Writing about dal reminded me of one of the most spectacular versions of the dish I have ever eaten. Sand entangled in my hair, hot desert wind in my face, thighs turned to jelly by an enthusiastic camel ride.
No, it wasn’t romantic at all.
I was deep in the Thar desert, one of the border outposts manned by the Indian border security force. It was nothing like the pretty comfort of Jaisalmer or Jaipur, and there weren’t any ‘royals’ lurking about either, ready to help you sample the delights of their erstwhile palaces converted into ‘heritage hotels’. Just tough, leather-faced men, their skin stroked into deep ravines by the hot desert wind. And bright-smiled, multi-bangled village women who so generously offered to feed the strange woman with short, men’s hair and her gracious, graceful mother.
What they turned out was a traditional meal – dalbatichurma – actually dal, bati and churma, but often spoken all together, unpunctuated, with no breaks for breath. Dal was hot, as in chilly-hot, a kind of level of chilly until then I imagined foreigners falsely accused Indian food of having. Bati were flour dumplings, insanely tasty, and churma was a kind of flour cooked in ghee. Ghee. Loads of it. The entire meal was a feast of ghee. No wonder the dal tastes so great, my mother remarked. Even lauki will taste awesome if you put so much ghee in it, she continued, forgetting that I no longer detested the watery gourd. And had travelled quite far from the childhood dislike.
We stuffed ourselves with enough dalbatichurma that would have stood a camel in good stead for at least a month, I wildly hoping I wouldn’t store the ghee in unfortunate bulges. Later, as we lay with the wind quietening around us and the stars glittering cold and hard, reflecting on life I suddenly hit upon the reason for all the ghee – all the chillies! Of course, it is believed that the ghee helps the chillies go down smoothly, and the chillies wouldn’t taste so good without the ghee. Having worked out this vicious circle, I went to sleep with satisfaction, the sand creeping into the crevices of my eyes and tinting my dreams golden.
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