A new book explores the history, environment, politics, social justice and cultural context of food, with hilarious illustrations
Did you know that samosas arrived in India through the Mughal court of Akbar and that fermented and steamed idlis were originally from Indonesia? Or that there are over 400 edible crab species?
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Something To Chew On, a book by Kalpavriksh, a Pune-based environment action group in Pune, released earlier this month, reveals such lesser-known interesting facts about food. There are no recipes but colourful illustrations that narrates stories of the different aspects of food — cultivation, food processing and even food wastage and its impact on the environment.
“Food is something close to all our hearts. But for most of us urban folks, it’s readily available on our plates; we hardly think about how it got there or how it affects us, and those around us. We have no idea about what people in the rest of the country eat. There are various ways of thinking about food, and we wanted to bring out a book that talked about those,” says Tanya Majmudar, who co-wrote the book with Sujatha Padmanabhan, Sharmila Deo and Shiba Desor; The illustrations are by Rohan Chakravarty.
Although the book is targetted at young readers, it is peppered with information about food, armed with stories and legends related to herbs and plants, and will appeal to anyone interested in food. For instance: The origin of the Dashehari mango: A mango tradesman, who was staying in the house of a monk in Dashehari village in Malihabad, Uttar Pradesh, got into a fight with his host. He threw a mango to the ground in anger and the first tree grew out of its seed. The village still has 200-year-old Dashehari trees.
Much of this information in the book was gleaned through personal experience. “While walking through a vegetable market in Pune, I came across a lady selling big flowers in a basket. I had never seen them before but got a bunch of them and made pakodas as instructed. These were flowers of the humming bird tree, and were delicious and I was told, medicinal too,” shares Deo.
Desor’s favourite stories related to how food travels, and how Indian food is not really Indian. One story that didn't make it to the book was about how the secret of tea was extracted from China and how it spread all over the world.
Email: kvbooks@gmail.com
Cost: 150
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