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Distinct cuisine
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Sample authentic food of the Saraswat community at the South Kanara Food Festival at Dakshin, ITC Kakatiya Sheraton Hotel and Towers.
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THE SARASWAT community today lives in Goa, Karwar, Konkan region and South Kanara. The Chitrapur Saraswats and Gouda Saraswats are the two branches. The Chitrapur Saraswats are traditionally vegetarian, but legend goes they took to eating fish when those living on the banks of the Saraswati centuries ago faced a famine. That is how the community got its name. This community, has its distinct cuisine. Under the community kitchen series, the Dakshin restaurant of the ITC Kakatiya Sheraton is showcasing some Saraswat delicacies as part of the Kanara Jaavan - South Kanara Food Festival till July 26.
Inhabiting a coastal countryside, it is natural for the Saraswats to eat or use sea food - fish, prawns and crab and coconut and jackfruit. "Coconut in fact is used in the gravies and coconut milk is also added in the dishes. Coconut, coriander seeds, red chillies, peppercorns and cumin seeds form the base of the masala. The souring agents are tamarind, triphal (a berry akin to a gooseberry), kokum and raw mangoes (when in season)," says Chef Chalapathi Rao of Dakshin.
The restaurant offers a right balance of veg and non-veg dishes (five in each) which can be ordered a la carte. One can begin with Tomato saar (a kind of rasam which is normally had by the Saraswats with rice but served as a soup here).
UNUSUAL SWEET: Jackfruit pancakes.
Rice is the staple cereal and it can be had with cauliflower batata rasbhaji (cauliflower and potato in a gravy of red chillies, coriander seeds and coconut milk) or golyachi amati (lentil dumpling in a spicy gravy - sort of similar to paruppu urandai kozhambu of Tamil Nadu), ambat (combinations of lentils with spinach, tamarind and coconut), batate sukke (potatoes in a thick gravy) and beeja manoli upkari (tempered tendli - dondakkai with cashewnuts and coconut).
The non-vegetarians have a dish each of prawns (nustiachi gashi - prawns in a gravy of coconut, green chillies, ginger and garlic), chicken (koli sukka - dry chicken with native spices) and crabs kurliche dabdabe (crabmeat tossed in a dry masala). The fish eaters have two dishes - pomfret kalvan (cooked in a gravy of traditional spices with raw mangoes) and banadyachi bujjane (mackerel marinated and deep fried). The fish is brought from Chennai, while prawns are from Visakhapatnam.
There are traditional sweet dishes like phanasachya patholya (jackfruit pancakes steamed in banana leaves), doodhali (moulded dessert of rice, coconut and jaggery - something like phirni) and kelyache muluk (deep fried banana fritters).
If you have not tasted traditional Saraswat food, here's a chance to do so, but make it before July 26.
RADHIKA RAJAMANI
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