by Pulkit Singh
As the hot summer breeze scorches off the leaves and grass to a particular shade of ochre and the midday sun beats down relentlessly on Mhow, a remote town bang in the heart of the country, you often hear a man’s loud call of ‘Kulfiiiii’ punctuated by the budd-budd-budd of a Lambretta scooter. His creamy, pista-laden dessert, sold atop his two-wheeler version of an ice-cream truck, has been bringing relief to residents of Mhow since before the 1980s. The town’s tradition demands that every time you hear of him approaching, you rush to the neighbour’s house so the onus of a treat is on them. Perhaps that is why you find groups of people huddled together mid-afternoon, enjoying a cool bite and a warm laugh.
Another state, another region. As you snake your way out of Udhampur – a small town that is all green bits and good people–towards Patnitop, you start climbing the Dogra hills. The thick blanket of foliage, river Tawi– now a quiet stream, now a raging river– and robust waterfalls keep you company. About an hour into the drive, there is a sharp bend in the road. A Masjid stands on one side and on the other side are unassuming tea shops. They offer the most delectable breakfast- makkiki roti, dollops of creamy yoghurt and chutney of chillis.
Or perhaps I could tell you about kalari kulcha, a snack made with kalari, a type of paneer made in this Dogra region of J&K. This cheese is sautéed in its own fat and is filled into small buns with a dense gravy of chole and coriander chutney. A cube of butter is added with a final flourish. As the melted richness of the fat mingles with the spices of the gravy, and you take your first bite of the kulcha tasting all the blast of flavours with a crispness of texture that the slightly pungent kalari provides, you know this would not taste as delicious anywhere but here, in the foothills in Udhampur.
When one pauses to think about it, India has an entire food spectrum to offer. From the masala chai to filter coffee, from laddoos to namkeens, from butter chicken to patrani machchi, from mutton biryani to garlic naan, from shrikhand to rasagulla – what flavour do we not patronize? Rasam for flu, seviyan for Id, modak for Ganesh Chathurthi, ajwain ladoos for lactating mothers, panjiri for winters, aampanna for summer and pickles for the year-round – did we miss out on anything?
Let us travel westwards to Kutch. I mentioned to the family that I was staying with in Bhuj that I wanted to taste authentic fare from the region. The next day I was very kindly invited into the home of a Rabari (the gypsies of the white desert) family. Amidst the innumerable bajra rotis, each that came with its own generous lump of home-churned butter, authentic kutchikadhi, curries and vegetables, I was told about jalebi and fafda, a standard Gujrati breakfast. Then we spoke of dabeli, a kutchi snack that the local shop owners whip up in a matter of seconds. In a medium-sized pav is spooned a mixture of potato, pomegranate seeds, namkeens and three kinds of chutney. What you have is a blast of sweet, sour, heat and crunch in every bite.
Another endearing thing I found about Kutch was the arid landscape dotted with tea stalls, which serve the milkiest tea ever. For a state that has banned alcohol, tea becomes their choice of poison. If you are fortunate like me, you will find an old poet, manning his little tea stall of thatch and tin, who, as he brews his tea leaves and cleans the little glass tumblers, regales you with his poems from memory because he never learnt to write.
Look east and a heady whiff of steamed momos wraps you up in a warm embrace. West Bengal’s Darjeeling and Kalimpong districts are home to Gorkhas – the race that inspired Field Marshall Sam Manekshaw, our most famous military man, to comment, ‘If anyone tells you he is never afraid, he is a liar or he is a Gorkha.’ While this brave tribe of people has made momos a part of our everyday vocabulary, I’d say it is their sel roti(ring-shaped bread made with rice flour, sugar, ghee and cloves) and gorkhali chutney (a concoction of potatoes, sesame seeds, onions, tamarind and a slew of other ingredients) that steal the thunder. As a tenant with a Gorkha family in Kalimpong, I was fortunate to enjoy their hospitality on Dassai celebrations. The experience of the festival and the food is quite incomparable.
My life is interspersed with food stories like these. I learnt to appreciate cooking and eating in the laps of my grandmothers. How one chopped, sliced or julienned the vegetables affected how they tasted. The timing and sequence of adding the ingredients were equally essential. Cooking and eating food was akin to meditation. They needed love and attention. Even making a cup of tea was a ritual, not a habit. You added the basil leaves, cloves and cinnamon and let it simmer with the tea leaves for just the right amount of time before adding a dash of milk and voila! you had nirvana in a cup.
This love for food was mirrored in my adopted family. My husband, a more enthusiastic foodie than me, received this passion for exploring new flavours from his parents. When I married into this Telugu household, I was promptly shown how to make a mean cup of filter coffee. And then I was given a peek into Andhra pachchadis and podis. My life has never been the same.
As a north Indian, my experience of food from the south was limited to dosas and idlis. I was left wide-eyed – and salivating, might I add–when I found there are about forty kinds of just chutneys. As a newly married foodie, this was as exciting as it could be. I learnt about pesarattu, paniyaram, avakkai, kandipodi, pulusu and pulihora.
As I live around this country more, in the smaller towns where the fabric of society, culture, brotherhood is snugger, I realise that each of us contributes to this blanket of bonhomie and fraternity. We make this country what it is – with our food, with our kindness and with our prejudices.
The India that I have travelled through, lived in, hurt for and loved much is more than the bad news. India, this nation of footnotes and exceptions, is also more than food, I know. But the easiest way to capture the ethos of this nation is to meet someone and be invited to tea or for a meal within a few moments. That is who we are – a nation that attempts to treat its guests like gods. With its unabashed generosity and its indefatigable hospitality, it is a country that provides its own kind of flavour to the world.
Picture from flickr.com/photos/simihegde/
