Madhur Jaffrey was born Madhur Bahadur on August 13, 1933 in Civil Lines, Delhi. The fifth of 6 children born to Lala Raj Bans Bahadur and Kashmiran Rani, she has had a remarkable and interesting life. From acting to cooking, and writing—the woman is a jack of all trades and a true entrepreneur.
From a young age, Jaffrey got the acting bug. She participated in school productions like “Pied Piper of Hamelin,” “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and played the lead role in “Robin Hood and His Merry Men.” She then went on to star on All India Radio station children’s programs in small roles—it was the first time she was paid for her talent.
As she grew older and witnessed what was going on around her, she became a strong supporter of Indian independence from British rule. She was one of the many who witnessed Mahatma Gandhi’s funeral procession at Rajpath and later cremation at Rajghat. Shortly after, in 1955, Jaffrey moved to London and joined the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art where she won a scholarship after just one audition. During her time there, she was enrolled with some of the greatest talents of her generation, actresses like Diana Rigg, Siân Phillips, and Glenda Jackson.
Finding herself far away from home at such a young age—and not being able to find any decent Indian restaurants in London—Jaffrey longed for a good meal. She began to write to her mother, begging her for recipes of various childhood favorites like potatoes with cumin, tandoori chicken, dal makhani, and mutton curry. With no previous experience, she slowly began to teach herself the culinary arts.
Around the same time, Saeed Jaffrey—her longtime boyfriend and former coworker at All Indian Radio—asked her parents for her hand in marriage. They refused to accept, thinking that as an actor he couldn’t possibly provide for their daughter; but he was persistent, and by the summer of 1956 they wed.
In 1957, after graduating RADA with honors, Jaffrey joined her husband in America, and started teaching pantomime at St. Michael’s Playhouse at Winooski as a summer job. Eventually, with the help of Reverend Gilbert V. Hartke, she was able to attend the Catholic University of America on a partial scholarship, while working at the Drama School library to make ends meet. By 1958, Jaffrey got a job as a tour guide at the United Nations while Saeed did public relations work for the government of India’s tourist office.
In 1965, Jaffrey was in “Shakespeare Wallah,” for which she won a Silver Bear for Best Actress award at the Berlin Film Festival. The director of the film, Ismail Merchant, wanted to get more exposure for the film and arranged for Jaffrey to be profiled by New York Times food critic Craig Claiborn, based on the idea of ‘’an actress who can cook.”
Before production on “Shakespeare Wallah” begun, Jaffrey’s marriage to Saeed had marriage ended. She found herself adrift, and in order to better provide for her family, she started freelance writing for a wide variety of magazines on travel, cooking, dance, and painting. In 1969, she collaborated again with Merchant, and appeared in “The Guru.” That same year, she married her second husband, Sanford Allen.
Over the years, she has appeared in a variety of film projects, (most notably for Ismail,) like “Autobiography of a Princess” (1976), “Heat and Dust” (1983) and “The Perfect Murder” (1988). Her writing career has also flourished. She has written many best sellers including “Madhur Jaffrey’s Indian Cookery” (1982) “Madhur Jaffrey’s Far Eastern Cookery” (1989) and “Madhur Jaffrey’s Flavours of India” (1995).
Because of her successful cookbooks, the BBC approached her to produce her cooking show “Madhur Jaffrey’s Flavours of India” which is now broadcast all over the world. In each episode the audience doesn’t just see her cooking in the kitchen—she gives the viewer a taste of India’s real culture, from the sights and sounds to the people that populate the country.
Madhur Jaffrey has carved out a piece of history for herself, and will be remembered for ages to come as a true ambassador of India to the world.
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