in Rajasthan and my father is a Malayali so I have tasted all kinds of cuisine from sea food to Chettinad to North Indian and love them all,” says the man held largely responsible for the ‘Indianisation’ of Star and who now as the head of NDTV Imagine is taking satellite channels on a mythological route with Ramayan.

Sipping watermelon juice, he shares, “Sunday is a huge event at home and the preparations start from Saturday evening when my son and I bring a leg of lamb. We marinate it in vinegar. There is lots of drama as we do different experiments like adding curd. We try to finish it off as much as possible but if we fail my dog has its day.” His figure negates his foodie status. “Constitutionally, we are thin and courtesy food shows on television, my mother has become very diet conscious. She tries everything on me — from karela to bottle gourd juice I taste them all through the week. But Sunday belongs to me.”

The sushi is still not in sight and Sameer reminds the waiter. His politeness is outstanding.

“I have a soft corner for the vocation, because I have experienced it when I was doing my hotel management course in Chennai. I did my internship at a revolving restaurant in Mumbai. We were expected to learn different things. During the week I was learning to be a waiter, a strange thing started happening with me. As it was a revolving restaurant with a fixed kitchen, the position of the guest changed from the time I took the order to the time I returned with the juice. I was about to offer it to the wrong guest before I realised that he was not the right face,” a trademark half smile flashes on his face.

“After the course I wanted to be an entrepreneur. So I started selling chicken rolls. It was fun in the beginning but it turned out to be very hectic, as I had to do everything myself. I used to work 20 hours a day. I made money but after four-five months ran out of energy. Then I worked with Yellow Pages. It was door-to-door selling, a unique experience where every person was a phone number. I got to meet different characters every day.”

It is these experiences with life which today reflect in his choices. Or as the media watchers say, he understands the pulse of middle class India. The sushi arrives and Sameer is ecstatic.

“Finally, I joined Goldwire, where my romance with television started. You remember Street Hawk? I used to edit it.” He clarifies he used to get it edited. “I used to call the editors operators because I knew what constituted a good shot. This sense developed through years of watching movies. I hardly missed any Hindi or English movie released between 1971 and 1985.” Even today he gets his confidence from the movies…of all kinds. When he is down he watches the likes of Neil ‘n’ Nikki or RGV Ki Aag. “They make me feel I am not doing that bad!”

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