Saluting the Beasts of Burden

I remember many, many years ago when my little daughter was interviewing for her kindergarten, she was asked where milk came from and she promptly replied "bottles"! Of course the teacher had a good laugh but considering the fact that my daughter had never seen a cow in her life, there was no way she could have made a connection between the animal and her beloved food. Children today will probably substitute bottle with a plastic bag or tetrapack for that is how milk is packaged these days!

Looking at the vegetables and fruit in the market neatly stacked in supermarkets or  in the fresh vegetable markets, one hardly gives a thought to their cultivation let alone the poor beasts of burden whose labour is used to help them grow.

So when I heard that the day after Ganesh Chaturthi the people of Maharashtra honour the beasts of burden by eating food that is not cultivated with their labour, I decided to at least go along to the market and see what could be eaten instead.

Even though it was raining cats and dogs, the market was full of vendors selling an assortment of leafy vegetables that go into this dish called Rishichibhaji. There was quite a bit of stuff too : tubers like yam, colocasia and sweet potato, red amaranthus, colocasia leaves , red pumpkin,  bits of boiled corn, okra and  drumstick that went along with the leafy veggies.

After I bought a whole heap of bhaji, I realised I didn't know what to do!

So I called up an aunt in Pune who told me that I should just wash everything well and then chop it into bits. Then, she told me, take a huge big kadhai or pressure cooker and heat up 2 tablespoons of oil. To this, she advised I should  add a teaspoon of mustard seed and after they had popped, a quarter teaspoon of asoefetida, some turmeric, chopped green chillies and then the tubers, pumpkin and okra ( one by one making sure that each one is partially cooked before adding the other ingredient), then topping off the whole lot with the leafy vegetables. The pot should be coverd and the leaves allowed to cook down. Then, she told me, you should add the pre-boiled bits of corn . The vegetable should be given one big stir and allowed to simmer for a few minutes more so that all the tastes mingle well.When I asked her for exact quantities, she laughed.

Then she said, the vegetable was ready to eat. I forgot to ask her with what? After all aren't rice and wheat flour cultivated with the labour of the beasts of burden???