Winter on a plate

With the freshest and the most colourful vegetables doing the rounds during this time of the year, everything appears just a little better in winter, writes Nimish Bhatia

If I rewind to my childhood days spent in Jammu, especially during the winter season, it was the best time spent in the abundance of good food and great company. The days often started late basking in the warm sun, relishing fresh red carrots, and winter radishes, cracking roasted shelled peanuts and charred sweet potatoes over hot cups of tea. Hot meaty soups, stews, multi-leaf saags, root vegetables, and buttered bread did the rounds throughout the day. The sun is a bit softer, the evenings chilly and the gardens in full bloom. The days are shorter and evenings a bit longer and the bazaars are flush with the freshest and the most colourful vegetables one can see. Everything appears just a little better in winter.

From the sarson ka saag in the north, gongura in the south to colocasia leaves in the west and bathua in the east, greens help boost digestion and nourish the system. Seasonal relishes such as winter achar, jaggery, chutney, corn and millet-based rotis are loaded with folic acid, iron and vital minerals that enhance the mood and improve blood circulation during this season. Let’s start with gur gur cha or the Ladakhi salted tea with a dollop of butter or the Kahwa in the Kashmir valley with fragrant whiffs of saffron which work as boosters in these places where the weather is cold all through the year. Skyu is a very popular and high-calorie soup with wheat dumplings, root vegetables and meat in Ladakh that helps beat the temperature that often drops below freezing point during winter. Skyu becomes Oma if replaced with milk. Gushtaba and Rishta are hand-pounded meat dumplings slowly simmered, while Nadaru Yakhani, the lotus stem, is also very popular during winter in Kashmir. Bengalis enjoy winters the most because it’s time for their favourite woody aroma of Jhola nolen gur or liquid date palm jaggery while Benaras is famous for its Makhan Malai.

As winter sets in Himachal Pradesh, warm aromas of Teliya mah and khatti meat waft in the air. Teliya mah is tempered black lentils and khatti meat is a mutton preparation with dry mango powder. Punjab and Haryana revel in buttery sarson ka saag which gets lapped up with fresh makki ki rotis. The feasts of the winter are celebrated with layered stuffed parathas, ghee-laced moong dal halwa, chole bhature and almond-topped pinni and of course, the most popular gajrella or the red carrot halwa topped with khova. Though Bihar and Jharkhand offer the popular litti chokha, the char-grilled bread with potato and aubergine, they dip this sattu-filled litti in ghee during winter. Horsegram, jaggery, millets, sesame are the chosen ingredients down South. Horse gram kollu rasam in Tamil Nadu and ulava charu in Andhra Pradesh, Dappalam and kadamba kootu vegetable curries, bisi bele bath, avarekalu saaru, and kadabu wrapped in turmeric leaf are delicious winter recipes.

(The author is an award-winning chef, mentor, maven & master of food & beverage with over three decades of experience in leading world-class
hotels & restaurants across the world.)