GOAN FOOD-2 By Valmiki Faleiro People like Teresa da Costa, Edridge Vaz and Carafina Pereira are like the true Goan homemaker: the hero of Goan food. Who kept the fires, and traditions, alive and burning. Our trio, too, bears a golden touch, across the board. Even if Carafina’s prawn curry shot ‘Martin’s Corner’ to fame. Or Edridge’s fish curry bears the makings of another epicurean legend in the 5-star hotel chain this young chef works for: “Masci,” Anjuna’s never forgettable Miguel Arcanjo Mascarenhas. Like them, whatever Teresa touches turns delicious. Take her ‘Rozanvade’ – the flower-shaped, Vitamin-C rich, tangy plum (will someone tell us its English name?) As a kid, I ate them raw or as ‘melados’ – pickled in sugar syrup. Teresa cooks Rozanvade, in a delicately spicy flavour, creating a rare goodness in the juicy inside.
From the contemporary, permit me to pan to the past.
Goa’s tradition breakfast ‘bhajis’ – sukki, patal, ussal – some with coarsely grated coconut and hand-pounded masalas are, alas, almost a thing of the past. “Te poder mele, te unde kabar zale.” Any tea-stall, even in a tiny hamlet, had great aromas wafting over a distance in times past. In tune with the present, as Goa’s very soul undergoes a slow but sure makeover, the smells now are of wadas, dosas, idlis, uttappa, uppam and ‘Pau Bhaji.’ (Like it was left to an Australian Chef to spell out the challenges facing authentic Goan cuisine at a food conference in Panjim in September 2007.) Some Panjim restaurants, though – not to forget Margao’s ‘Bombay Café’ – maintain a Goan modicum, while hoary Café Central still makes some savoury local snacks. I remember visiting remote Potrem, at the foothills of the Ghats in Sanguem taluka, with a ‘big bhatkar’ friend. In his densely wooded property flowed a stream. The waters were icy cold even in sweltering summer! The friend gave an elderly village lady some diced mutton to prepare our lunch. I was apprehensive, wondering where in the middle of that forest she would fetch the condiments needed to cook. I was advised to keep cool. Laze I did in the stream waters until lunch was ready. I don’t think I ate more mutton xacuti and chappatis in a single sitting than I did that day, cross-legged on a bamboo mat, on a cowdung-plastered floor, eating from a ‘potravol’ (sewn leaves plate.) Like at a picnic to the Dr. Gambeta da Costa farm at Molcornem, where another ‘mundkar’ housewife dished out a lunchtime xacuti so memorable that fingers smell even today! One rainy day, I was riding pillion on a Bajaj scooter with Dilkush Dessai, then an MLA rampaging forests in Sulcorna. It was mid-day, as we headed for his tree-felling site. Dilkush bought some mushrooms en route. Again, I wondered how the lumberers would cook without requisite masalas. In an hour, they produced a meal so simple, so savoury, that what looked like a whitish broth was something memorable, with hot boiled rice, eaten from banana-leaf plates, sitting on the log of a felled tree. Simple and delicious, in a better environ, was a meal off the side of the outer isle off Mormugao (either ‘Ilha dos Ratos’ or of ‘Morcegos.’) We were on a day trip, courtesy a fishing trawler of Heraldo Fernandes, of Colva’s “Arab Brothers” fame. Lunchtime, as the usual xacuti-pulao fare was being served, I spotted the trawler crew preparing to sit for their meal. I quickly took the dingy to their boat anchored nearby. Heraldo’s crew, those days, comprised exclusively of Goan fishermen. Crisp-fried baby sardines (wrapped in newsprint), fat Goan rice, and ground, DRY ‘curry’ – the type I thought existed only in Kankhavli / Ratnagiri regions of Maharashtra. The latter was tangier, this Goan variant was spicier, and, out in the open ocean breeze, heavenly. The best wildmeat ‘sukkem’ I’ve ever tasted was prepared by Dilkush’s affable mother. The best wild boar ‘xacuti’ by the wife of former Sports minister, Francisco Monte Cruz. The best fish preparations by the wife of KB Naik, another former MLA. (Among my many unforgettable picnics was one at KB’s farm, by the banks of River Khandeapar.) The best Goan food comes pickled. At lunch at one of South Goa’s oldest starred hotels, I was telling Balram, its then long-serving GM, that he must add Goan pickled stuff to his menu to give the tourist a true ‘experience’ of Goan cuisine. He asked if I’d like to taste what his Chef brought for mates, made by his mother in Cuncolim. The flabbergast Chef himself served us the last few bits. Mackerel para never tasted as good. (To conclude.) (ENDS) The Valmiki Faleiro weekly column at: http://www.goanet.org/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=330 ============================================================================== The above article appeared in the May 4, 2008 edition of the Herald, Goa
