Chef Niyati Rao's home kitchen gets whimsical with silicone lid lifters

In a professional kitchen, everything has a place and a purpose. But my home kitchen? I want to confess it is a different and chaotic yet aspirational landscape. It is a place where the boundary between the “chef” and the impulsive “feel good shopper” gets dangerously blurred.

While hunting for some honey toffee almonds tucked deep within the dark recesses of my wonder pantry, a search prompted by curiosity rather than hunger, I found myself excavating layers of forgotten indulgences gathered over months and years of travel.

Right behind the Sri Lankan mango chutney lay a clutter of edible souvenirs and sentimental curiosities. There was a small bottle of Old Bay Seasoning for shrimp boils, a half-used tin of buttery Scottish shortbread brought back from a rain-soaked London morning, and a small bottle of wild Tuscan olive oil, its green-gold hue catching the light. There was a crinkled packet of Japanese senbei crackers, the assorted kinds with dried fish and seaweed-coated peanuts because I always need my snacks. Tons of Chinese sauces and pickles, some soybean chilli paste, a spicy fern pickle, and so much more leaned against the most gorgeous looking tin of smoked Tasmanian honey.

For a moment, the pantry felt less like a storage space and more like a museum of journeys, each item, edible or otherwise, whispering stories of places I had been, and versions of myself I had briefly become.

And then, quite unexpectedly, nestled between a jar of Odisha mango mustard achaar, and bags of assorted dry seaweed I use in soups, and a stubbornly sealed bottle of Himalayan rhododendron squash, I stumbled upon a forgotten trio of farm animals—a bubblegum pink pig, a snowy sheep, and a defiant red rooster. They looked like oversized Monopoly pieces or perhaps sensory toys for a toddler.

They are silicone lid lifters. Their sole job is to perch on the rim of a pot, holding the lid just a crack open to let the steam escape. In the world of high-end gastronomy, we use folded side towels or perforated lids to manage evaporation. Like we do for the herbaceous, robust Mizoram balm chicken broth we make at Ekaa. But at home, apparently I once decided I needed a rubber farmyard to do the heavy lifting.

I remember exactly when I bought them. It was in January 2025 at the St Lawrence Market in Toronto in the winter chill with my dear partner. We were on a slow, snow-laced holiday, wandering and then ducking into cafés to thaw our hands.

The market was a bustling indoor maze, where vendors called out from behind the counters laden with preserves, stacked wheels of artisanal cheese, and rows of sourdough breads still warm to the touch. There were butchers with immaculate displays of marbled cuts, fishmongers arranging their gleaming catch on beds of ice. We drifted from stall to stall, and somewhere between the laughter and the aromas, the little farm animals called out my name.

I was romanticising a version of myself that did not exist. A version of me that cooked Sunday suppers at a glacial pace, where the only urgency meant watching a pink pig struggle to hold up a heavy Dutch oven lid. My imaginary Sunday supper would be yakhni with baby potatoes and whole spices. The farm trio seemed perfect for the job.

I bought them because they were cute. And for a chef, “cute” is a luxury we rarely afford ourselves in a line of fire. Holding the little sheep now, I realise these aren’t just gadgets, they are artefacts of quiet ambition. We often buy tools not for the task they perform, but for the lifestyle they promise. We buy those fancy gym shoes because we want to be runners, or the leather-bound journal because we want to be writers. I bought a silicone pig because I wanted to be a person who had the patience to watch water boil. Back then, these animals promised me a kitchen that was whimsical rather than high-pressure in a place I call home.

I washed the dust off the rooster today. His red matte finish popped against the marble of my counter, looking bright, hopeful, and entirely unnecessary. I’ve decided they aren’t going back into storage. Tonight, I’m not testing a recipe for a new menu or worrying about the next service. I’m making a simple, slow-simmered soup. With shiro miso, some seaweed from the pantry, of course, carrots, and fresh shiitake mushrooms procured from one of my suppliers. All of that with a mound of hot rice cooked in my newest love—a Tiger Japanese rice cooker. Not because I have a column to write or a photo to take, but because the little red rooster deserves to do the job it was made for. And perhaps, for 20 minutes while the steam curls around his silicone feathers, I can try being that patient version of myself again. And while the steam starts to rise, I am going to let the little pink pig or rooster take its spot on the rim of the pot.

As a chef, I spend my life mastering the elements. But as Niyati, maybe I just need to remember to let off a little steam once in a while even if it takes a silicone animal to remind me how.

Niyati Rao is the chef-partner of Ekaa restaurant in Mumbai.