Food enthusiasts and others are only now learning about Ranji Smile, one of the first celebrity chefs in the U.S. who gave a taste of authentic Indian food to Americans for the first time when he arrived here from India via London in 1899.
Dubbed by several American publications at the time as âThe King of Curry,â the young Muslim chef from Karachi (then in India) captivated Americans when he began cooking Indian dishes at Sherryâs restaurant in New York. According to various accounts, before arriving here, he worked at Cecil Hotel in London where he impressed the owner of Sherryâs, Louis Sherry, with his culinary skills, following which he brought Smile, and his young English wife, to New York in 1899.