After the samosa and sandesh, they order you to come for a meal and bully you into stuffing yourself with the hilsa in mustard sauce, prawn malai curry and earthen bowls of mishti doi. Growing up with Old Delhi kormas and kababs, I am no lover of fish and hilsa bristles with tiny lethal bones, but for that creamy hilsa of Calcutta I was willing to risk anything. Also when a mashima's beady eye watches you from across the dining table, you clean up your plate.
