Phalsey, churan, chanas and sannata

Rahul Verma

I HEARD a long-forgotten cry the other day. On a hot afternoon, a vendor with a basket on his head sang out, ‘Kaaley kaaley phalsey,’ referring to the tiny berries in the basket, and their purple-black colour. I went back into time and remembered how the call — the slogan and the tune haven’t changed in the last five decades — once meant a quick dash to the hawker, laying my grubby hands on a packet of phalsey and a smaller packet of masalas, the instant demolition of the fruit, and the tell-tale purple-tinged mouth that indicated I’d had a bellyful of ‘khattey meethey phalsey’ (sweet and sour berries).

As the phalseywallah did the rounds of my neighbourhood that day, I saw a pizza boy making a delivery to one of the flats. I wondered if the youngsters who were going to gorge on that pizza had ever had phalsey with the special masala that added such zing to it.

Eating habits and dishes change with time, but there are some foods and customs that I sorely miss. A friend recently reminded me how many of us would connect certain hawker cries or sounds with specific items. A loud ‘ais-cream’ meant that the ice-cream man was passing by, carrying locally produced ware in his refrigerated cart. A Coca-Cola bar — suitably black — came for 10 paise. And the tinkling of bells meant the lakkar-hajam churanwallah had arrived.

Churan occupied a special spot in our young hearts. The geela one, a wet mass of tamarind, jaggery and god knows what else, was a favourite. The churanwallahs, many of whom were to be found near schools, also sold aam papad (dried and tangy mango slices) and various kinds of toffees and lozenges. Some sold kamrak (star fruit), crossed with a knife at the centre, and filled with some watery masalas.

A lot of what we ate came from carts that hawkers pushed, or little troves of food that they carried in tins on cycles. I remember the flaky patties that one vendor specialised in, and the cold rasgullas that many others carted in a small icebox.

TV did not dominate our routine in my growing-up years, so we saw no tantalising food ads. But we had fun with simple dishes that were rustled up at home. A friend loved his sweet mango chutney sandwich, and I couldn’t have enough sugar-sprinkled malai on toast. And since those days skimmed milk was an oxymoron, milk came laden with cream, and there was no dearth of malai.

One of the dishes cooked in my village home that has all but disappeared was called ganney ke ras ki kheer. It’s a dessert of sugarcane juice thickened with milk and flavoured with a dollop of desi ghee. I can see people squirming at the thought of it — but it was delicious! Another easy-to-make dessert was gur ke paranthe, prepared mostly in winter. Then there was bhura chawal — unprocessed sugar on plain rice, topped with what else but ghee?

There was another village dish. It was called sannata. For any community meal, villagers would bring some curd from their homes and put it in a huge pot. The curd was really sour by the time it was served — and attempts were made to mask the taste by adding huge amounts of red chillies to it. That’s how, a wag once said, it got its name. Sannata means an eerie silence. People who ate it were so shell-shocked that they couldn’t utter a word.

So many people and things have vanished with time. There was the chanachurwallah, who could be spotted in public parks with a tin containing flat chanas. He would give the chanas a swirl with some masalas in a small container, and then stack them in a newspaper cone. Around Diwali, we would eat a strange sweet shaped like animals made purely of sugar. I recall in particular a thin sugar sheet dotted with peppercorn.

We had interesting drinks called Rimzim (masala soda) and buntas. The latter came in a bottle that could be opened only when you removed a marble that acted as a stopper.

I was discussing these forgotten foods with some friends who, like me, thrive on nostalgia. A retired professor recalled the chana dal halwa sold in Urdu Bazar, near Jama Masjid. Another friend remembered how she waited for the dahi vada seller who visited homes in Daryaganj with a matka full of sweet and tart dahi vadas. Each vada had a fat raisin at the centre, and getting a taste of that raisin was blissful. A friend goes misty-eyed when he remembers the palkova ( sweetened and thickened milk cake) that he had as a kid of Chennai (and still does, when he can!). And I shed a few quiet tears when I remember the aloo tikki filled with minced meat sold in Khanna Market.

I like to think that it’s good to stay ahead of the times. Occasionally, though, it would be nice if we could turn back the hands of time.