Onam

Onam,the harvest festival in kerala is celebrated by all malayalees irrespective of religion and cast.To the likes of us who have been born and brought up in madras,pongal is more familiar than onam.To me eating the onam meal dates back to the days when i was six or seven and we all got invited to our dad only mallu hindu friends house.Then the feast was laid out on plantain leaves and my mother had to remind me not to overeat as there were lots of dishes to finish but i was already stuffing my face with the ones that came first.I didn't know then how to make all of the dishes(don't know now either) but i remember the names,olan,kalan,ericheri,pachadi,thoran and ada pradhaman were the ones that stuck in my memory.The friend died and the feasts stoped.We never celebrated onam at home as its a meal to be eaten with a large group and ours being a small family it just didnt seem like fun.

This year however thanks to the many ads in the papers of meals that could be ordered,we are finding ourselves eating the foods of every festival,be it hindu,muslim or christian.So for ganesh pooja we ordered the typical foods and had a feast.My mom knew most of the dishes but we decided to keep her for better things.So naturally when onam reared it head and the ads started,the husband keep reading out the names of all the things on offer.The mother worried that the boy may just decide to order out or heaven forbid,go to some mallu joint for lunch.She would have been insulted beyond belief that a mallu house couldn't dish up its own recipes for the son in law(he still being rather important in the house).So we went into full swing.Of course we did eliminate all dishes with curd base(rather a lot but the husband doesn't eat these) and decided to stick to sambar,ericheri,sweet banana chips,appalam,pickle,two thorans and one dry vegggie.We had to have the pride of the feast,the ada pradhaman.I must say my mother loves a challenge so she got into the kitchen to dish up all the favourites and despite my pleas to help refused to let me cut the veggies.I cannot understand this obsession with all pieces being the same length and width,when all we were to do was to puree them.What possible difference did size make.But the mother is a perfectionist so we left her to it.I must admit that the obsession to perfection pays off.The feast was so good that we all had difficulty getting up from the table.Thank god we didn't go too traditional and sit on the floor that would mean sitting there till the food was digested.I must admit that this new idea that we should celebrate all festivals for their food is something i like.Ramzan is next so if that means mutton biryani after the whole vegetarian fare at onam,then I am not complaining.