The fight between keeping up traditions and giving into modernity is probably one of the most debated topics. And nowhere does this fight feature more prominently than in the Indian kitchens of today, with traditional methods making way for more efficient, time-saving ones. And now with bottled pickles and packaged papads appearing on shelves and traditional drinks and home-made fare fast disappearing, the fight seems pretty much one-sided now. But often for most of us these traditional dishes, drinks, foods are not just edibles, but cues to memories of good times and happy childhoods. And that’s the worst casualty of this fight for modernity.
I remember while I was growing up, my grandmother had a winter time food ritual. Each year she would buy loads of ugly black carrots and then somehow conjure the loveliest wildly purplish red drink out of it all. Kanji, I was told, is what it was called and it was pretty much love at first taste. But as I look back now, I realise that the drink came to mean so much more to me- cold Delhi winter mornings spent out on a sunny verandah sipping the tangy drink and feeling the comfort of the hot sun against the cold nip all around, family conversations peppered with bits of gossip about relatives I had only ever heard of and my grandmom wrapped in a grey embroidered shawl knitting a sweater for yet another cousin or chopping vegetables. But somehow over the years, between Bombay and Singapore, the drink was forgotten, and with it, some of the memories too. That is until some days back, when a package of Black carrots arrived from Delhi and I decided to try my hand at my grand mother’s ritual.
Kanji is a traditional Punjabi drink typically made by fermenting black carrots or beetroots with spices, though Kashmiris and UPites do a really good turnip version of it too. It is mostly made in the winter months between December and April when black carrots are available in plenty. While traditionally huge glazed earthenware or ceramic jars were used to ferment the Carrot, water and spice mixture in the sun, glass jars work as well. The final concoction has a slightly salty, pungent and sour taste to it, probably owing to the fermentation and the spices. And as it turns out, it can do you some good too. Kanji is a nutritious probiotic drink and is considered to have cooling, soothing and digestive properties.
Ingredients-
1/2 Kg Black Carrot
2 Tbsp mustard seeds (Rai)
1 Tbsp red chilli powder
Salt to taste
2 litres boiled and cooled water
Wash and scrape the carrots lightly. Cut the carrots into 1 inche long pieces and dry grind the mustard seeds. In a large bowl, mix the carrots with salt, red chilli, Mustard Seeds and add it to the water in an airtight wide mouth jar or bottle. Close lid tightly and mix well. Keep the bottle in the sun for 3-4 days, making sure to stir it a few times daily. Once it is ready, keep the bottle in the fridge. The fermented Kanji, can be consumed for upto a week.
Now as I stand sipping my glass of Kanji right here in Sunny Singapore, the setting is different, the weather too, but the memories come flooding back. I can almost feel the nip of the cold and hear the clickety clack of the knitting needles. And I am thinking in my head- Tradition - 1, Modernity - 0.
