SPICE ROUTE
IFyou’ve followed Marryam Reshii’s food and travel writing over the past 30 years, it won’t come as a surprise to you that she has the ability to craft an engaging, entertaining and eye-opening narrative from something as commonplace as the spices in your kitchen cabinet. The Flavour of Spice: Journeys,
Recipes, Stories is Reshii’s first book and, as if chronicling the use of spices across a country as vast as India wasn’t a task daunting enough, she also examines other nations.
Stories of her scouring markets across Athens or Mumbai or Iran armed with spices such as fenugreek or
dagad phool or saffron to present to shopkeepers suggest that her investigations quite possibly began long before the book was commissioned. She is meticulous about providing context, taking the reader for the joyride she’s already been on. Not only do we follow her across farms and factories in present day Guntur, Coorg, Kashmir or Gujarat, but also down a historical path to trace chillis down to ancient South America or picture nutmeg growing in the pre-colonial Banda islands.
The book packs in so much information that it certainly helps that Reshii has a wonderful sense of humour, and a knack for picking the perfect introductory anecdote for a spice or the unlikeliest of adjectives to describe it. She submits to the fact that, in some cases, the spices continue to tease her with their mysteries. And yet, she can easily lay claim to being the reigning mistress of spices. The recipes range from expert level to novice cook, provided by seasoned chefs, hobby cooks and friends. Some, including the delicious sabudana khichdi and black pepper lamb, have already been tried, tested and enjoyed by the reviewer but, more importantly, Reshii’s contagious passion and generous tips sprinkled throughout the book inspired a careful reexamination of the spice cabinet.
Would the book have benefited from Reshii delving deeper into the less popular spices such as Radhuni or Kalpasi? Perhaps. But this book manages to uncover a fair amount about spices that are found in every Indian pantry. It’s a good thing she has left fodder for a follow-up.