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Prepared with seasonal vegetables, baant is light on the stomach, says
Pushpesh Pant THE word baant translates literally as ‘distribution’ and seems an apt description of this recipe. The gravy is quite thin and the pot-full can stretch across many diners. A non-vegetarian version is prepared ritually and shared on temple precincts after a goat is sacrificed but it is the shaakahari rendering that has always beguiled us. Prepared with simplest ingredients — alu and muli — the dish is exceptionally satisfying. When torai and capsicum are added it dons the garb of a festive dish. The cool and refreshing touch is added by chhachh and absence of the ubiquitous garlic and onion or for that matter tomatoes. Even ginger is eschewed and one can relish the original taste of everything. This cooling recipe is good for the digestive system during the heat wave. It was often prepared at home in the hills of what is now Uttarakhand during the 1950s and early 1960s when the vegetables consumed were always the seasonal produce — and most of the time the choice was limited to what was available. Chhachh was churned at home and used generously in cooking. South of the Vindhyas our Dravidian brethren prepared delicate kozhumbus exploiting its cooling potential — banana stem curry is a remarkable illustration — and it is surprising that we tend to routinely overlook it. The dish may not look stunningly beautiful but is an unalloyed delight in all other aspects — easy to cook, light and wonderfully refreshing. One can adjust the amount of vegetables used according to one’s own preference.
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Ingredients