The Comforts of Home

Breakfasts of sweet and juicy grapefruit freshly picked from one’s own garden, hot, doughy rotis topped with freshly churned butter and crumbled jaggery and endless cups of steaming ginger tea…. Meals of steaming-hot real basmati rice doused in homemade ghee, hot tor dal (a soup-like dish made with whole Pidgeon peas, indiginous to Uttarakhandi cuisine) tempered with pharan (a chive like herb indiginous to Uttaranchal) and garlicky stir-fried greens from the kitchen garden...and the sweet, sweet finale: hot halwa! Going home to Dehradun is a smorgasbord of winter comforts for the taste buds!

Famous for its unspoiled environment and natural beauty, Dehradun is the capital of the North Indian state of Uttarakhand and nestled in the Doon valley in the foothills of the Himalayas. The people of this region refer to themselves as Paharis (meaning “from the hills”). Their cuisine is therefore referred to as Pahari food (but should not be confused with other high-altitude regional cuisines of India).

In accordance with the needs of hard-working people who live in a cold, uncompromising region, Pahari food is, out of necessity, simple, flavourful and filling and uses ingredients cultivated by traditional farming methods or found in the wild. Because of its location, Dehradun enjoys a mixed climate that calls for seasonal menus.

We managed to make it to Dehra Dun, in Uttarakhand the foothills of the Himalayas in time to savour the season’s best. We had a single united priority: to get all the home-cooked Pahari food we could manage. And the best time for this gourmandising (there is no other word for it) is winter. Winter is the season of plenty in rural India; fields of ripening produce stretch endlessly. There is an abundance of offerings: oversized cauliflowers blooming off vegetable carts; verdant, leafy vegetables in kitchen gardens; turgid citrus fruit and tart guavas weighing down trees; and bright-orange, even crimson, carrots that cook into delicious halwas. And, almost in anticipation of the harvest to come, India seems to settle into relaxed, lazy winter days filled with traditional winter foods, the unending demands of work and family temporarily set aside. 

Our first breakfast at home set the tone for the rest of our trip. When we finally emerged from our cocoon of warm blankets, it was to a hurried morning meal of rotis. Either simple, thick wheat-flour roti or more elaborate stuffed versions bursting with mandua (finger-millet flour), vegetables or spiced dal. These were served hot off the flame with a choice of ghee, freshly churned white butter, pickle, lehsun ki chutney (made by pounding shoots of green garlic with salt in a mortar) or, as I was craving it, jaggery.

It was probably from smelling jaggery all the way home the day before. Winter is the season for making jaggery (also called “gur”), a specific type of unrefined sugar popular in India that is made by reducing raw sugar cane or date palm juice. Dehradun being close to the sugar belt of the north, you can see the glow of banked flames and smell the caramel aroma of reduced jaggery on the air for miles around along the road to Dehradun. (You can even stop along the way to get a taste of the molten liquid jaggery.) 

By the time breakfast was done, the sun would be out. One by one, the kids would be bathed and let loose in the sun to dry out and warm up. They were watched over by their grandmother while the adults braved the bitter cold to bathe. Sunning oneself is an essential activity at this time of the year, and so is snacking: nuggets of fresh jaggery, chikkis (nut brittles) or, my latest discovery, chakotra, a kind of local grapefruit that grows wild here. Most houses have a tree laden with fruit in season. Their dull-yellow skins give way to jewel-like pale-yellow flesh that is tossed with a dressing of crushed green garlic, green chili, salt and a little sugar. Delicious!

Lunch was usually the Indian staple meal of rice and dal, supplemented with freshly picked leafy greens cooked and served with chutneys or pickles. The winter dals of the Pahari meal proved to be a perfect antidote to the gloomy hours when the sun slowly set and the cold crept in. A plate of steaming rice topped with hot dal and a dollop of ghee hit the spot before one took a long, cozy nap!

“Dal” refers to a wide variety of dried split peas, beans, lentils and pulses, as well as the dish made out of them. Summer dals are made of easier-to-digest options, but heavier dals are eaten in winter. In Pahari cuisine, there are a few delicious options. There is urad dal (made with urd beans, black grams or black lentils), which is served in a phenomenal number of variations. Whole urad that is roasted and ground makes chainsoo, a textured purée to be eaten with rice. Split urad that is soaked, skinned and ground makes phanu, also eaten with rice and ghee. On this trip, I was lucky enough to discover dhabadi, a silky purée of pahari palak (an indigenous hill variety of spinach) and urad.

Two other winter dals are Tor (whole pigeon pea) and gehat (horse gram). Tor is popular as a dal eaten with rice and piquant sesame chutney made with large wild lemons that are in season during winter. Gehat, on the other hand, is a dal that does not disintegrate during cooking; the liquid is strained out and savoured as a soup, while the grains are used to stuff rotis or, although not traditional, could also be cooked into a khichdi with rice.

Khichdi, a dish of rice and lentils cooked together in one pot, is another great comfort food in the winter. While lighter versions of khichdi are used as sustenance for people who are ill, the winter offers the opportunity for delicious, heartier versions made with urad or lobia (black-eyed beans) topped with ghee and pickle and served with pappadums. 

The winter also makes meat-based dishes easier to digest. The non-vegetarian repertoire of Pahari cuisine is small, but meat-bhaat (mutton curry and rice) is a must. Every kitchen has its own delicious version. It is eaten with steamed basmati rice, which the region is famous for, and served with sesame chutney and seasonal greens.

While we were there, we sampled a variety of seasonal greens, including mustard and radish greens and pahadi palak, which is so soft it needs no chopping, just a thorough washing, because it breaks down as it cooks. Leafy greens are usually stir-fried in smoking mustard oil that has been tempered with jakhiya, a nutty-flavoured spice that is indigenous to the area.

While there are several sweet preparations to end a meal with, there’s nothing like a hot halwa. Halwas are sticky sweets that would be classified as puddings in the West and are made from one predominant ingredient, such as a flour, lentil, fruit or vegetable that is cooked with ghee and sugar. Halwas cooked longer can also be set and cut into shapes. We were offered an array of these, from simple versions made of whole-wheat flour or semolina to the ubiquitous gajar halwa and the heavier versions.

All in all, it was an idyllic trip. And in an age when the world is gravitating toward the mantra of seasonal, organic and local (SOL) food, it is heartening to know that Pahari cuisine adheres to ancient traditions that celebrate these same practices.

Meat-bhaat (Mutton Curry and Rice) Recipe

Til Ki Chutney (Sesame and Lemon Chutney) Recipe

Kafuli (Thick Green Curry) Recipe