As he stood in a room at Mumbai’s Taj Palace hotel chatting with Prince William and Kate it was a dream come true for 93-year-old Boman Kohinoor, owner of the city’s iconic Britannia restaurant.
Britannia is a Mumbai landmark. It is what locals call an Irani restaurant, offering signature dishes with Persian flavours.
And Kohinoor claims to be one of the British royal family’s most devoted fans in India.
“My father has written to Queen Elizabeth many times. She has sent him a letter and a life-size portrait of hers,” Boman Kohinoor’s son Afshin Kohinoor said yesterday.
Afshin Kohinoor says a video of his father talking about himself and his desire to meet the young royal couple put out by Conde Nast Traveller India went viral on YouTube catching the attention of British officials.
The Duke and Duchess heard about the story of the 93-year-old Mumbai resident and were touched and invited them to their hotel on Sunday night, Kensington Palace said on Twitter.
The tweet is accompanied by a photograph of the frail elderly man talking to the young royals.
“My father is hard of hearing and cannot talk over telephone, but I was in the room with him ... Prince William asked him how did your restaurant get the name Britannia,” Afshin Kohinoor recounted.
Prince William also asked what Boman Kohinoor rated as Britannia’s best dish and was told it was the berry pulao. “The prince told father he would come back to taste it on his next visit,” Afshin said.
“My father asked Prince William to give his warm regards to his grandmother, the queen. He also said: You kiss your children Prince George and Princess Charlotte on my behalf when you get back.”
Boman Kohinoor’s father Rashid Kohinoor came to Mumbai from Yazd in Iran along with many others of Zoroastrian faith and opened the now iconic restaurant in 1923 and named it Britannia to honour the then British rulers.
The restaurant has life-size cut-outs of Prince William and Kate, the laminated letter from Queen Elizabeth hangs on the wall along with her portrait. Boman Kohinoor named his granddaughter Diana after the former princess of Wales, Prince William’s mother.
Sadly, if Prince William does decide to come back for the berry pulao he may not get it. Afshin Kohinoor said his father and his uncle are really old now and his children are not interested in carrying on the family business. “So I am looking to sell out,” he said.
William also tried his hand at Indian cookery.
The Duke of Cambridge earlier spoke with entrepreneurs and inventors before making the Indian pancake known as a dosa, using an innovative automatic device called DosaMatic.
After watching a demonstration, William gladly poured some batter and waited for the dosa to cook before tasting a bit and declaring it “not bad”, although the Duchess could not be tempted to take a bite.
“The Duke said he would love to have the machine in his palace,” Eshwar Vikas, device inventor and chief executive of Mukunda Foods, told reporters afterwards.
Prince William and Kate are on a week-long tour of India and Bhutan.