Rachana Priyadarshini
In my house, not a single dish is made from any one vegetable. It is customary to make more than one dish from almost every vegetable. For example, if we talk about Parwal available nowadays, mother makes vegetables, bhujia, chutney, chokha, pickle and sweets from it. Similarly, three types of gourd vegetable, pakoras and its peel are made into bhujia. If you don’t feel like cooking vegetables, then while cooking lentils, wash 4-5 potatoes and put them in it. Out of them, 2-3 potatoes are made into chokha and the rest is cut into thin pieces and raita is made by mixing curd, black salt and cumin powder. Chutney is made by roasting dry gram dal on a griddle and grinding it with raw garlic, salt and mustard oil. It means to say that whether the vegetable is expensive or cheap, the plate of food coming out of mother’s kitchen is always full of four-five dishes.
Don’t spoil your budget in appearance
Patna’s housewife Savita Kumari, who has a deep knowledge of food and drink, says- “We have been eating sukhouta i.e. dried vegetables in the form of Badi etc. in the rainy season since childhood. In this season, people used to refrain from eating tomatoes, green vegetables, because insects get into the vegetables in the rainy season. There is also a saying that greens should not be eaten in Sawan and milk and curd should not be eaten in Bhado. Now talking about the inflation of tomatoes these days, so modernity has pushed us into the market of ostentatiousness. Don’t spoil the budget of your house in appearances, because there are neither enough polyhouses nor arrangements to produce the tomato without which you have sleepless nights. Agricultural scientists say that the tomato crop has been damaged due to excessive heat. Due to this production has been affected. Now is the time to plant tomato nursery. Enjoy tomatoes again after two months.
Your plate will be enriched with these measures
Our grandmother’s kitchen was always full. No matter who came at any time, he could not go hungry. Nor was there any compromise with the taste of his plate. However, nowadays all kinds of vegetables are available throughout the year. These off-season vegetables are very expensive and secondly, they also lack natural taste. With some home remedies, you can also keep your food and drink rich by adopting economical methods.
Wash and boil the potatoes and cut them into pieces. Then put them on cotton cloth or gunny and dry them well in the sun and store them in an airtight container. Wash and cook in hot water before use.
When seasonal vegetables like cauliflower, cabbage, peas, onions, garlic, bitter gourd, beans, tomatoes, zucchini, drumstick, fenugreek etc. are cheap, then wash and dry them thoroughly in the sun. They can be used for six months if packed in airtight containers. Before cooking vegetables, boil them in hot water for two minutes.
Cook Chana/Khesari Saag and drain its water and then make small cakes of it and keep it. Add garlic, salt, water and roasted red chillies to it and grind them on a grinder or a grinder. Fun chutney is ready.
Wash chana dal/ masoor dal/ urad dal/ moong dal thoroughly and soak it for 6-7 hours. Now grind them coarsely in the mixie and make them into balls and dry them in the sun. They can be cooked with vegetables like potato, bottle gourd, brinjal, zucchini etc.
Grind peas, bakula, beans etc. and make bigis out of it. Then dry them in the hot sun and pack them in an airtight container. Before cooking, just put it in lukewarm water for a minute and take it out and cook delicious dishes by mixing it with potatoes or greens etc.
Roast chana dal/ moong dal/ peanuts/ dry peas/ dry coriander on a pan. When it cools down, grind it by mixing salt, raw garlic and a little mustard oil. Tasty chutney will be ready.
Sukhota is prepared on a large scale in Türkiye
In Izmir, Turkey, the work of drying tomatoes goes on with great pomp. In India too, if tomato is dried, its paste, juice and other products are made, then the farmers can get full benefit and the prices will not increase due to scarcity. When tomatoes are available cheap, dry them, make powder, store them in an air tight jar and store them in the fridge and use them whenever you want. Similarly, there are many such fruits like guava, custard apple, papaya etc., from which not many products are made in the country, so farmers do not get much profit.
demand of time traditional food
Aruna Tirkey, who runs a tribal food restaurant called ‘Ajam-Emba’ in Ranchi, says- “The demand for rural and tribal food is increasing again. The traditional method of preservation of food items has always been present in the tribal food tradition. We dry many things like flowers, fruits, leaves, fish, meat, raw bamboo (Harua) etc. and use them according to need. In this way, the nutritional value of the food items is not destroyed and their taste also remains intact.
Radha Rani Ambashtha, 68, of Kankarbagh, Patna, says- “We used to start preparing for the rainy season in the summer itself. Used to store the vegetables by drying them. Apart from this, Chanauri (rice balls), Danori (lentil balls), Adauri (Bhua balls), papad, pickles etc. were also prepared and kept. Be it the rainy season or winter, they were used in every season. The new generation seems to be deprived of this tradition, while I still make it as much as possible.
