Uma is a doting wife and mother who is passionate about cooking healthy, delicious food and loves to create fusion dishes. She is lovingly called 'MCM’ (Master Chef Mom) at home and now runs a popular blog where she shares food experiences and recipes. Her husband and children inspire and motivate her to cook and innovate with food. She is a self-taught baker and tries to bring in the right balance of taste, nutrition and presentation to all her dishes. Having worked as a school teacher for more than five years, she understands child psychology and the role food plays in influencing eating habits. The proof of this is the excitement she brings to “lunchbox recipes,” which are a hit not only with her children and their friends but also with those who follow her blog. Uma lives in a simple apartment in Gurgaon with her husband, Raghuraman, daughter, Gayatri, and son, Vishnu. She loves gardening and has a small terrace garden where she grows different herbs that she uses in her cooking. Enjoy a welcome drink panagam, made with jaggery, and snack on some mini idlis (savory cakes) with chutney as Uma tells you all about south Indian food. She will show you the spices and masalas that she uses in her cooking, most which she prefers to mix at home. Your meal will be served in the traditional way on banana leaves and might include dishes such as tamarind rice, coconut rice, mint pulao (Uma’s mother’s special dish) served with achari tomato raita (yogurt), garlic and pepper rasam (a tangy tamarind soup), appalam (a savory pancake made with fermented rice batter), or urulai roast (potato). End your meal with a traditional dessert of curd rice, pickle and payasam (rice pudding). If you book a cooking experience, join Uma in her kitchen for a South Indian cooking class, where you will learn to make four dishes, dosas, idlis, sambar and chutney. The cooking experience lasts approximately one hour before you sit down together to enjoy the meal you helped prepare. Please note this is a vegetarian experience; as with many South Indian families Uma and her family are vegetarian.