Trincas at 100: How the Kolkata restaurant plans to use its past as a springboard to the future

Each wall of the 99-year-old Trincas, a Kolkata icon, resonates with history. There are photos of prominent patrons, popular entertainers who have performed here and Park Street scenes from decades ago.

But Trincas does not just serve up a flavour of the past. For many in Kolkata, the first visit to Trincas is a coming-of-age experience. It is an induction into excess – of good food, good music, perhaps the first sip of liquor.

As the famed establishment gears up to celebrate its centenary in 2027, Anand Puri, a third-generation managing partner of Trincas, faces a challenge: how to ensure that the restaurant that is a part of a million memories stays relevant in the decades ahead.

He has some ideas. He’s redesigned the restaurant logo – heart-shaped, it features a halo, roses, a sash, a mic, and champagne flutes clinking. He’s ensuring that old favourites such as chicken à la Kiev and lobster thermidor still taste the way they always have.

A touchpoint of history

But most of all, he knows that his restaurant’s storied past is the springboard to its future. To try to understand the Trincas mystique, Puri in 2019 started The Trincas Timeline Project to tap into the memories of long-time patrons.

It soon became an “internet phenomenon”. Stories began pouring in from all over the world.

Among the stories the project has excavated so far are tales about Park Street Christmas celebrations over the century, guitarist Willie Walters’s reminisces about his early days playing jazz and the appearance of the Trinca’s facade in the 1952 Bimal Roy movie, Do Bigha Zamin.

Puri plans to use these recollections in a book he is writing about Kolkata’s cosmopolitan roots. He aims to paint a portrait of the 20th-century city that was a destination for artists from around the world – and which allowed them to flourish.

For many patrons, Trincas is the very embodiment of this energetic spirit.

Trincas, said arts and events curator Oindrilla Dutt, who has been visiting the restaurant since she was a child, is where “music was made”. For longtime patron Maina Bhagat Trincas is synonymous with “good times”.

Puri added that Trincas represents “a touchpoint of personal history” for many in Kolkata, and even for those without any connection to the establishment at all, it represents “a touchpoint with the history of pop culture in India”.

Trincas started life in British Calcutta in 1927 as a tea room called Flury & Trinca. It took its name from its founders, Swiss entrepreneurs Quinto Cinzio Trinca and Joseph Flury. In 1939, when the partnership split, Flury stayed in the same location and renamed the establishment after himself. It still flourishes.

Trinca and his wife Lilly moved across to 17 Park Street.

In 1959, when Quinto Trinca decided to retire and move back to Switzerland, he sold the establishment to a Jewish refugee from Burma named Ellis Joshua. Joshua’s business partner was Om Prakash Puri, who had come to Kolkata from Lahore when he was 18.

Joshua knew the trade and Puri was good at organisation and management.

Om Puri transformed the tea room into a restaurant – with floor shows. After all, along with their food, patrons expected good music and lively dance performances.

Puri and Joshua never thought to change the name of the establishment. Trinca’s was already popular among the Kolkata upper classes. And when the restaurant began to feature entertainment, it started to appeal to younger people.

Soon, Trincas was playing host to musicians from around the world. In 1962, for instance, British jazz musician Dick Morrissey performed there. He said in a magazine interview that it was “an extremely good musical experience” that “broadened [his] outlook no end”.

But four years later, in 1966, after two wars and prolonged droughts, the rupee was devalued. It became almost impossible to bring in musicians and performers from abroad. But this proved to be a boon for local talent.

Making music

Maina Bhagat, who would go on to become the director of Oxford Bookstore next door, recalled early performances by a young singer named Usha Iyer. The singer had come to Kolkata in 1969 from Mumbai and would stay for decades. The same year, she met her future husband at Trincas and after they got married, she changed her name to Usha Uthup.

In The Queen of Pop, his biography of the singer, Vikas Kumar Jha writes that Iyer’s first contract was for three weeks. She was paid Rs 750. Her booming voice had already become her signature, Bhagat said. At Iyer’s first performance, she sang the Beatles’ tunes Hard Day’s Night and Yesterday

A few years before, the stage at Trincas had played host to the Trojans, featuring a singer called Biddu Appiah. “The place was big and crowded with diners,” he wrote in his memoir. “It was smoky, sexy and hedonistic…”

Biddu would drop his last name and move to the UK, where he produced Nazia Hassan’s 1981 smash-hit album, Disco Deewane. In 1995, he produced another chartbuster – Alisha Chinai’s Made in India.

Go-go cabaret featuring women in flashy costumes performing dance routines) were also quite popular in the 1960s. Miss Shefali – a cabaret dancer who featured in Satyajit Ray’s Pratidwandi (1970) and Seemabaddha (1971) – was a fixture at these performances.

This turned Trincas into a place for young people to go on dates. The Sunday jam sessions held in the afternoon, after church service, brought in many Anglo-Indian clients.

Evenings were dominated by well-heeled boxwallahs who worked for British companies that still had a presence in the city: Balmer Lawrie, ITC Limited and Britannia Industries.

But the Naxalite insurgency in the 1970s unsettled patrons. Anxious about the law and order situation in the city, many stayed home in the evenings. In the 1980s, power cuts became frequent, making it impossible to run the air conditioning system. Patrons, unsurprisingly, did not want to eat in the sweltering Kolkata heat. But the Puris persisted.

In the early 2000s, Trincas had two bands performing every day. One played a mix of Hindi film classics and newer Bollywood numbers, while the Western band focused on soft rock and pop.

In 2004, Puri’s mother, Shashi, did something new. She invited five Bengali bands to perform at Trincas over the period of a week – Fossils, Krosswindz, Lakhichhara, Chandrabindoo, and Cactus.

Today, Tavern, the moodily lit bar in Trincas’s backyard, hosts Bengali music performances every night, from Rabindrasangeet to rock music and even rap.

The food comes first

Of course, the main attraction at Trincas has always been the food. Some items have been on the menu since the restaurant was started. Others reflect the innovations over the years.

In 1983, Sunny Puri added Ming’s Room to Trincas, separated from the main restaurant by a glass partition. Cantonese and Hakka cuisines were already around but the Kolkata palette needed something spicy. Puri introduced the city to Sichuan cuisine.

The Trincas’ chilli paste, which is now called Ming ‘83, was the starting point for the menu. It first made its way into the chilli garlic noodles, lamb in hot garlic sauce and Sichuan prawns.

The patrons were delighted by the taste of this new “Chinese” fare – the flavours were more to their taste and the brightly coloured sauces made the dishes look more inviting.

Oindrilla Dutt said that she is fond of a dish that is not on the menu – Aunty Chimoo’s Chicken Curry. It is only served on special request.

The family has considered opening branches but Puri said that Trincas already has many rooms in its current Park Street location. The team would need more experience before expanding.

The show must go on

For the time being, the focus is on creating community spaces. For instance, Trincas has opened its rooms to queer groups for members to meet safely. The restaurant is also giving the city’s young hip-hop community an audience.

As Trincas welcomes a new generation through its doors, the restaurant continues to be a favourite of its longtime patrons.

Bengali filmmaker Anik Dutta, who recently shot a song from his movie Joto Kando Kolkatatei at Trincas, admires the “sense of mystique” that the restaurant has been able to preserve.

Sanjay Khullar, manager of Amber restaurant on Waterloo Street nearby, recalled Trincas was where he watched a cabaret performance for the first time as a boy with his father.

Trincas, said Khullar, was always an “incredible” time. He is certain that Trincas will offer patrons the same experience as it turns 100.

All photos shared by Anand Puri.