As the first Indian chef to be awarded a Michelin star, Atul Kochhar’s contribution to curry culture in Britain is huge.

Through the food at his restaurants – chiefly Benares in Mayfair, but also Petts Wood’s Indian Essence – his TV appearances and his cook books, Atul has changed the face of modern Indian cuisine in this country.

October 13 marks the start of National Curry Week and the 55-year-old chef said it is important to celebrate Indian food in the UK.

He said: “Indian food has been eaten in Britian in one form or another for a very long time, even if you look back into the old recipe books and things like Coronation Chicken, which was inspired by Asia.”

He added: “As an Indian I can say it is addictive, it is great, people love it but as a Brit I can say it has become part of our heritage.

“We have an open culture, we are a secular country, we welcome people and influences and religions into our culture and say ‘fine, this is your home’. We celebrate that too.”

Born in India, Atul has lived in Britain for more than 20 years and considers himself British Indian. It is that mixture of cultures that informs his cooking.

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He said: “For me, it is all about where you are and what you are doing and what you get in your surroundings – what fish you get in your water, what vegetables you get to your door and what kind of meat you eat.

“To be able to embrace that has been part of my upbringing. My family is from north India but I was born in East India, so I saw that happening within my own country. Coming here was no different.

“Whatever I eat, the way I practice, what I do – everything becomes part of my culture.”

A long way from the likes of chicken korma, Indian Essence serves up seasonal produce like venison, grouse and partridge.

He said: “It is something perhaps that you’ll never get in an Indian restaurant in the High Street. Come summer, we’ll have wild salmon or organic salmon with a gooseberry korma.

“They are things that are conceptually British flavours but we have worked them into Indian recipes. It can be done.”

Clearly it can be done, and is being done well at Indian Essence –the restaurant was awarded the Bib Gourmand rating in the latest Michelin Guide.

Atul, who had already been awarded a pair of Michelin stars for his other restaurants, said: “I am hugely proud of it.

“We were not looking for it, let’s put it that way.

“We were just looking to be a good neighbourhood restaurant and we have landed up as a Bib Gourmand and we are very proud of it.”

All of this is not to say that Atul in any way dislikes Britain’s curry houses, the kind of places where you get a chicken tikka massala and a few pints of Cobra at the weekend.

He said: “If anything, they are the people who set us up.

“I am here because they had done the spade work before I arrived. I cannot take anything away from them but what I think they have forgotten is that cuisine is never a static thing.

“It keeps moving and they forgot to progress.”

Go to indianessence.co.uk