South Indian food: I eat, therefore iPodi

Taking up to the smell of roasted chana dal was a happy start to a Sunday morning. It meant mother was busy making chutney podi.

Red chillies were roasted, followed by grated kopra (dried coconut). Once they cooled down a bit, these ingredients would be ground together along with a host of other ingredients to make chutney podi.
The podi (powder) would be a regular accompaniment during breakfast, lunch and dinner at our homes.

Mixed with oil, it would replace chutney when we have idlis or dosas. During lunch and dinner, it complemented the main dishes, just like pickle. Plus, in case we fell short of rasam on a given day, we mixed the podi with rice, along with oil. And as I realised in one of my early experiments, it could make a regular tomato-cucumber sandwich very appetising.

Little wonder that the podi would be over in 10 days or less. Mother ignored our pleas to make the podi again. "Not until next month," she would say, "Do you know how tedious it is to make?"

As fiery as gunpowder
The chutney podi at home is just one of the many varieties of podis made in households across South India. While it is ubiquitous in all four southern states, nowhere is the podi as loved as it is in Andhra Pradesh.

“Podi and pachchidi (chutney) is the first course of any traditional Andhra meal unlike other regions where it is usually sambar and rice,” says Pratibha Jain, co-author of Cooking At Home With Pedhata, a book on traditional Andhra recipes. “People of this region can create podis out of anything,” she adds.
You have the podi chutney, popularly known as gunpowder for its fiery taste, which can be had with idlis and dosas. While this podi is granular and hence crunchy, kandhi podi, which is meant to be mixed with rice along with ghee, has a smoother texture. Both podis are spicy and hence it is important to eat it in the right manner, says Jain who learnt these recipes from Subhadra Krishna Rau Parigi, or pedatha (aunt in Telugu) as she is fondly known.

“When we had kandhi podi with rice at pedhata’s house, it was tasty. But when we tried it out at home, it was far too spicy,” says Jain. It was pedhata who pointed out that the rice should be mixed with a healthy amount of ghee before adding the podi to ensure you don’t burn your palate.
Podis from Andhra Pradesh tend to be spicier, but apart from this difference, podis across South India are more or less the same — consisting of lentils, along with flavourings such as sesame seed, curry leaf, and coriander leaves. The process of making them is simple enough, but involves a significant amount of work.

Rooted in tradition
Mangalamma, who has made podis for several decades now, should know. “Every girl in our mattam — the extended Tamil Brahmin household — knew how to make it,” says the 71-year-old from the temple town of Payyanur. In the old days, podis were mass-produced during weddings and other celebrations, and wasn’t a one-woman job, she says.

“Now, every local grocer sells gram ready to be cooked or fried. Earlier, we had to buy whole grams, soak them overnight, peel off their skin, dry them, and then fry them. That itself would take days. The chutney podi would be black in colour then.”

Malayalis enjoy a tweaked version of this podi and call it the chammandi podi. Popular in the Namboothiri and Nair households in central and south Kerala, this has two additional ingredients: rice and lots of curry leaves. Latha Mohanan, from Kottayam, shares her recipe: “Fry one cup of rice in coconut oil. Add two cups of urad and chana dal to it. Add powdered hing, lots of curry leaves and dried red chillies. Add salt and powder the mixture.” Her mother used to serve this podi with idli or dosa even when they would have sambhar or fresh chutney ready, she recalls. “My mother-in-law taught me how to make it 34 years ago. I still make it often as my sons love it,” she says, generously offering us a bottle of her next lot of chammandi podi.

In the Ernakulam district of Kerala, there is an entirely different kind of podi. The chief ingredient is the jackfruit. Ripe jackfruit is cut into thin strips, and sun dried until crispy. This is powdered and preserved, to be had with fresh grated coconut, mixed with rice flakes.

“Jackfruit is a common seasonal fruit that ripens just before the monsoons in Kerala. The monsoon is harsh, and the month called Karkidakam in the Malayalam calendar is tough for the poor. In the old days, there would be no farming, and therefore, hardly anything to eat. The poor and prosperous had to prepare ahead of the ‘panja (poor) Karkidakam’. All kinds of preserves are made to last through the rainy season. Dried jackfruit powder is one of them,” says 87-year-old Karthiyayini Bhai.

“Nobody makes this jackfruit powder anymore as it tires you out. When we were young, it would take us a month to make. And every day, we had to spread it on a straw mat under bright sun. Children were asked to guard it from hungry birds and squirrels. The dried strips were collected before the sun set. Any moisture that could seep in would spoil the preserve,” she says. Chammandi podi is more popular, she adds. “Who in their right minds would attempt to make powdered jackfruit these days.”