Food for thought and otherwise

So this post is about a book on food.

The book is called “Indian Food A Historical Companion” by K.T.Achaya. I first wrote about this book here. Recently, i wrote about this in telugu here which goes to show that i fell in love with this book. It was infact my birthday gift to myself :P .. Boy oh boy what a gift! :P

“The Hindu” had  two articles on this book long back .. links to that here and here.

I will keep this short partly because i have already written about it once so the initial enthusiasm would have died down obviously ;) . Anyway, the book is about the history of our food as the title says. The book talks about our eating traditions and the paraphernalia around our cooking styles etc from pre-vedic to vedic to modern days. This has got mentions about where all the food we eat today has come from and where all our food customs have come from so on. The book will also change your own idea of globalisation .. once you finish the book you would realise that the kitchen is the best example for globalisation. And if your kitchen itself is so globalised then what is the point harping about protectionism elsewhere ;) ?

Anyway, some of the interesting snippets from the book are as follows:

Mention of Meat eating and meat cooking expertise in vedic scriptures amazed me. Particularly so because i had absolutely no idea about the food of the gods ;) . So as per the book Brahmins of those days had their share of horse meat after the sacrifice during the yagna ;) . Similarly, there is talk about meat of  Deer, Peacock, Porcupine, Rabbit, Rhinoceros, Lizard, Monitor Lizard, Donkey, Camel, Monkey etc :P . So next time you say anything overtly racist about the eating habits of our eastern neighbours then please look back at your own history :D

Then  the book also talks about alcohol consumption across various eras etc. It has some mentions of wine consumption by Lord Rama-Sita as well. A very nice collection of stories these.

Achaya then slowly traces the evolution of vegetarianism in India, the social pressures created by the rise of Buddhist and Jain religions which neccesitated these changes so on.

The best part of the book starts after this. There are so many stories about the export-import of our kitchen items that after sometime your whole idea about swadeshi will be shattered.. if at all there was one in the first place i.e., ;) . I will try and jot down some of those stories.

• Pineapple came to India from SouthAmerica
• Jalebi has Persian and Arab origins
• Cocunut has travelled along the ocean waters from Papua New Guinea and reached india through the waters of Indian Ocean
• Sweet Potato has its origins in Peru
• Rajma and Ragi are again from South America. Infact, the ancient South America-India civilisational links make a fascinating read
• Rice has a east indian-chinese-vietnamese origin
• Sesame Seeds, Mustard Seeds, Brinjal, Cucumber are Indian (Yay!!! :P)
• Ladyfinger or Okhra has come from Africa
• The andhra special “Gongura” is infact from Angola or Sudan it seems :P
• Some citrus fruits like Lemon, Mosambi, Orange and others like Mango also seem to have an Indian origin (Yay!! :P)
• Most of the spices ofcourse seem to belong either to India or Malacca Strait
• Pumpkin came from Mexico and Pomegranate came from Iran/Iraq :P
• Sunflower wasn’t there in Indian till the 1940-70 period until the russians brought it ;)
• Groundnut came from Europe while Soya came from China
• Tomato came to Europe from Mexico in 1550 and reached India in 18th Century
• Potato came from Bolivia to Europe in 1570 and reached India in 1830

Thus, Ladies and Gentleman .. from times immemorial we have been a globalised civilisation :P .. Like they say we were a melting pot of various cultures and traditions and foods thereof. This book has many more such stories.. it is a must read for anyone who loves eating :D .. I think we welcomed all foods and thoroughly Indianised them in the due course .. guess that is how it works for everything else as well.

Indiaaaa .. Incredible Indiaaaa ;)

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