How to eat local when not a local. Powered by millets and sprouts and all things good.

Usal with pav

One of the driving principles of what I call #LittleJackHornerMeals, the diet plan that I devised for myself a couple of years back in an attempt to eat more sensibly and age appropriately, was to ‘eat local.’ To introduce a higher proportion of local grains and vegetable produce and seafood into my diet: and spices and cooking methods too.

Now, thing is that I am a Bengali living in Mumbai. Hence ‘local,’ in this case Maharashtrian food, is not native to me. So what I often do is buy millets like jowar and bajra or ingredients such as peanuts and grated coconut which are used here and request our cook Banu (when she comes to work as she bunks oftern) to cook with this. She is a Muslim from Bandra and earlier we had got her to make dishes such as kebabs, pulaos, dal gosht and kaleji (liver) masala which are associated with the local Muslim community. However, her roots lie in Sholapur in Maharashtra and she has relatives there whom she visits. She uses techniques learnt there at times when I request her to make dishes such as bhaakri (millet bread), fish and egg coconut curries and most recently usal. She faces a bit of a challenge translating those dishes in our kitchen as cooking techniques used in the village are different from what we can manage here but over the years has made an effort to improve. Especially when I have encouraged her to cook dishes from her home repertoire. She is not a trained cook but this makes a big difference to what she cooks and has enriched our menu at home.

This post stitches together two Instagram posts from Friday to illustrate my point.

Tea on Friday

This tasted so much better than a few years back when I  would get Banu sprouts and ask her to boil it with salt & pepper and add lime juice later.

‘I realised this evening that usal is a nice way to have ones quota of sprouts and makes for a nice evening snack too. For those who do not know, usal is a Maharashtrian gravy based dish made with a mix of legumes and sprouts. The components and recipes of which vary from region to region within the state. As do the spice, sweet, salt and sourness levels. When farsan/ namkeen is sprinkled on it, it becomes misal I think and the world I am told connotes ‘mixture’. Traditionally this was paired with roti/ bhakris/ handmade chapatis. Now, thanks to the vada pav revolution of the 1960s on the streets of Mumbai, which made pav more acceptable in Maharashtrian homes (unlike earlier where a distance was kept as it was made in Goan and Irani bakeries), misal and usal is often paired with pav. The combination we non-Maharashtrians are more familiar with.

Disclaimer: What I’ve written is on usal based on my observations and not any expertise on the subject

Lunch on Friday

Clockwise: Lauki, bajra bhaakri, koshimbir, chawli

‘If you thought my dinner (lamb and feta burger with fries from Smoke House Deli) was indulgent, well lunch gave balance.

Lauki in singdana chutney. Bottle gourd cooked in a roasted crushed peanut and red chilli base. Chawli. Black eyed peas. Bajra bhaakri. Roasted millet flat bread.

A Maharashtrian #littlejackhornermeals lunch by our cook Banu. She asked me how the lau posto she made recently was (the salt was a wee bit under) and that made me give her specific feedback on the last few dishes she had made and how she could have improved on them. Feedback worked. Lunch was good. I made a koshimbir (raita) to complete the set.’

To answer the question I raised in the headline. Having an open mind would be a good way to start!

Dinner from SWC was so good. When we order in, we order in style!