Naguesh Bhatcar wrote:
Pav Bhaji has been around for more than 25 years. It is nothing new to Goa.
It might have been an 'import' from Bombay then and definitely not typical Goan.
There used to be a 'gado' outiside Samrat/Ashok theatre in Panjim
and a lot of people used to flock to it in the evenings.
Naguesh Bhatcar
[email protected]
Thanks Naguesh. I too did some instant cut-and-paste "research"
Some recipes here:
www.google.com/search?q=pav+bhaji+recipe& ie=utf-8&...
And it's history:
Pav bhaji (Marathi: पाव भाजी, also transliterated as pao bhaji and pau
bhaji) is a fast food dish native to Maharashtrians and is popular in
most metropolitan areas in India, particularly in the Maharashtrian city
of Mumbai & Pune.[1] Pav in Marathi means bread, the word Marathi
borrowed from Portuguese pão (lit., "bread"). Bhaji is a term for a
curry and vegetable dish. Pav bhaji consists of the bhaji (a
potato-based curry) and the pav, garnished with coriander and chopped
onions. Pav is high in carbohydrates and fats (if served with butter),
while bhaji, the vegetable-based curry portion, is high in carbohydrates.
The origin of this dish is traced to the heyday of the textile mills in
Mumbai. The mill workers used to have lunch breaks too short for a full
meal, and a light lunch was preferred to a heavy one, as the employees
had to return to physical labor after lunch. A vendor created this dish
using items or parts of other dishes available on the menu. Roti or rice
was replaced with pav and the curries that usually go with Indian bread
or rice were amalgamated into just one spicy concoction-the 'bhaji'.
Initially, it remained the food of the mill-workers. With time the dish
found its way into restaurants and spread over Central Mumbai and other
parts of the city via the Udipi restaurants. Such is popularity of this
dish, that it is common to find it on the menu of most Indian
restaurants serving fast food in Asia (especially Singapore, Hong Kong),
America, UK (London), Switzerland and elsewhere.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pav_Bhaji
PS: I find it a bit too rich and oily (prefer the simpler 'paatal
bhaji') but it's okay for a change.
