South Kanara (Karnataka)- a week

Last week, I spent a week in and around Ujire, Karkal, in South Kanara. Visited places, spent time with people, attended family functions. I have mentioned some of my noticeable observations below.

Functions in Karnataka are no bragger, especially as compared to functions in Maharashtra, where the people hosting and attending the function act like exhibitionist. The venue is generally a temple and the cooking is done by the family members/local people. The host provides the constituents/raw material for cooking as per the menu. The male members of the family/families come together and chop all the required vegetable the previous day. Temple premises are generally used for cooking and again family members/local people serve food. Overall, the functions ask for more involvement of the family members/local people at the operational level which enrich relations.

One well-intentioned way of starting the actual function is by introducing all the family members to each other. One person from each family addresses the crowd and introduces the family members. Seems like this is a good practice especially in functions like engagement, marriage where two families come together.

Some notes on the food now. Tiffin generally includes easy-to-serve items like Idli, Chutney, Sheera, etc. followed by Tea/Coffee/Malt/Badam Milk. Tiffin = breakfast! 

Regarding the meals, the way of serving and consuming is interesting. Meals are usually served in a particular order and required to be consumed in a particular order as well. These meals are served on banana/plantain leaves. First accompaniments are served which includes variety of Palya, Kosambari, sweet-savory gojju, hot spicy chutney Pickles, bajji, bonda, vade, Papads along with lots of rice. The first course is generally where a very small quantity of each item is served. This democratic way of serving gives freedom to the people to have their own choice of item out of all the available items (which are generally many). Obviously, this also reduces wastage of food drastically. The second course is generally where all the items served in small quantities previously, are repeated. It is a set of curries to be consumed with rice. It generally starts with Tovve, a mild lentil dish laced with ghee, Majjige Huli, vegetables simmered in a mild yogurt sauce, followed by Huli, lentils and vegetables spiced and tempered with ghee, mustard, asafoetida and curry leaves. This is followed by tili Saaru which is a thin lentil stock spiced and laced with ghee and curry leaves.  Above mentioned items in the course vary, from function to function, and depend upon factors like the type of function, caste, etc. However, the order of serving is followed. The final course of the meal is rice and curd with pickles. Buttermilk is also served to be consumed at the end of the meal.

More rice is used, especially among certain Brahmin communities.

More interestingly, salt is served at the end of the first course (In Maharashtra, it is generally the first item that is served).

One more remarkable practice is a ‘NO-NO’ to crackers before/after the function.

P.S.:  Some references taken from the internet to make the above passage on meals so comprehensive.