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International Cuisine Conference on Traditional Asian Diet
Panaji, Goa, September 2-5, 2007 - http://www.indologygoa.in
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SPOROPHORES!
By Valmiki Faleiro
Honestly, I was surprised at the response to last week’s humble piece ... on
plants. Nine
readers reacted. That is notable, considering the nil response I get when I
write on such
earth-shaking events as Goa’s wondrous politics and quicksand governments. Even
if
seven of the nine were non-resident Goans, who emailed me or wrote at the cyber
fora
where this appears after it does in the Herald. Eight of the nine, oddly, were
female.
Does that say something?
I don’t believe male interest in plants is confined to eating the fruit. All
involved in my
selecting, sourcing, grafting, and planting and after care were men. Before
this strays
into a male-female issue, I’ll revert to the response from the two resident
Goans, both
women, one from Mapusa, the other, if I recall right, from Arpora. Strangely,
their
reaction was almost identical.
What seemed to get their goat was not last Sunday’s piece, per se, but its
tailpiece.
That, if you remember, was about saving frogs from extinction in Goa and beyond
-- by
refusing to eat them. Both ladies took umbrage at my perceived partiality
towards frogs.
They said there were more life forms facing extinction due to human
overexploitation of
nature in Goa, which they felt I ignored. Honestly, I am no encyclopaedia on
matters
Goan, but had decided on a sequel on another local monsoon delicacy inching
towards
oblivion and into history -- by way of an entire 750-word column, not a mere
tailpiece.
That story, alas, may not be complete. The man I viewed as part of the
solution, not the
problem, could not be interviewed. He said he was a busy man ("wearing many
hats," in
his words) and failed to fix an appointment. Had he known the kind of audience,
he
might have done otherwise. Some things can’t be helped.
Back to what I should have started with. The rains. When the heavens open,
nature
celebrates. Flora and fauna bursts forth with new life. The scorching, killing
summer is a
thing of the past. Ah, who doesn’t love the rains?
I always have, even if more for another reason. This may sound childlike, even
funny,
but I associate rains and new life with, of all the things on this good earth,
not umbrellas
or phalluses, but something similarly shaped that Mother Nature blessed us with:
sporophores, the science name for mushrooms. Maybe because in childhood, I loved
the rains but relished Goa’s earthy wild mushrooms more.
Bad I should be thinking of mushrooms. For two reasons. The time of the year
reminds
us of the horrible ‘mushroom’ clouds over Hiroshima and Nagasaki this week 62
years
ago, an un-wistful reminder of man’s conflict between himself and with nature.
The
second: over the years, supply of the Goan delicacy has dwindled, to the point
we must
think of conservation.
Ironically, mushrooms have negligible nutritive value. They are 90+ percent
water. Less
than 5% is carbohydrate, about 2% protein, and microscopic fat, minerals and
vitamins.
Only the flavour draws us to them. When Goan varieties became scarce, one drove
with
friends down highway 4-A (towards Belgaum) or NH-17 (Kankavli northwards, M’lore
southwards), on the particular days of sprouting, in search of a stray roadside
vendor!
For the single virtue of its flavour, Goa’s wild mushrooms are almost extinct.
Dr. Nandkumar Kamat, researcher into several things Goan, including mushrooms,
today counts only about six species from the 27 he knew barely two decades ago
--
thanks to our myopia. Then came this Goan doctorate holder from the USA. He
started
Goa’s first commercial mushroom cultivation. If and to what extent this
favorably
impacted the wild variety is a story that for now will remain untold. There
were also
upcountry blokes who descended on Goa, with mushroom cultivation techniques and
‘guaranteed’ buy-back, most regarded as unreliable operators.
>From its risky picking in the wild, to cultivation in sterilized environs, the
>mushroom will
ever remain tantalizing.
BUSINESS-LIKE: True entrepreneurship has never been a Goan forte. After sales
service paints an even gloomier picture. Even top national and multi-national
brands are
accused of pampering the customer up to the point of sale, leaving him
thereafter to
heaven’s mercy -- at least in Goa. Refreshing to find Oricon, a Bangalore-based
electrical stabilizers company, living up its after-sales promise, including
spot
replacement of defective units. Surprise is, Mark Phillips, the owner’s nephew
who runs
the West India operations, revealed his uncle is of part Goan descent. Who says
Goans
don’t excel outside Goa? (ENDS)
The Valmiki Faleiro weekly column at:
http://www.goanet.org/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=330
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The above article appeared in the August 12, 2007 edition of the Herald, Goa
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