Maria Teresa Nenezes - The Essential Goa Cookbook

N ostalgic memories of holidays spent in Goa during my early childhood first prompted me to record those halcyon daysto share those memories as a sort of legacy for my grandchildren. They had never known that era, nor the affectionate warmth of large family gatherings in vast mansions, where devoted family retainers cheerfully looked after everyone and produced an unending stream of foodboth classic cuisine and good old soul food.

How clearly I recall the voyage by steamboat from Bombay to Panjim; the slow progress upriver to Divar in a flat-bottomed pathmari which was the sailing boat used along the coast; the creak of the oarlocks; the smell of tar; and the thrill of seeing shewto (mullet) arch out of the river in a silvery shimmering spray. From the landing on the island a box-like bullock-cart bounced us up the road to the house where my granduncle, Tio Julio, waited to welcome us home. In the kitchen, the caretaker/cook, dear old Quiteria, would be putting the finishing touches to lunch.

No matter that we children had been eating non-stop all the way from Bombay, the sea air and the holiday mood always sharpened our appetites, and we would go through the meal as though starving! First, a chicken soup with a hint of olive oil and alphabet macaroni in it, then croquettes with tambadi bhaji (red amaranthus) followed by prawn curry and Goa rice accompanied by a platter of small fried fish, netted at the sluice gate that very morning. Of course, it being May, bowls of mangoes ended the meal. Such menus were standard in most homes. For dinner, the rice and curry could be left out and a pudding or sweet replace the mangoes. Tea at 4 oclock meant the various sweets we lovedmerenda or a slice of doce, our favourite being doce de grao, made of Bengal gram, coconut and sugarwe particularly loved its soft sweetness.

May saw all the family assembled to celebrate the village feast in a relatives homemarried sons and daughters, cousins and relatives, about thirty adults and twenty children. They brought maids and attendants with them and the cavernous kitchen with a battery of chulhas (cooking fires) at either end, would throb with activity. The wide kitchen veranda which gave out onto the backyard was furnished with four huge grinding stones of the pestle and mortar type, plus two sil-batti stones, which are flat grinding stones with rollers. Separate grinding stones were reserved for grinding the masalas for fish curries, meat curries, coconuts used in sweets, wet and dry masalas and masalas that did not require coconut. The sil-batti were backups for occasions when the house was really full! About fifteen to twenty coconuts were ground daily for various dishes, sweet and savoury, to feed family and attendants. Two fish curries, one mild and the other piquant, which were mandatory, plus fried fish of some sort, a meat entree and a couple of vegetables were the norm. The matriarch of the housea delicate, exquisitely dressed lady, around seventy years old, would not come to table unless there were a specified number of dishes, nor would she take tea unless two sweet dishes were offered. It was not greed, but maintaining a way of life in which the appreciation of good food played an important part. Each recipe was meticulously followed. Tia Carolina who presided over the kitchen had amazingly sensitive taste buds.