The Kolkata Report #13
As a child, I was never given spicy food to eat. I suppose much of my early childhood was spent in being rather sickly and suffering from a plethora of major and minor illnesses. My poor mother, in desperation fed me all kinds of foods suitable for invalids and others in like situations, in the hopes of strengthening my constitution. It was rather sad that she, an excellent and creative cook, kept such insipid pabulum for me, while everyone else had wonderful foods. After all that was said and done, my refusal to eat such foods as were ear marked for me, got me firmly labelled as a picky eater. There are few creatures in the world as anxious and desperate as mothers from South Asia, that feel constantly that their children are imminently facing death from starvation, between meals. And my dear mother, was a champion amongst them. Her panacea for the evil of my indifferent appetite was a large glass of hot milk, which I loathed. Other than that, various egg preparations, chicken, meat and of course fish (after all we are Bengalis, and fish is our staple food), were routinely made in stews, roasts, soups and made to slip down my gullet. There was a point to it. I suffered from terrible and debilitating bouts of tonsillitis, which made eating difficult. But a tonsillectomy at age 6, made history of all that. Yet, my appetite remained iffy. When I was nearly 8 years old, I was packed off to a boarding school in the mountains, where I learned to eat voraciously, along with all the other children.
A few years later, I was yanked out of that school and began to attend a new school in the big city of Calcutta, where my father had just been posted. Finally, my mother exclaimed with satisfaction, we were in a civilized place with civilized schools.
By now, I was eating at par with all others of my age group. I did not particularly enjoy the sandwiches we ate for lunch at school, but every now and then, I would poach some Chinese sausages from my friend Katy's lunch box. They cured the sausages at home, along with chilli and perhaps soy sauces. Everything from her lunch box was indescribably delicious. For a while, the school enabled us to eat at the adjacent sister college, where my sister studied. There was a canteen there, that served chicken cutlets, french fries and my great favorite, baked beans. At first I was gawky with using a knife and fork, but driven by hunger, I mastered the use of utensils quickly.
Calcutta was a cosmopolitan city with a rich heritage of cuisines not just of the four corners of India, but also of the Chinese, English, Portuguese, Dutch, French, Danish, Middle Eastern and Italian. My mother cooked in the distinctive styles of East Bengali foods, the delicately spiced Dhakai, the gutsier Barisali and the fiery spicy Chittagong styles. We also loved the southern Indian flavours, that she cooked rather well, having learned that new cuisine as a new bride in south India, The best foods, were however, the simplest fish curry and rice, the robust mutton curries and dals of northern India and fresh hot wheaten phulka pan breads. My mother, like many Bengali mothers, believed that small fishes like pabda, koi, tangra and mourala, were the best foods for building good brains in children. 'Phosphorus', she claimed, 'That's what you eat in small fish , that brings you brain power'. Some day, a scientific paper may lend credence to her claim, though we just ate it all because it tasted good.
We had said goodbye to food for invalids, with such goodies like 'gawla bhat' (a soft gruelly rice dish with boiled eggs and vegetables), and 'pish pash' (another gruelly rice dish, an Anglo Indian invention, with chicken and sometimes lamb, cooked with whole spices to extreme tenderness). We also bid goodbye mercifully to a horrible raw egg smoothie, called an Egg Flip, which claimed to give its drinkers an immediate energy boost, if they did not suffer from immediate nausea.
At about this time, my dear father, who had spent his early teenage years in north Calcutta, took to rediscovering the rich culinary heritage of that part of town. He found in me, a willing accomplice in sampling the delights of the kitchen and table. Anadi Cabin's Moghlai Paratha, Basanta Cabin's Kabiraji Cutlet (right across the street from his Alma Mater, and for a few months, mine- The Scottish Church College), the nameless countless places that sold fresh fritters called Telebhaja and Fuluri, the delectable Jhal Muri, spiced puffed rice, and many others. Then there was this shop that specialized in exotic flavoured 'Sharbats'. Every few years, it had changed ownership, but its name always varied between two; it was either Paragon or Paradise. Of course both were apt, and its products, a dozen or so of flavoured and natural fruit beverages, unfailingly delighted.
The slow incursion of Gujarati and Marwari snacks and farsan into other areas of the city, followed the spread of these communities out of their usual homes in the Burrabazar area. The chaat and Puchka man became a common place sight, though their products made of unhygienic ingredients, sickened many. Even so, it was impossible to resist the siren call of these hot and spicy foods, eaten with the same thrill of perhaps encountering and escaping from a man eating tiger in the forest. With a silent prayer to the Gods for protection against gastroeneritis, food poisoning and 'jaundice', we gorged on this stuff, anyway.
Across from the Dhakuria Lakes, on a sidewalk by the Vivekananda Park, there now is the establishment of one Dilipda. He is a celebrity Fuchka maker (the name Puchka had evolved into Fuchka in some thirty years). He is much sought after, flown across the country for celebrity parties and even for creating chaats for the erstwhile British Prime Minister David Cameron, on his visit to Kolkata (yes the name Calcutta has also changed to Kolkata). He returns to the humble sidewalk stall, and with unfailing courtesy, serves you the incredibly delicious, mouth tingling Fuchkas. his Fuchka water is is made with bottled water, fresh tamarind and a blend of spices, that his father perfected. He gives you a hand sanitizer and also some water to wash your hands with at the start and finish of your eating adventure.
When we moved to south Calcutta in the 1960s, a fledgling television program debuted. Everyone rushed to buy the black and white ECTV company brand televisions, sometimes waitlisted for months. Every Thursday, there used to be a program called 'Phool Khiley HaiN Gulshan Gulshan' (Beautiful flowers are blooming), hosted by an ebullient host called Tabassum, whose coy mannerisms drove many wild with joy and others take a derisive position. However, everyone watched replays of song and dance sequences from popular movies, with the same avidity as people watch the final games of major sports tournaments.
On those days, and when no one felt like cooking, we would send our cook to a local South Indian dorm and kitchen, called the Ramakrishna Lunch Home, which sold a small quantity of food to the public, other than what was needed for its residents. The food was well cooked and served in clean premises. Last week, I walked down past the place at 8 pm on a Sunday evening. A crowd waited on the sidewalk, with tickets for the waiting line. The Manager emerged and called out ' Number Forty Seven, for 5 people!'
I guess it isn't a small lunch home any more, but lives on as an iconic restaurant with consistently good though limited menu, holding its own against fancier eateries and a nod to the adage- Good quality is the hall mark of success.
A number of Bengali eateries have also sprouted up all over, with a few chain restaurants like Bhaja Hari Manna (named after a famous 'eating' character from Bengali literature), 6 Ballygunj Place. They do serve great food, the former calling itself a Pice Hotels, which were humble eateries serving homestyle foods cheaply, for labourers, and sailors (Calcutta is a sea faring port city, though many miles upstream from the Bay of Bengal). However, my favorite Bengali Restaurant will always be Kewpie's, which pioneered this food trend. Named after its late owner, who acquired this name as a child, undoubtedly because she looked like a Kewpie doll, this restaurant, for me, is the gold standard in Bengali cuisine. You must eat Shukto here, to know what awesome is.
I had in an earlier report, explored the rich heritage of Bengali confectionary and have explored other types of foods in this. I know I have not covered all the wonderful eateries that serve the mughlai and Awadhi style of foods- yes, they are very different. The deposed Nawab of Awadh (Oudh to the British), Wajid Ali Shah, spent the waning years of his life in this city, in a palace near the water front. To his cooks go the credit of the Calcutta Biriyani, a distinctly different recipe and taste as well the inclusion of potatoes in the dish. Those foods, still live on in places like Arsalan, Aminia and many other nameless Biriyani places scattered all over the Kidderpore and Park Circus areas.
At the end of the day- mothers kitchens everywhere rule.
As my late grandmother used to say, about my foodie cousin, Haruda, 'Where Maida and Ghee have come together to form Luchi, Haru is definitely to be found there'. And there are Harudas everywhere on every weekend morning when Luchi Torkari reigns supreme!
May 25, 2018
As a child, I was never given spicy food to eat. I suppose much of my early childhood was spent in being rather sickly and suffering from a plethora of major and minor illnesses. My poor mother, in desperation fed me all kinds of foods suitable for invalids and others in like situations, in the hopes of strengthening my constitution. It was rather sad that she, an excellent and creative cook, kept such insipid pabulum for me, while everyone else had wonderful foods. After all that was said and done, my refusal to eat such foods as were ear marked for me, got me firmly labelled as a picky eater. There are few creatures in the world as anxious and desperate as mothers from South Asia, that feel constantly that their children are imminently facing death from starvation, between meals. And my dear mother, was a champion amongst them. Her panacea for the evil of my indifferent appetite was a large glass of hot milk, which I loathed. Other than that, various egg preparations, chicken, meat and of course fish (after all we are Bengalis, and fish is our staple food), were routinely made in stews, roasts, soups and made to slip down my gullet. There was a point to it. I suffered from terrible and debilitating bouts of tonsillitis, which made eating difficult. But a tonsillectomy at age 6, made history of all that. Yet, my appetite remained iffy. When I was nearly 8 years old, I was packed off to a boarding school in the mountains, where I learned to eat voraciously, along with all the other children.
A few years later, I was yanked out of that school and began to attend a new school in the big city of Calcutta, where my father had just been posted. Finally, my mother exclaimed with satisfaction, we were in a civilized place with civilized schools.
By now, I was eating at par with all others of my age group. I did not particularly enjoy the sandwiches we ate for lunch at school, but every now and then, I would poach some Chinese sausages from my friend Katy's lunch box. They cured the sausages at home, along with chilli and perhaps soy sauces. Everything from her lunch box was indescribably delicious. For a while, the school enabled us to eat at the adjacent sister college, where my sister studied. There was a canteen there, that served chicken cutlets, french fries and my great favorite, baked beans. At first I was gawky with using a knife and fork, but driven by hunger, I mastered the use of utensils quickly.
Calcutta was a cosmopolitan city with a rich heritage of cuisines not just of the four corners of India, but also of the Chinese, English, Portuguese, Dutch, French, Danish, Middle Eastern and Italian. My mother cooked in the distinctive styles of East Bengali foods, the delicately spiced Dhakai, the gutsier Barisali and the fiery spicy Chittagong styles. We also loved the southern Indian flavours, that she cooked rather well, having learned that new cuisine as a new bride in south India, The best foods, were however, the simplest fish curry and rice, the robust mutton curries and dals of northern India and fresh hot wheaten phulka pan breads. My mother, like many Bengali mothers, believed that small fishes like pabda, koi, tangra and mourala, were the best foods for building good brains in children. 'Phosphorus', she claimed, 'That's what you eat in small fish , that brings you brain power'. Some day, a scientific paper may lend credence to her claim, though we just ate it all because it tasted good.
We had said goodbye to food for invalids, with such goodies like 'gawla bhat' (a soft gruelly rice dish with boiled eggs and vegetables), and 'pish pash' (another gruelly rice dish, an Anglo Indian invention, with chicken and sometimes lamb, cooked with whole spices to extreme tenderness). We also bid goodbye mercifully to a horrible raw egg smoothie, called an Egg Flip, which claimed to give its drinkers an immediate energy boost, if they did not suffer from immediate nausea.
At about this time, my dear father, who had spent his early teenage years in north Calcutta, took to rediscovering the rich culinary heritage of that part of town. He found in me, a willing accomplice in sampling the delights of the kitchen and table. Anadi Cabin's Moghlai Paratha, Basanta Cabin's Kabiraji Cutlet (right across the street from his Alma Mater, and for a few months, mine- The Scottish Church College), the nameless countless places that sold fresh fritters called Telebhaja and Fuluri, the delectable Jhal Muri, spiced puffed rice, and many others. Then there was this shop that specialized in exotic flavoured 'Sharbats'. Every few years, it had changed ownership, but its name always varied between two; it was either Paragon or Paradise. Of course both were apt, and its products, a dozen or so of flavoured and natural fruit beverages, unfailingly delighted.
The slow incursion of Gujarati and Marwari snacks and farsan into other areas of the city, followed the spread of these communities out of their usual homes in the Burrabazar area. The chaat and Puchka man became a common place sight, though their products made of unhygienic ingredients, sickened many. Even so, it was impossible to resist the siren call of these hot and spicy foods, eaten with the same thrill of perhaps encountering and escaping from a man eating tiger in the forest. With a silent prayer to the Gods for protection against gastroeneritis, food poisoning and 'jaundice', we gorged on this stuff, anyway.
Across from the Dhakuria Lakes, on a sidewalk by the Vivekananda Park, there now is the establishment of one Dilipda. He is a celebrity Fuchka maker (the name Puchka had evolved into Fuchka in some thirty years). He is much sought after, flown across the country for celebrity parties and even for creating chaats for the erstwhile British Prime Minister David Cameron, on his visit to Kolkata (yes the name Calcutta has also changed to Kolkata). He returns to the humble sidewalk stall, and with unfailing courtesy, serves you the incredibly delicious, mouth tingling Fuchkas. his Fuchka water is is made with bottled water, fresh tamarind and a blend of spices, that his father perfected. He gives you a hand sanitizer and also some water to wash your hands with at the start and finish of your eating adventure.
When we moved to south Calcutta in the 1960s, a fledgling television program debuted. Everyone rushed to buy the black and white ECTV company brand televisions, sometimes waitlisted for months. Every Thursday, there used to be a program called 'Phool Khiley HaiN Gulshan Gulshan' (Beautiful flowers are blooming), hosted by an ebullient host called Tabassum, whose coy mannerisms drove many wild with joy and others take a derisive position. However, everyone watched replays of song and dance sequences from popular movies, with the same avidity as people watch the final games of major sports tournaments.
On those days, and when no one felt like cooking, we would send our cook to a local South Indian dorm and kitchen, called the Ramakrishna Lunch Home, which sold a small quantity of food to the public, other than what was needed for its residents. The food was well cooked and served in clean premises. Last week, I walked down past the place at 8 pm on a Sunday evening. A crowd waited on the sidewalk, with tickets for the waiting line. The Manager emerged and called out ' Number Forty Seven, for 5 people!'
I guess it isn't a small lunch home any more, but lives on as an iconic restaurant with consistently good though limited menu, holding its own against fancier eateries and a nod to the adage- Good quality is the hall mark of success.
A number of Bengali eateries have also sprouted up all over, with a few chain restaurants like Bhaja Hari Manna (named after a famous 'eating' character from Bengali literature), 6 Ballygunj Place. They do serve great food, the former calling itself a Pice Hotels, which were humble eateries serving homestyle foods cheaply, for labourers, and sailors (Calcutta is a sea faring port city, though many miles upstream from the Bay of Bengal). However, my favorite Bengali Restaurant will always be Kewpie's, which pioneered this food trend. Named after its late owner, who acquired this name as a child, undoubtedly because she looked like a Kewpie doll, this restaurant, for me, is the gold standard in Bengali cuisine. You must eat Shukto here, to know what awesome is.
I had in an earlier report, explored the rich heritage of Bengali confectionary and have explored other types of foods in this. I know I have not covered all the wonderful eateries that serve the mughlai and Awadhi style of foods- yes, they are very different. The deposed Nawab of Awadh (Oudh to the British), Wajid Ali Shah, spent the waning years of his life in this city, in a palace near the water front. To his cooks go the credit of the Calcutta Biriyani, a distinctly different recipe and taste as well the inclusion of potatoes in the dish. Those foods, still live on in places like Arsalan, Aminia and many other nameless Biriyani places scattered all over the Kidderpore and Park Circus areas.
At the end of the day- mothers kitchens everywhere rule.
As my late grandmother used to say, about my foodie cousin, Haruda, 'Where Maida and Ghee have come together to form Luchi, Haru is definitely to be found there'. And there are Harudas everywhere on every weekend morning when Luchi Torkari reigns supreme!
May 25, 2018
