As you climb down Mount Titlis in the Urner Alps of Switzerland, over 3,000 metres high, it's not what you would expect - the aroma of samosas wafting through the chilly mountain air.
Europeans are lining up at a huge, all-white van parked in the middle of the snow-covered slopes. Their faces light up at the sight of Punjab da puttar, Bhairu Singh, frying the popular savoury, just the way they want it.
A few yards away, Hyatt Singh's finger-licking butter chicken is lapped up by most visitors at Hotel Terrace, the only hospitality unit in this part of the Alps. This Amritsari gabroo has made the ubiquitous Punjabi recipe a hit among Europeans. His colleague, Jeevan Singh, has gone a step further and converted the bread-eating, chocolate-making Swiss populace salivate for his dal makhni and naan.
The three Punjabi chefs, who have been wooing locals and visitors alike in the tourist haven of Switzerland for the past few years, work with Gourm India, a 25- year-old company specializing in Punjabi food.
This company is the sole supplier of Punjabi food to Terrace, the only hotel at Mount Titlis.
Gourm India is not the only company proud of its Punjabi chefs.
Others from the Land of the Five Rivers have also made it big with their recipes and cooking at various places in Switzerland.
Two brothers from Rajpura, Mann Singh and Harbinder Singh, have set up Tandoor Haus, a restaurant specializing in exotic Punjabi dishes in the Swiss capital of Zurich. The duo, who came to Switzerland to work in a hotel, are now well-settled in the beautiful country along with their families.
"I had begun working as a cook in Rajpura. I migrated to Switzerland after I got a job in a hotel. Later, my brother, too, joined me,'' says Mann Singh, a graduate from Mahindra College in Patiala. The kitchen at Tandoor Haus is all too familiar for Punjabis. Utensils being used to cook delicacies like murg shorba, murg makhani, tandoori murg and macchhi are straight from a Punjabi kitchen. To round up a perfect Punjabi khaana, they serve kulfi too.
[Courtesy: Times of India]