Indian Cuisine; temptation irresistable.

 Modern Indian Cuisine is an adorable cuisine almost all over the world. But it has not reached its present position in a day. There is a long history of it. The geographical position of India has also played a responsible role behind its development. I wish to write quite a few articles on Modern Indian Cuisine and the present one is an introduction of that. Your criticism is what I require for inspiration.

I fell into a great confusion when I first learned that our tongue can only differentiate four tastes; salt, sour, bitter and sweet. The reason of confusion was quite simple; what we call as the taste of a food cannot be explained by these four tastes only, there must be some extras. Later on, I learned that our noses take a vital role in taking the taste of foods. That’s why we fail to take the taste of foods when our noses get clogged in cold. Now it’s quite clear that it’s the aroma or fragrance or smell that constitutes the main part of what we mean by the taste of a delicacy.

Just few months ago I read a travel story that narrates the trip of the writer to the land of the Eskimos. The information made me amazed that modern Eskimos do not reside in igloos rather they live in modern houses and use several modern gadgets. But it was not surprising to me when I read in that article that the cooking of the Eskimos is still in the primitive stage. To learn the basics of cooking requires quite a few hundred years and to elevate cooking to the level of an art, conscious efforts of few millenniums in the process of civilization are required.

 The history of Indian cuisine dates back at least to the time of the Vedas. The words ‘at least’ are used as I have never read anywhere of Harappan cuisine though earthen utensils were discovered in the excavation of Mohenjodaro and Harappa. Just like modern Indian civilization modern Indian cuisine is also the conglomeration of several streams. I don’t know whether any historian has made any research on the History of Indian Cuisine or not, but I think there is ample scope of writing few dozens of Ph.D. papers on it.

What has helped India to become a place of estimable cuisine is the availability of spices in and around this land. Truly, India is a bowl of spices; Saffron of the north to Cardamom of the south, Red Chili of the east to Coriander of the west, what is not available here. The smell of these spices went far away across the seas even in ancient days. Several voyages were set out to discover this ‘land of spices’.

What is now meant by Indian cuisine over the world is actually the cuisine of the Indian subcontinent. It is getting popular day by day with the migration of people of this region to the different parts of the world. Indian curry shops or Indian Restaurants are now available almost all the major cities of Europe and America. But the most amazing thing about Indian cuisine is that the cuisine of a particular region of India differs from that of the other regions. A north Indian man may not feel comfortable with the south Indian food and the vice versa. Besides, there are several varieties of a dish; take ‘Dhosha’(a South Indian dish)  as an example; there are more than hundred varieties of it.  Similarly in Bengal (West Bengal and Bangladesh) dozens of varieties of ‘Hilsa’ Fish dishes are available. The conclusion is simple; it will take your lifetime if you want to taste all the varieties of foods in India.

 Now let me finish this article with two jokes like incidents or incidents like jokes. Both are from my memory of readings. The first one is from the writings of Syed Muztaba Ali and the other from a magazine I have read long ago.

During Second World War an East Bengali family was settled in Germany. On the first day when they started cooking their neighbours wore gas mask out of fear that some kind of chemical weapon was charged upon them.

The second one is related to cricket. England cricket team was on a visit to India in the sixties and a test match was being played at Eden Gardens, Calcutta. India was on the verge of defeat at the end of fourth day which was a very common event in those days. Cricket was not a mere commerce then as it is now. The host team threw a dinner in the honour of the guest team at the Grand Hotel, Calcutta. On the next day India drew the match and the credit was not of any Indian bowler or batsman. It was the famous Bengali dish ‘Prawn Malaikari’ that made few players of the opponent team out of the field. Actually British tongues couldn’t resist themselves from taking the superb taste of the dish but their stomachs declined to bear the load of lobster along with spices and there were few ‘upsets’. Three or four players of England team were busy at dressing room attending natures call while India made the match to a draw.