WHY DO GOANS LOVE THEIR SEASONAL MONSOON VEGETABLES? Focussing on ten delicacies of the rains
Dr.Nandkumar M. Kamat [email protected] --------------------------------------- Originally published in shorter form in The Sunday Panorama, The Navhind Times, Sunday, July 25, 2010. This version modified on July 28, 2010. --------------------------------------- On the morning of Sunday, July 25, the craving began. This year I had not tasted Goa's crunchy pipryos, the finger long vegetable delicacies which we used to munch by the tens as kids with or without the local agarachem (locally farmed) salt, lime juice, chilly or black pepper powder. Occasionally the bitter part would trouble us. My craving took me to Panaji-Ponda road where, after crossing Bhoma and till Farmagudi you see roadside stalls displaying fresh farm produce. I went up to Farmagudi and sampled the green wealth of my red Goan soil. Ten pipryos for Rs. 50 -- the rate was same at every stall and non-negotiable. Like an angler finding his prize catch and hunter his game, I piled up a stack of crunchy pipryos, ridge gourds, snake gourds, local saldati bananas, multicoloured and heavy, grenade-shaped tender bamboo shoots or quills, bitter gourd (karatim) and returned home victorious and satiated. My communion with the fertility principle of my motherland was now complete. Why do Goans love their seasonal monsoon vegetables? It is all in the genes and conditioned by culture, family upbringing. The simplest rule of nutrition is to eat lower down the food chain. That reduces the levels of xenobiotics and toxins entering our bodies. Under the microscope of anthropology and nutritional science, epigenetics and genomics, Goa's traditional foods tell us something unique -- the call of the Goan genes for seasonal delicacies. The current disease burden in Goa shows a clear nutritional disconnect from traditional foods, traditional diets, seasonal food intake. Ecological simplification in Goa matches dietary simplification. Dietary simplification causes genetic simplification and spread of only hybrids and monocultures. Traditional Goan food draws from seasonal food resources. The principle was to combine prebiotics, probiotics, antibiotics by selecting vegetables yielding beneficial phytochemicals. This article stresses on the importance of ten monsoon vegetable delicacies in search of which a true Goan would roam the markets, travel far distances and bargain hard just because his genes dictate his taste buds, his enzymes crave for the ancient substrates. Many vegetables also provide cures for ailments which the body demands. Which are these ten delicacies? These include ferns, grasses, cucurbits, aroids. Let me list them-- the first is an iodine-rich edible fern -- Ankur, scientific name Acrostichum aureum, followed by two species of bamboo-Dendrocalamus strictus and Bambusa bambos -- the tender shoots of which are known as 'quills'. Fourth on my list is Taro or alu -- Colocasia esculenta. Fifth is white amaranthus known as 'dhavi bhaji'. Sixth is Shirmundalechi bhaji, a rare vegetable now exploited for medicinal purposes -- the wild Chlorophytum tuberosum. Seventh on my list are the edible, tasty flowers of Dudi, the Red Pumpkin -- Cucurbita maxima -- a species introduced from Mexico. The last three vegetables belong to Cucurbitaceae family -- Cucumbers (Cucumis sativus), Padwal or Snake Gourd, Trichosanthes cucumerina and the spongy Ghosali or Ridge Gourd, Luffa acutangula. How many traditional preparations Goans make from these ten vegetables? A minimum of 100. Let us take Ankur. It is a fern found in mangrove areas next to the estuaries of Goa. One can see huge stands of Acrostichum near the Guirim byepass and along the Cumbarjua canal. The tender fiddleheads are harvested, made into small bundles and sold. Rich in fibres, vitamins and minerals, well-cooked Ankur is a passport to good health. Goa joins a few select global communities which consume edible ferns. Anthropologically it tells us about the wisdom of our ancestors and first settlers who discovered their use. Bamboos are grasses found in a large belt on earth. But it needs wisdom of thousands of years to identify the edible species, harvest and process them. Tender bamboo shoots contain lethal concentrations and amounts of cyanogenic glucosides which on endogenic hydrolysis yield hydrocyanic acid. Cooking destroys the enzyme responsible for the endogenic hydrolysis to a very large extent. But Goans know the art and science of cutting, soaking, removing the unwanted principle. The tender bamboo shoots which Goans consume are rich in vitamins, cellulose, amino acids and trace elements and fibre. Edible content of a newly harvested tender bamboo shoot is usually 25 to 30 per cent, with smaller shoots yielding a lower percentage edible content. Without knowledge of its preparation, tender bamboo shoots should never be purchased. Among the two species which Goans exploit -- Bambusa species is considered tastier. Colocasia or taro is very favourite leafy vegetable in Goa. It is a member of the Araceae family, which is made up of at least 100 genera and more than 1500 species. It is one of the oldest cultivated crops grown for its edible corms and leaves. It is grown easily and once its irritating principle Calcium oxalate is removed, it makes a tasty preparation. Aluvadi, rolled leaf sandwiches are well known in Goa and Konkan. It is reportedly one of the first plant domesticated in Goa and the Konkan so people have accumulated a lot of knowledge of identifying the less irritating and tastier varieties. The love of Goans for Taro connects them with Taro consuming culture in south east Asia. From where Goans first got their Taro/Alu? The origin of the plant is suspected to be in the Indo-Malayan region, probably in eastern India and Bangladesh. From there it spread eastward into Southeast Asia, eastern Asia, and the Pacific Islands. Then it marched westward to Egypt and the eastern Mediterranean; and finally southward and westward from there into Africa, where it moved into the Carribbean and the Americas. Taro is a vegetable which Goans have been cultivating for past three thousand years. But for the white amaranthus, Goa's dhovi bhaji, this is not the case. Whereas the popular red amaranthus -- tambdi bhaji -- is available almost whole year-the spiny, dhavi bhaji is mostly found in the wild and has to be harvested carefully. This makes it a rare monsoon vegetable delicacy. Equally rare is the wild shirmundalechi bhaji or 'safed musali' -- a species of Chlorophytum which people must have been consuming for both nutritional and medicinal value. It is still popular with Velip tribals of Goa. Goans consume edible flowers. But the tastiest preparation is made from harvesting the yellow to orange flowers of red pumpkin-dudhi which is found to grow on the thatched roofs of rural houses and huts. Cucurbita maxima -- red pumpkin -- has several medicinal uses. The juice being anti-diabetic. The edible flowers provide ample vitamins. Cucumbers (Cucumis sativus) is a widely cultivated plant in the gourd family Cucurbitace. Cucumbers originated in India. Large genetic variety of cucumber has been observed in different parts of India. It has been cultivated for at least 3,000 years in Western Asia, and was probably introduced to other parts of Europe by the Romans. Tender cucumbers of Goa -- pipryos -- are in high demand and there is a feast dedicated to Cucumbers at St. Anne's Church at Talaulim, Tiswadi. Straub and colleagues from USDA were impressed by the diversity of cucumbers in India. Snake gourd or Padval is easily cultivated and even the seeds are roasted and consumed. Padval would be seen in the company of ridge gourd -- Ghosali -- in market. The seeds of padval 'padvalachyo biyo' are lightly fried in oil with a pinchful of turmeric and salt to taste. Both these cucurbits make excellent dry vegetable preparations -- a rich source of dietary fibre and micronutrients. When one travels during July-September from Panaji to Canacona via Ponda and Margao, most of the biodiversity of the monsoon vegetables which I have mentioned would be found for sale by the roadside. For the Goan ethnophyto connoisseur I recommend halts at Conem, Priol, Farmagudi, Dhavali, Bori (before the bridge), Padi-ghat, and Karmal-ghat. Between Ponda to Molem one can halt near Usgao, Sancorda, Dharbandora and Molem to survey the stalls and pick up the delicacies. Please remember that all of them are Goenkar cultivators and the money that you would spend would go a long way to keep them in the business. Indirectly by patronizing the local fresh farm produce, you would be contributing to protect Goa's existing agrobiodiversity. Unfortunately and despite repeated warnings, the Goa government is promoting monocultures of genetically identical hybrids. By aggressively pushing such hybrids and transgenic crops at the cost of these traditional land races -- conserved, preserved and lovingly propagated by nameless cultivators, the government is encouraging genetic simplification and ecological simplification. A good season would give the producers a few thousand rupees. Many among them have shifted to other professions. Now we see mostly women managing the stalls even in inclement weather. Why do they still cultivate these vegetables? Because they could not forget the call of their genes -- the Goan genes which crave for the above monsoon delicacies. Can Goans give up something which they have been consuming for 3000 years -- for more than 120-150 generations? Moving away from a genetically dictated traditional diet is an invitation to lifestyle related diseases and disorders. It is a pity that Goan parents are compelling their children to switch over to a global diet culture -- one unfit for our genes. Direct all queries to [email protected] GOANET READER seeks to promote interesting Goa-centric writing. If you have a submission, send it in to [email protected] (Frederick Noronha) * * * Encounter hints (and more) of the Goan life in Zanzibar, Poona, Mombasa, Basra, Dubai, and even Nuvem and Colva, Sanvordem and colonial Goa. Learn of experiences that shaped Goans worldwide. Selma Carvalho's *Into the Diaspora Wilderness* now available at Broadways Book Centre, Panjim [Ph +91-9822488564] Ask a friend to buy it, before it gets sold out. Price (in Goa only) Rs 295. http://selmacarvalho.squarespace.com/ * * *
