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Jumpin' beans!
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No wonder the Bangalorean is full of beans these days. It's that time of the year again when the avare kai takes the centre stage and goes into every meal, with the possible exception of morning coffee, observes M.V. CHANDRASEKHAR
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Photo: Sampath Kumar G.P.
SUMMER IS to mango is as winter is to avare kai, at least in Old Mysore area. While the King of Fruits reigns from March to June, the misty mornings of Bangalore herald the singular odour of the avare during December and January, the two months during which the rest of the vegetables might as well go into hibernation. For, the diehard Bangalorean will shed his customary good manners and snub them all in favour of his annual indulgence.
Centre stage
From markets to pushcarts to the dining table, the role of other vegetables is reduced to that of an accompanist, with the avare holding centre stage, from breakfast, through lunch, tea and to dinner.
This aromatic member of the legume family gets into every dish one can think of and even those unthinkable, like the payasam!
One only needs an excuse to entertain this winter visitor. From upma, akki roti or ragi roti at breakfast, rasam and sambar at lunch, usli at tea and leftover rasam at dinner, the oval-shaped bean leaves the Bangalorean with a contentment that only his by-two coffee perhaps gives. This bean gets along perfectly well with non-vegetarian dishes too.
For the uninitiated, the avare may not hold the visual appeal a mound of green peas does, but the bean, harvested from diminutive plants around Bangalore, Mysore, Mandya, Tumkur and Kolar, leaves all its cousins in the legume family green with envy during the season. The climate in these regions, with the cold, misty and dry conditions, is ideal for this plant to flourish. An unseasonal rain and it's cold water on Bangalorean's dreams of a delicious avare year.
It's only natural that Bangaloreans take no chances. They are there when the first heaps land in the market. After a bit of haggling, the first consignment in brought home with ecstasy and ceremony. The yield this year, thankfully, has been good, going by the humungous heaps at the wholesale market in Kalasipalyam. "A kilo sells at Rs. 8 to Rs. 10 and the invasion of this bean usually sends the prices of other vegetables on a downward slide," says Anand, a wholesale merchant. If the chikkad kai, brinjal, knol khol and potatoes find any favour, it's only because they are used as sidekicks to the avare in sambars.
Basavangudi scene
Nowhere is the respect for the avare tradition as high as in Basavangudi. A couple in the area, Aswathnarayan and Sushila Narayan, are making the most of the season like they have been doing over the years. "Our evening walk is incomplete without a visit to the neighbourhood Gandhi Bazaar and the eventual purchase of the avare kai," says Sushila, who, in keeping the times, buys the shelled variety, which has been hitting the markets over the last few seasons. This is one aspect of the tradition that has probably bowed to the march of time. "During our childhood, the family used to sit around a mound of the avare and shell them, taking in the strong aroma," says Aswathnarayan, adding that they used to buy sackfuls at 30 paise a kg.
A typical avare season day at the Narayan household would begin either with the upma, akki roti or ragi roti. The upma is made of coarse rava and spiced with whole pepper, green chillies and jeera. It is garnished with fresh coconut and coriander leaves. Fuelled by avakkai pickle, the day blasts off. Even as the upma begins to settle, the boiled beans are ground and cooked in rasam with some powdered spices. Garlic, tanned in ghee, is served to those who can stomach it.
Through the season, the variety is kept up with akki rotis, ragi rotis, uslis, sambars and rasams to go with either rice or ragi balls and bisi bele bath joining the array.
The avare is also a delicious value addition to non-vegetarian dishes. The season sees the it add a new dimension to mutton gravy and kheema. "I can't wait to add some to mutton and chicken biriyanis, mutton and chicken gravies, kheema, chitrannna, halasaru, vada, pongal, idli, ragi roti and bisi bele bath," says Hamsaveni Nagaraj. It's the aroma that comes through these dishes that avare fans relish.
Dried also
Avare lovers find the commodity too precious to squander it on daily consumption. They have a method of storing it for, yes, a rainy day, when the bean doesn't grow. It is called the hithik bele. It is derived after soaking the shelled beans in water overnight and divesting them of their seed coat the following morning. The naked beans are then sun-bathed for drying and then fried, spiced, salted, stored and savoured when one succumbs to an off-season craving.
Another Bangalorean, Suseelamma, recalls how in the '60s, her family used to buy heaps of the avare to make hithik bele to last till the next season. "Those were the days when my mother-in-law used to make her own spices and cooked the avare over firewood to achieve that elusive flavour," she sighs.
There are certain beliefs revolving around the hithik bele. The seed coat is usually thrown on the road in front of the house. One belief is that the more the seed coats are trampled on by passers by, the tastier the gravy. The other belief is that it keeps off both mosquitoes and evil omens.
TAILPIECE
Overheard near a Basavangudi hotel: "The wife's indulgence with avare kai has begun this year. It's avare in the morning, avare at noon and avare at night. Beats me how the damned bean hasn't yet popped up in my morning coffee."
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