From crashing East Indian food-saturated open houses to the joy of indulging in forbidden fairground classics, childhood memories of wonton gluttony come to the fore on this first day of the annual September Bandra Feast—the crowning glory of the Queen of Mumbai’s suburbs!
By Raul Dias
As you read this, I’m probably dying. Yes, dying in anticipation for an annual Sunday lunch feast of epic proportions that I’m about to indulge in at the home of our dear friends, the Gonsalves family, as I have been doing so since I was a toddler. Their quaint wooden cottage is nestled in the meandering alleyways of the Chuim Gaonthan. The latter, one of the last old East Indian Villages of its kind in the Queen of Mumbai’s suburbs, Bandra. A rare one that hasn’t fallen prey to unscrupulous ‘land sharks’ waiting to raze it to the ground, only to replace it with ugly high-rise apartment blocks.
Bedecked in a thousand twinkling fairy lights, and festooned with colourful banners and streamers, the entire little village will soon erupt into a free-for-all feeding frenzy. For it is on today’s 8th of September Feast of the Nativity of Mary aka. Bandra Feast, when the gaonthan’s generous denizens open up their doors and hearts to all those desirous of some true-blue East Indian nosh.
Some of the most potent food memories of my growing up years have been fertilised by the treats—some approved and most forbidden—that I’d indulge in while attending the Bandra Feast and its fun-filled spin-off, the Bandra Fair. But more on those a little later.
The Back Story
The real saga behind the Bandra Feast begins a few hundred meters away from the Chuim Gaonthan at the Basilica of Our Lady of The Mount overlooking the famous, Bollywood star home-infested neighbourhood of Bandstand. Simply known as Mount Mary’s, this grand, Gothic edifice also plays the greatest role in this “noshtalgic narrative”. It is believed that the church was established in the mid-1700s, soon after an idol of the Virgin Mary was found floating in the waters of the Arabian Sea off the Bandra coast.
Interestingly, this was a few years after a fisherman from the local Koli (as Mumbai’s indigenous East Indian community was called then) had prophesised the finding of said idol. Many subsequent iterations of the church later, the basilica as we know it today was built in 1904. It is since then that the Bandra Feast has been actively celebrated come September every year with copious amounts of food as its lynchpin.
Think Christmas celebrations combined with those of Easter, then multiplied tenfold. That’s how important this feast is to the Catholic East Indians of Bandra. One that goes on for seven whole days, beginning on the Sunday following the 8th of September.
Worms and Beedis
Till I was around 12 or so, I’d never miss an opportunity of going to the Bandra Fair. Mum and Dad would make sure we’d first pay obeisance at the basilica, lighting a candle for whatever we wanted along with making other supplications. Then, we’d descend down the hundred or so stone steps at the eastern side of the church to get to what I believed to be then the best part of the feast—the fair.
The wide stairway would be dotted on either side by vendors selling all sorts of assorted kitschy tat, from fake rubber lizards to soapy bubble dispensers. But my eyes would always be fixed on forbidden sweets like the tapioca flour- and jaggery-based, gnarly, twig-shaped keedio beedios (literally worms and beedis), the sugar-coated peanuts and the luridly coloured slabs of translucent Bombay halwa. Strangely, the only two things that we were ever allowed to indulge in were the pink guava cheese sweets made and sold by a tiny, snow-white haired Goan lady and the jaw-busting sesame chikki from the stall of a well-known store in Lonavala that my father approved of.
Meat Feast
Sweet binge done, we’d exit the steps and make our way down the assorted fair games- and Ferris wheel-flanked Chapel Road towards the dead end of the fair which was always the September Gardens food court held in the grounds of the Mount Carmel Church. Here, we’d eat a few savoury snacks like beef mince-filled potato chops and mutton pan rolls bought off a gaggle of indulgent old aunties manning their tiny food stalls. Then it would be off chez Gonsalves for the legendary lunch feast made up of dishes that reflect the unique hybrid Portuguese-meets-Marathi, East Indian cuisine.
Now, the axis around which most savoury East Indian dishes pivot is the all-important bottle masala. Made from an insanely wide range of spices—with cumin, coriander and chili powders headlining—this mainstay is packed tightly into amber-hued beer bottles and hence its rather intriguing name. And it is this masala, that, along with sautéed onions and slit fresh green chilies, makes the East Indian version of the rich Indo-Portuguese pork stew sorpotel different from its Goan counterpart. The sorpotel—along with two other Bandra Feast staples of the coconut milk-based mutton lonvas and chicken khuddi curry—is best mopped up with crispy, hot fugia balls.
Made from a slurry of flour, yeast, coconut milk and eggs (and named after the Marathi word for balloon—fugga) fugias are the de facto East Indian fried bread no celebration is ever complete without. As a child, I’d waltz right into Aunty Edna Gonsalves’s kitchen to see her create the mini balloons by squeezing the stretchy batter in the web of her hand between the thumb and forefinger and plopping the raw fugias into hot oil to fry till golden perfection was achieved.
But the two most important table toppers at any Bandra Feast have got to be my all-time favourite of the stuffed whole roast suckling pig. And a dish that I hated as a child but have now come to love over the years—the supremely spicy duck moile curry. Both once again made using the ubiquitous bottle masala.
And both, just like all the other East Indian goodies, reflecting that generously divine Bandra Feast vibe!
SUNDAY RECIPE
Mutton Lonvas
INGREDIENTS:
Mutton (cubed, bone in pieces) 500 gms
White pumpkin (peeled and cut into cubes) 500 gms
Garlic (crushed) 8 flakes
Coconut milk 150 ml
Bottle masala 2 tbsp
Tamarind pulp 2 tbsp
Ghee 2 tbsp
Salt ½ tsp
Water 2 cups
METHOD:
1. Par boil the mutton with water and salt and set aside.
2. In a medium sized saucepan heat the ghee on a medium flame and fry the crushed garlic, making sure to not brown it too much.
3. Add the bottle masala to the garlic and fry for a few minutes till fragrant.
4. Add the cubed pumpkin and mutton along with its residual stock and cook for another five to seven minutes, still on medium flame.
5. When the pumpkin is cooked, add the coconut milk and the tamarind pulp. Adjust the salt (if needed) and simmer for a few minutes.
6. Serve hot with fugias or bread rolls.
The Mumbai-based writer and restaurant reviewer is passionate about food, travel and luxury, not necessarily in that order.
(An edited version of this article first appeared in the 8th September 2019 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 12 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/food/eat-pray-repeat/article29360830.ece)
By Raul Dias
As you read this, I’m probably dying. Yes, dying in anticipation for an annual Sunday lunch feast of epic proportions that I’m about to indulge in at the home of our dear friends, the Gonsalves family, as I have been doing so since I was a toddler. Their quaint wooden cottage is nestled in the meandering alleyways of the Chuim Gaonthan. The latter, one of the last old East Indian Villages of its kind in the Queen of Mumbai’s suburbs, Bandra. A rare one that hasn’t fallen prey to unscrupulous ‘land sharks’ waiting to raze it to the ground, only to replace it with ugly high-rise apartment blocks.
Bedecked in a thousand twinkling fairy lights, and festooned with colourful banners and streamers, the entire little village will soon erupt into a free-for-all feeding frenzy. For it is on today’s 8th of September Feast of the Nativity of Mary aka. Bandra Feast, when the gaonthan’s generous denizens open up their doors and hearts to all those desirous of some true-blue East Indian nosh.
Some of the most potent food memories of my growing up years have been fertilised by the treats—some approved and most forbidden—that I’d indulge in while attending the Bandra Feast and its fun-filled spin-off, the Bandra Fair. But more on those a little later.
The Back Story
The real saga behind the Bandra Feast begins a few hundred meters away from the Chuim Gaonthan at the Basilica of Our Lady of The Mount overlooking the famous, Bollywood star home-infested neighbourhood of Bandstand. Simply known as Mount Mary’s, this grand, Gothic edifice also plays the greatest role in this “noshtalgic narrative”. It is believed that the church was established in the mid-1700s, soon after an idol of the Virgin Mary was found floating in the waters of the Arabian Sea off the Bandra coast.
Interestingly, this was a few years after a fisherman from the local Koli (as Mumbai’s indigenous East Indian community was called then) had prophesised the finding of said idol. Many subsequent iterations of the church later, the basilica as we know it today was built in 1904. It is since then that the Bandra Feast has been actively celebrated come September every year with copious amounts of food as its lynchpin.
Think Christmas celebrations combined with those of Easter, then multiplied tenfold. That’s how important this feast is to the Catholic East Indians of Bandra. One that goes on for seven whole days, beginning on the Sunday following the 8th of September.
Worms and Beedis
Till I was around 12 or so, I’d never miss an opportunity of going to the Bandra Fair. Mum and Dad would make sure we’d first pay obeisance at the basilica, lighting a candle for whatever we wanted along with making other supplications. Then, we’d descend down the hundred or so stone steps at the eastern side of the church to get to what I believed to be then the best part of the feast—the fair.
The wide stairway would be dotted on either side by vendors selling all sorts of assorted kitschy tat, from fake rubber lizards to soapy bubble dispensers. But my eyes would always be fixed on forbidden sweets like the tapioca flour- and jaggery-based, gnarly, twig-shaped keedio beedios (literally worms and beedis), the sugar-coated peanuts and the luridly coloured slabs of translucent Bombay halwa. Strangely, the only two things that we were ever allowed to indulge in were the pink guava cheese sweets made and sold by a tiny, snow-white haired Goan lady and the jaw-busting sesame chikki from the stall of a well-known store in Lonavala that my father approved of.
Meat Feast
Sweet binge done, we’d exit the steps and make our way down the assorted fair games- and Ferris wheel-flanked Chapel Road towards the dead end of the fair which was always the September Gardens food court held in the grounds of the Mount Carmel Church. Here, we’d eat a few savoury snacks like beef mince-filled potato chops and mutton pan rolls bought off a gaggle of indulgent old aunties manning their tiny food stalls. Then it would be off chez Gonsalves for the legendary lunch feast made up of dishes that reflect the unique hybrid Portuguese-meets-Marathi, East Indian cuisine.
Now, the axis around which most savoury East Indian dishes pivot is the all-important bottle masala. Made from an insanely wide range of spices—with cumin, coriander and chili powders headlining—this mainstay is packed tightly into amber-hued beer bottles and hence its rather intriguing name. And it is this masala, that, along with sautéed onions and slit fresh green chilies, makes the East Indian version of the rich Indo-Portuguese pork stew sorpotel different from its Goan counterpart. The sorpotel—along with two other Bandra Feast staples of the coconut milk-based mutton lonvas and chicken khuddi curry—is best mopped up with crispy, hot fugia balls.
Made from a slurry of flour, yeast, coconut milk and eggs (and named after the Marathi word for balloon—fugga) fugias are the de facto East Indian fried bread no celebration is ever complete without. As a child, I’d waltz right into Aunty Edna Gonsalves’s kitchen to see her create the mini balloons by squeezing the stretchy batter in the web of her hand between the thumb and forefinger and plopping the raw fugias into hot oil to fry till golden perfection was achieved.
But the two most important table toppers at any Bandra Feast have got to be my all-time favourite of the stuffed whole roast suckling pig. And a dish that I hated as a child but have now come to love over the years—the supremely spicy duck moile curry. Both once again made using the ubiquitous bottle masala.
And both, just like all the other East Indian goodies, reflecting that generously divine Bandra Feast vibe!
SUNDAY RECIPE
Mutton Lonvas
INGREDIENTS:
Mutton (cubed, bone in pieces) 500 gms
White pumpkin (peeled and cut into cubes) 500 gms
Garlic (crushed) 8 flakes
Coconut milk 150 ml
Bottle masala 2 tbsp
Tamarind pulp 2 tbsp
Ghee 2 tbsp
Salt ½ tsp
Water 2 cups
METHOD:
1. Par boil the mutton with water and salt and set aside.
2. In a medium sized saucepan heat the ghee on a medium flame and fry the crushed garlic, making sure to not brown it too much.
3. Add the bottle masala to the garlic and fry for a few minutes till fragrant.
4. Add the cubed pumpkin and mutton along with its residual stock and cook for another five to seven minutes, still on medium flame.
5. When the pumpkin is cooked, add the coconut milk and the tamarind pulp. Adjust the salt (if needed) and simmer for a few minutes.
6. Serve hot with fugias or bread rolls.
The Mumbai-based writer and restaurant reviewer is passionate about food, travel and luxury, not necessarily in that order.
(An edited version of this article first appeared in the 8th September 2019 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 12 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/food/eat-pray-repeat/article29360830.ece)
No comments:
Post a Comment