By H H Mohrmen
About a year or so ago, a piece about popular foods in Shillong was shared on social media. In the story it was mentioned that momo is the traditional food of the tribals of the area. While we cannot deny that momo and chow (noodles) are popular food item in the region, the fact remains that the writer is way off the mark because momo is not even indigenous to the area. The question then is, why are our traditional food (in spite of the varieties that we have), taking a back seat and is not as popular as the other foods even in our very own state of Meghalaya.
Why don’t the few jadoh stalls that dot our landscape along highways etc have the same charm as any other restaurant which serves Continental, Chinese, North or South Indian dishes? We now have restaurants which serve Korean, Thai and other foods. We already have Dominos Pizza which serves Italian food. Soon we will have outlets serving Mexican dishes. But what happens to our own food? What is it that our food lacks which prevents it from being as popular as other food items in its own land? Phrang Roy, President of the North East Slow-food and Agro-biodiversity Society (NESFAS) says that traditional foods have all the elements and ingredients of good food. It only needs to be glamourized. Perhaps we really need to relook at the way we present our food and add glamour to make it popular and palatable.
At the International Terra Madre which was held in Turin in the last week of September, NESFAS sent a chef from the region to showcase some food from here at the international forum. Chef Joel Basumatary on two occasions served the delegates sumptuous traditional cuisine from the region. The first event when traditional food was shared was at the taste workshop which attracted huge crowds and the second occasion was when Chef Joel Basumatry along with Chef Shawn Sherwood of the Sioux tribe served their respective indigenous cuisine to those who had paid for the dinner. The two prominent Chefs of their respective communities cooked dinner which was a combination of the Native American food and food from North East India. The food from North East India was part of the eight course dinner comprising Naga food. Joel also served pork fried with black sesame seeds known as ‘doh neiïong’ in Khasi and ‘dohseiñ’ in Pnar and boiled red rice which is again unique only to the tribals of the area was part of the cuisine served that day.
This is a small effort to popularize food from the region in the international forum and those who paid for the food all had words of praise for the food and the dinner was a sell-out. The other event which was again an occasion to discuss indigenous food was a panel discussion on the subject “Giving value to indigenous knowledge and practices: the example of wild edibles.” In the session the member delegate from North East India Akole Tsuhah Wekowei from Nagaland shared her thoughts on the important subject with the international audience.
Talking about wild edibles, there are innumerable items of wild edibles consumed by the tribal communities in North East India and the food varies from one region to another. If we take only West Jaintia into consideration, one would see that the wild edibles used by the War Jaintias like ‘jia harew, jiakeng’ etc., are not found in the dishes used by people on the other side of the district. But the rare and exotic food item common to both the Khasi-Pnar of Meghalaya is wild mushrooms. We still don’t have the exact numbers of wild mushrooms that are edible because we are yet to do a comprehensive study on this, but rough estimates suggest there are about thirty varieties of edible mushrooms in Jaintia hills alone. The most popular are ‘tit kjet syiar, tit tung, tit kjet hati, and other which one would see available in the market at least twice a year during Spring and Autumn. Although it is expensive many people anxiously wait for the two seasons to arrive when they would see wild edible mushrooms being sold in the market.
One can’t help but be astounded by the recent circular released by the Agriculture department of Meghalaya which forbids people from eating any kind of mushroom except the foreign cultured mushroom that the government introduced to the community. Of course this is the Department’s kneejerk reaction to the unfortunate incidents of people losing their life for eating toxic mushroom which happens on a regular basis. But is there no other alternative other than banning? The circular which was widely publicized strongly recommended that people eat only button and oyster mushrooms which are safe for human consumption. So what about the time tested wild mushrooms which the people of the area have consumed for ages now? Are we to do away with wild edibles in general and mushrooms in particular just because they find no mention in the Agriculture books that the Agri-horti officers are familiar with?
Why is there no study on the wild mushrooms in the area? Instead we simply take the easy way of introducing to the people foreign species which are tested elsewhere? What’s the point of Government having Agriculture scientists on its payroll if they spend most of their time doing desk job than in the field? Wild edibles like mushrooms are part of our culture and can we just do away with them? Rather than coming up with a blanket ban on using of wild mushroom one would expect that the department concerned to conduct a study on the wild mushrooms that grow in the area and share the information with the public so that people can distinguish edible from toxic mushrooms.
Is there any such study to begin with? Every time when one suggests tissue culturing on the endemic flowers or edible plants which are popular in the area one would find a turf war between the departments of the government. Once this columnist enquired from the horticulturalist expert in the district, if tissue culture is being done on the orchids in the area. The response one received was like a bolt from the blue. He said his department cannot even try doing that because the Wildlife department will not allow them to do so on the pretext that the plant is a protected species.
We are talking about protecting our biodiversity, but if we continue introducing foreign species in the area and do not preserve the existing diversity then what biodiversity are we talking about. Another such case is the introduction of fish-cum-paddy culture which sounds very interesting because it helps to enhance the income of the people and improve the economy of the area, but on second thoughts one can ask whether our ancestors had not already practiced it? The practice by which farmers capture snakehead fish (channa striata) known locally as dathli or dohthli by using small baskets known as ‘khnam’ is also fish cum-paddy culture? Every summer when the rain fills the paddy fields to the brim; the farmers would use the baskets to trap the snakehead fish by placing the baskets at different locations of the paddy field. The need is to improve on the existing activity which people are familiar with to help enhance the income of the farmers.
On the other hand the introduction of fish cum-paddy culture can have an impact on the population of the snakehead fish which is endemic to the area and it could also endanger this unique fish species and put it at the risk of extinction.
The other question is why are we having this penchant only for something that is foreign and in doing so neglect or look down on our own or what we have? We have our foods which are second to none yet we are not proud of it. We do not have restaurants which serve ethnic cuisine which is at par with the good restaurants that we have in our cities. The only semblance of this is the Trattoria ‘jadoh stall’ in the Muda shopping complex, but even that is more like an eating joint than a restaurant because of the limited space available.
Apart from adding glamour to our food we also need to be proud of it and also proudly share it with the world. One hopes that one day we will have plenty of restaurants which serve indigenous food in our towns and cities where customers will be served the best of our cuisines in a platter.