Food habits die hard, at least in this small village in Hooghly district, 65 km from Kolkata. Though village life has changed drastically over the past years, villagers have added little new to their platter. Subhro Mukherjee (25), an IT-trained NGO employee, says life in Mamudpur is not as difficult as it used to be five-seven years ago. ?Roads, transportation, telecommunication, electricity and water supply, all are much improved. But eating habits remain the same since my childhood. There is no chowmein for dinner or toast and sandwiches for breakfast,? he adds. So what does the family eat? ?Chapatti and sabzi for breakfast, rice, dal, curry and fish for lunch and chapatti or rice with curry for dinner,? Chabi Mukherjee, Subhro?s mother, fills in. But has she introduced any new ingredients to her cooking? ?Not really. I have been using packet ingredients all along since I got married 27 years ago and I continue to use that. I have so far not used packed atta or packed non-basmati rice for cooking. Even for cooking basmati rice I prefer to buy it from our nearby grocery shop. But yes, we do buy packed basmati rice sometimes for a special occasion when we make fried rice or pulao,? she adds. Ask her if the younger generation in the family clamours for noodles or pasta and she quips, ?There is no use of cooking such food as these are not filling. We firmly believe in paying a price for something that is nutritious,? Chabi says.
A quick visit to the local kirana shop and more details pour forth. Partha Seth, who runs the shop, reveals that villagers don?t prefer packed atta or packed rice, but sale of packed edible oil has started picking up because people find it more hygienic than oil sold from cans. But his shop does have space for Maggie noodles, Lays potato chips, Kurkure, Mad Angles and so forth. ?These I keep for people who have been exposed to city life,? Seth says. But all these items are with a price tag between Rs 5 and Rs 10 and there are no big packets.
Even for those who have done better economically, the food they eat is the same as before. Take Keshto Mandi, who has a job in a factory near Kolkata. He has a concrete house, a TV set, but the kitchen is still a make-shift chulha under the sky for his wife Lakhi likes it that way. ?Rice is the best of all that I eat and the flesh of rabbit or a rat compares with no food that this world can offer,? says Keshto Mandi.
Small world, his!