While fighting terminal cancer, Raghavan is publishing a cookbook on how to more easily cook curry dishes. Curry contains turmeric, which some believe is helpful in fighting cancer.
(p. D1) Mr. Iyer arrived in Marshall, Minn., in 1982, unprepared for a hard culinary truth: There was almost nothing there for a vegetarian raised on South Indian cooking to eat. To make matters worse, Mr. Iyer couldn’t cook. He found a can of something called curry powder at a local grocery store and made potato curry. It was so bad he wept.
But Mr. Iyer, a man with six languages at his command and the astrological stubbornness of a Taurus, would not be defeated. He had his mother and older sister send recipes from India. He picked up a few cooking tips from new friends and put his chemistry degree to work.
“Everything became an experiment,” he said. “Blooming the spices was the big lesson.”
Mr. Iyer, 61, has by some estimations taught more Americans how to cook Indian food than anyone else. His formula is simple: Pare down techniques, use ingredients people can buy at the supermarket and deliver it all with the kindness of a kindergarten teacher.
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(p. D7) Next Tuesday [Feb. 28, 2023], Mr. Iyer will publish “On the Curry Trail: Chasing the Flavor That Seduced the World in 50 Recipes.”
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Mr. Iyer says it will be his last. Colorectal cancer has invaded his brain and lungs. He’s been fighting it for five years, which is years longer than people with that type of cancer usually survive. He has endured thousands of hours of radiation and chemotherapy, endless scans and four surgeries with multiple complications.
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“I’m not worried about dying,” Mr. Iyer said. “Seriously, when you’re dead you don’t know what the hell is happening, so this book is not an homage to my death. This is really celebrating life, family, friends and food.”
That he eats a vegetarian diet, practices yoga and was an avid swimmer have helped him make it this long, he said. So did idli, the spongy, beloved South Indian breakfast staple made by fermenting and steaming rice.
After his first surgery, he lost 30 pounds — a lot for a man who had never topped 155. Before he went into the hospital, he made dozens of idli and froze them so Mr. Erickson could easily warm them up when Mr. Iyer returned home to recuperate.
“Idli nourished me from the inside out,” Mr. Iyer said.
His experience gave him the idea for the Revival Project, which he hopes to get up and running before he dies. He is building a searchable database of comfort-food recipes, organized by cuisine and medical condition, that hospital and other health care workers could use.
“I still don’t understand why the great wisdom of the world’s home cooks and healers has not yet found its way into hospitals and dietary training,” he said. If it weren’t for idli and sambar, yogurt and bowls of brothy rasam, Mr. Iyer might have not regained enough strength to finish “On the Curry Trail.”
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The novelist Amy Tan met Mr. Iyer at the wedding of the writer Scott Turow. Both authors wrote endorsements for the book jacket.
“I jokingly said to Raghavan that this book is a recipe for world peace,” Ms. Tan said in a phone interview. “The way he embraces commonality as a form of love is truly special.”
She’s a vegan but not skilled in the kitchen, which is why she appreciates the way Mr. Iyer writes a recipe.
For the full story, see:
(Note: ellipses, and bracketed date, added.)
(Note: the online version of the story was updated Feb. 23, 2023, and has the title “He Taught Americans to Cook Indian Food. Now He’s on His Final Chapter.” The version quoted above omits a sentence that appears in the online, but not the print, version of the article.)
The latest curry cookbook by Raghavan is:
Iyer, Raghavan. On the Curry Trail: Chasing the Flavor That Seduced the World. New York: Workman Publishing Company, 2023.