While we Indians are still relishing the flavours of our traditional new year festivities, celebrated in various forms across the country, we are joined by our neighbours across Asia in celebrating the new year and harvest festivals. Needless to say, food is an essential part of all celebrations and each festival brings with it its own culinary traditions.
In Myanmar, the new year and harvest festival is called Thingyan, also known as the water festival, when water is splashed on others to symbolise purification, cleansing and new beginnings. Celebrated over four-five days, Thingyan is comparable to other festivals in Asia, such as the Songkran in Laos and Thailand, the Cambodian New Year, the Sinhalese New Year and Baisakhi in Punjab, Puthandu in Tamil Nadu, Vishu in Kerala and Bihu in Assam in India. This is also the time for Hanami in Japan, which celebrates the arrival of spring and cherry and plum blossoms.
Festivals are a time for families to come together and eat together. So, food is shared as people sit together and indulge in traditional delicacies. Rice is central to all Asian cuisines, and an essential part of the new year celebrations around the continent. Like mont lone yay paw, the traditional Thingyan sweet of glutinous rice flour dumplings filled with palm jaggery and topped with shredded coconut. In the Vietnamese new year, also known as the Tet festival or Tet Nguyen Dan, which happens in February, sticky rice cakes wrapped in banana leaves are essential. Called banh chung, the steamed glutinous rice cakes are filled with pork and green beans, representing the balance between yin and yang. Similarly, one of the staples during Hanami in Japan is dango, a rice flour dumpling coloured pink, white and green, resembling the sakura flowers.
The flavours in all cuisines are fresh, a nod to the bounties of spring, and heralding the upcoming summer with its offerings of juicy, luscious fruit. Like the lemon poppy seed ice cream at Burma Burma, a pan-Indian Burmese specialty restaurant and tearoom, which is tangy, sweet, creamy and crunchy at the same time. Celebrating the new year, the restaurant is offering home-style Burmese delicacies to patrons, complete with a large ‘village set’ that replicates community eating with dishes arranged on a large basket platter.
Start with raw mango salad, which is a Thingyan tradition, and the quintessential crunchy fritters including mock-mince samusa, sweet potato tempura and rice crackers that are a part of a Burmese meal just as they are in India, and go on to a traditional pumpkin and broad bean curry with coconut rice and tofu and mushroom stir fry with palatha, akin to an Indian paratha.
Coconut rice, traditionally known as ohn hatmin, is a ceremonial dish served on special occasions, made with fragrant short rice cooked with raisins and onions in fresh coconut milk. The pumpkin curry is a version of sebiyan from the Shan state, where yellow pumpkin and broad bean grow widely. This curry is cooked with shallots, coconut and chillies, celebrating popular Burmese vegetables and legumes. Finish with a banana sanwin makin, which is a traditional Burmese semolina cake with banana and strawberry, baked in coconut cream and topped with poppy seeds.
Meanwhile, in the ‘Land of the Rising Sun’, almost every area is blanketed in shades of pink, white and mauve with pretty cherry blossoms in full bloom. Coinciding with Hanami, people across Japan gather in parks and public places for picnics and parties beneath the sakura, with the pretty pink and white flowers often snowing down from the branches. And no party or picnic is complete without some delicious food. Apart from the Hanami staple dango, there is the go-to bento, a single-portion meal, home-cooked or take-out, which generally includes rice or noodles, fish and vegetables. Then there are sushis, mochis (rice cakes) and tamagoyaki, the thinly-layered soft Japanese-style omelette, which are in much demand during the Hanami festival. The cherry blossoms influence the drinks as well as people feast on sakura-flavoured alcohols like sake (Japanese rice wine) and soju.
Drawing inspiration from further east, Guppy, the Delhi-based Japanese restaurant, is hosting a Hanami festival with a menu oozing spring, colours and newness.
You can start with avocado, beetroot and edamame salad with sesame and wafu dressing, both flavourful and light on the palate. Top this off with a plate of rainbow roll sushi made with salmon, tuna, avocado, yellowtail and crab. “Salmon has a unique taste at this time of the year as temperature shifts from cold to hot,” says head chef Saurabh Sharan. The main course features tofu, asparagus and artichoke and comes with a cauliflower-based garlic sauce.
How can a Japanese meal be complete without a good bowl of ramen? As temperature rises, what is more common is cold, and not hot ramen. Containing all the summer elements in place, Guppy offers cold ramen with melon, mango, seaweed and cucumber with sesame-based sauce. “You can have a bowlful of it on a hot summer afternoon and yet feel refreshed,” the chef comments.
The Hanami spirit also reflects on Guppy’s drinks menu, the perfect example of which is the litchi bloom cocktail, made with sakura gin and litchi soju. Since sake is considered a Hanami staple, one must also try berry cosmo, made with sake, aperol, vodka and blueberry lemonade. “The drinks menu is curated around some kind of flowers,” the chef says.
The festivities continue for several days. The Vietnamese new year, for instance, is observed over a five-day period to celebrate the arrival of spring. “Family celebrations continue for almost seven days and delicacies are especially prepared to show respect and gratitude to ancestors and parents,” says Nquyen Thi Lua, sous chef at Hyatt Regency Danang, who is in India to host a Vietnamese pop-up at the European Food Hall, AnnaMaya, Andaz Delhi, this week.
One of the must-haves during this time is xoi, a savoury made with sticky rice as base ingredient with pandan leaves, turmeric or vegetable broth, green beans, corn, meat, fish and fruits, coconut milk and topped with fried onions for extra flavour. What is most interesting about xoi is that it can be consumed all through the day—breakfast, snack or a side snack for lunch or dinner.
Another staple is dua mon, pickled/ brined vegetables found on every table of feasting families and made from vegetables to taste sour, spicy, salty, bitter and sweet, which helps in digestion.
“Every dish is an appetising tale with a range of nutrients and ingredients. For instance, most households prepare the dua mon and xoi in bulk. These dishes signify wealth and prosperity. Cilantro is used as an accompaniment to pho or banh mi subs, the traditional stuffed rice pancakes. Not only is cilantro delicious, but this herb also adds nutritional value to every meal. It is plant-based, high in fibre and helps promote healthy digestion,” adds Lua.
Traditional cakes like chung and tet are made to express respect for the sky, the Earth and the ancestors. “Cake making is a big process, and includes wrapping and cooking with ingredients like phrynium leaves, glutinous rice, mung beans, meat, salt and freshly ground black pepper. We like to prepare cakes in bulk so that these can be stored for up to two weeks,” adds Lua.
A five-fruit tray (mam ngu qua)—representing five elements and colours, typically including banana, grapefruit, peach and others—adds colours to the feast. “The houses are decorated in red and yellow as these are lucky colours for us,” says Lua.
