“My journey across India’s villages gave me a new life,” said Kavya Saxena, a traveller who gave up the comforts of city life and decided to chart unfamiliar territories across the rural areas of East and North-east India. An 8-month-long sojourn across Odisha, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Arunachal Pradesh, and Nagaland’s villages culminated in her making Odisha’s Koraput region her home for over four years.
“Touch-and-go is an injustice to the village’s way of life. It will give you a superficial understanding of how people live, eat, and celebrate. My idea was to feel belonged and make the villagers and their lifestyle my own, ” said Saxena.
She spent a considerable amount of time in the Koraput region, which lies close to Odisha’s border with Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh. Her 4.5-year stay introduced her to the 62 Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs), their unique culinary practices and ways of life.
Step Into The Tribal Kitchens Of Odisha
“A lot of what we aspire for in modern kitchens today has been the norm among people in villages across India for decades,” said Saxena.” She mentioned how tribes across India depend on food for sustenance and nutrition, as opposed to the present-day idea of food that revolves around aesthetics.
Foraging in the surrounding forests and utilising seasonal and local ingredients, such as berries, fruits, and leaves, is the basis of most recipes in these areas.
This philosophy is the foundation of the farm-to-table movement and sustainable cooking, which many acclaimed chefs today are working towards.
Among the flowers used for cooking, Saxena mentioned the mahua flowers, which are primarily utilised by tribes across Central and Eastern India for their food and drinks. Another flower widely used by tribes across Odisha is the agathi (Sesbania grandiflora, also known as the West Indian pea). The flowers and leaves of this plant are cooked as a curry or fried with other vegetables. They are also known for their high nutritional potential.
An example of a vegetable used innovatively is the tumma, or locally foraged bottle gourd in Odisha, which is sun-dried and used as a container. “The pulp of the lauki (bottle gourd in Hindi) is removed, and the rest is sun-dried for it to be used as a glass or container,” Saxena added.
Odisha’s Unique Foraging, Cooking, And Storing Techniques
In addition to ingredients, unique cooking and storage techniques play an equally important role in tribal kitchens. Talking about the Bonda tribes, a highly vulnerable tribe that inhabits the upper highlands of Odisha (a special permit from the state government is required to visit them), Saxena said, “They are star foragers and are known to ferment anything and everything they find in the forests into liquor.”
Diving deeper into the preparation of local brews in Koraput, Saxena explained the prevalence of an on-site distillation process carried out in the terrace fields of the region. “Taking into account the topography of their fields and their in-depth knowledge about it, farmers carry out a clear distillation setup of whatever they are brewing (eg, mahua flowers) on their fields,”
The steam generated during this distillation process must be constantly cooled. The running water on these rice fields facilitates that part of the process. “If such a setup is created at home, then the tedious task of cooling off the steam would have to be carried out manually,” she added.
Another practice common across the Odisha-Andhra and Odisha-Chhattisgarh borders in Koraput is the fermentation of rice. While the process remains the same, the form in which the fermented rice is consumed differs. The former uses rice batter to make thick dosas and thatte idlis, while the latter uses it to make chakuli pithas that are very similar to the chillas of North India.
The proximity to the sea also makes fish and seafood an integral part of people’s diets in Odisha. Sun drying the fish after sprinkling salt on it remains an essential part of preserving it, particularly in the Chilika belt of Odisha. “People store it for over a year, and the fish retains its taste,” Saxena added.
A Look At Arunachal Pradesh’s Cooking Techniques
As you move north from Odisha to Arunachal Pradesh, smoking of meat is a technique that takes centre stage in the kitchens of the North-East Indian state.
Home to over 16 tribes, each of which practices its own way of smoking meat. A standard binding thread among them is the use of bamboo kitchens and their high ceilings.
“Slices and sheets of meat are hung from the ceiling, and these absorb the smoke released from the other cooking and boiling that takes place in the kitchen. This renders a charred, smoky flavour to the meat,” Saxena added. She is also the FICCI president from Arunachal Pradesh.
She shared a common instinct she observed among people across the country—the wise and best use of the resources available to them.
In this context, she spoke about the Apatani tribe in the Ziro Valley of Arunachal Pradesh, who cultivate fish and rice in the same field. “Since the rice fields use up so much water, pockets of this water are used to breed fish. Once the rice is harvested, the fish is also used for cooking,” explained Saxena.
A common feature among people from tribal and rural regions is their ability to make the most of available resources and utilise seasonal ingredients and produce from the surrounding forests to create recipes that provide them with the proper nutrition. Their ability to function sustainably within the limits of their means is a quality that city dwellers must adopt and practice.
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