Regi Mathew is doing something perhaps no India-based chef has ever done before-go global and open an Indian restaurant for an international audience. And, he has chosen the toughest food market in the world to launch 'Chatti by Regi Mathew, named after the clay pot used for cooking in his home state Kerala, on February 12 in New York.

"Food is a reflection of our culture and taking one's food to the world is akin to inviting someone to your home and telling them, "This is what we are," said Mathew in a video call from New York. "I want everybody to understand that Indian regional cuisine has so much potential. Today I am doing it; tomorrow, a lot of others will get inspired and say, 'yes, it can be done; let's also try something".

While there have been Indian chefs and restaurateurs who have made it big on the international stage-Vikas Khanna and Gaggan Anand are the first that come to mind, their successes have been essentially abroad where either they studied and made their name (like with Khanna) or primarily built their career on an international stage, as is the case with Vineet Bhatia, who became the first Indian to win a Michelin star when he got it for his Indian restaurant Rasoi in London in 2001.

Mathew, however, has come up the hard way, growing up in Pala in central Kerala, studying in Kovalam and doing the grind in hotels in Bengaluru and elsewhere, honing his skills before opening the runaway-hit restaurant Kappa Chakka Kandhari, or KCK for convenience (kappa is cassava, chakka is jackfruit and kandhari is bird's eye chilli-three common ingredients in Kerala cooking), just a few years ago.

First in Chennai followed by Bengaluru, KCK outlets earned rave reviews and scooped food awards in recent years, establishing Mathew as a sort of a poster-boy of Kerala food, a stature to which only perhaps Chef Suresh Pillai has come close in recent years, though in the latter's case, his TV show stardom preceded him.