Walk into any Indian kitchen during Navratri and the it looks quietly rearranged. The wheat flour and rice move to the back. Rock salt comes forward. For nine days, a short list of ingredients has to do the work of an entire menu, and that limit is where the creativity starts.
Barnyard millet cooks fast, roughly 12 minutes with two cups of water per cup of grain. Because it works, it is a small piece of kitchen logic, handed down. Five of them, it turns out, are enough to build a full day of eating: sabudana, kuttu, samak rice, potatoes and makhana. Tapioca pearls are the breakfast answer for a reason. They are mostly starch, so they fill you up fast and keep you going. The trick is patience. Soak one cup for four to five hours, until a pearl squishes easily between two fingers. Rushing this step is the usual reason khichdi turns into a sticky clump. Heat ghee, crackle some cumin, add green chilli, then boiled diced potato and roughly crushed roasted peanuts. Fold in the drained pearls and cook for just three to four minutes. Lemon and coriander go in at the end. Leftover mix can be shaped into sabudana vada and fried crisp, best eaten with curd. Buckwheat flour has no gluten, so the dough tends to crack and crumble. As the Roman poet Horace put it, “Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents. Here, the kuttu flour is boiled, mashed potato. Knead it in with rock salt and a little cumin, and the dough holds together well enough to roll into puris or parathas, then fry in ghee. Sauté cumin, green chilli and cubed potato or carrot in ghee, add the washed grain, and a pulao is done. Or let the grain cool and stir in whisked curd, cucumber and roasted cumin. That version suits a warm afternoon far better than anything heavy.
Potatoes appear in nearly everything above, which says something. Jeera aloo, cubes tossed in ghee, cumin and black pepper, is the classic partner for kuttu puris. For something less expected, a curd-based gravy thickened with a little singhara or rajgira flour and simmered with boiled potatoes works like a gentle kadhi. In the evening, boiled or roasted sweet potato with lemon, rock salt, black pepper and pomegranate seeds makes a snack that tastes far more indulgent than it is. Dry-roasted fox nuts, tossed in a little ghee with rock salt and pepper, are the easiest snack on this list. The same nuts, lightly crushed and simmered in full-fat milk with sugar or jaggery, cardamom and a few nuts, turn into a creamy kheer. Start with sabudana khichdi and buttermilk. Lunch can be samak pulao with cucumber raita. Evening calls for makhana or sweet potato chaat with fruit. Dinner is kuttu puris, jeera aloo and the curd gravy, finished with a small bowl of kheer. Since so much of this is starch, a few habits help: squeeze lemon over sabudana and chaat to cut the heaviness, keep frying moderate, balance plates with fruit, curd and milk, and drink water, coconut water or buttermilk through the day. Disclaimer: This article is for general information only. Fasting customs and permitted ingredients vary by family and region.
