Traditional Kitchen Style

Posting today, a  feature about traditional kitchens from around India appeared in the  Sep 23 , 20113 issue of India Today Home.

  

At the heart of every Indian house lies its kitchen. Although the traditional Indian hearth is a far cry from the gleaming counter tops of its city counterpart, it is not hard to find homes that still retain their age-old sanctums, with due modifications that occur over time.

The traditional kitchen evokes strong images – that of basic, utilitarian spaces, wood fired stoves and ovens, gleaming brass or stainless steel storage boxes, ceramic containers used to store pickles and preserves, charred patina of thick terracotta, meticulously scrubbed brass and steel pots.

Depending on the region the kitchen, there is also the odd implement and tool used for specific purposes of steaming, molding, grating and cutting etc.

Even as one routinely chances upon quirky coconut graters from down south and brass moulds to set kulfi in from the north in flea markets of Mumbai or Delhi, and ubiquitous gas cylinders and shiny stoves come to replace the traditional chullha, one questions the need to reminisce and observe age old practices. Is it an exercise merely driven by nostalgia? Or is there more to the traditional kitchen, the recipes it gives birth to and the traditions it represents?

 A close look into the mores that thrive in the Indian kitchen tells how this humble space is a receptacle of culture and a way of life that shapes an entire civilization.

The smell of wood smoke is enough to trigger journeys back into time and into spaces that one way or the other form a strong part of childhood memories for many. May be from a long lost a home back in a village, or that of an odd relative or friend that one visited or that of a grandparent.

 Usually when one thinks back to a home from the past, it is not surprising that most stories and associations one has are from long lost kitchens.  This more than any other part of the home brims with sights sounds and smells of all kind. However prosaic the range of activities that surround such a space, it seems to feed a lifetime  of memories and imagination of entire civilisations.

A guests cup of Khante, or salt butter tea always brims on a visit to a Ladakhi home

Where the modern kitchen is best suited to meet the needs of increasingly convenience driven households, the traditional kitchen addresses more than just functionality.  It is a sacred space, treated as such, perpetuating tradition and lessons that speak of a way of life.

Probably why, owners of a Raibnder home in Goa refused to cut the coconut trees that came in the way of their home while it was being constructed. So, very creatively two robust coconut trees serve as a pillar around which the kitchen is constructed.  “Trees are sacred, we did not want to cut those on the plot while making room for the house,’’ I was told by the owners. Speaks volumes about the sensitivity to the natural environment. A lot of the practices that surround old kitchens are considered sacred almost mystical than the purely scientific or functional. Not surprisingly the sight is unlike anything that a urban household can ever conceive of as possible.

With time, much has changed in rural as well as semi-urban and urban kitchens across the country. The tradition of cooking on a newly raised platform in a Rajashtani Haveli situated in the old quarter of Jaipur for example.  ``We used to have a large kitchen where the cooking was done on a hand made chullha’’, explains Aarti Devi, the matriarch of the family. However since the fragmentation of the joint family, the kitchen was reorganized into a much smaller corner she said. Their new kitchen- less than five years old- is more efficient in meeting the needs of their smaller household, yet retaining the essential character of the traditional haveli it finds a place of pride within.

For most part though kitchens like homes everywhere in traditional societies straddle the past and present comfortably, evolving with time, and retaining what remains functional and relevant from the past.   Thick Tibetan carpets cover the wooden floor of a traditional Ladhaki kitchen in Hunder in the Nubra Valley.  `` We still use traditional implements handed down to us by our parents since they suit our needs so well ‘’ says home-owner Tashi Dorjey, speaking off the `Lungto’ a traditional Stone urn that is used to cook rice in. The dense walls of the vessel keeps its contents warm for a long time even in below freezing conditions.

Perhaps revisiting a traditional kitchen is just more than an exercise in nostalgia then.  For this space with its symbols and rituals, above all spaces in the domestic domain not only upholds a way of life but also shapes the mind and body of entire civilizations. 

A peek into kitchen's around Goa.

The way we live : A house by the sea

Society  has produced  the housing it needs, naturally and indigenously... this is not habitat that an outsider has to come in and `design'; rather it is the end product of a process that is organic to society, like flowers that bloom in a meadow

~ Charles Correa 

The homes built in the vernacular of  coastal Maharashtra are hardly for iconic or grandiose architecture. Yet driving past any residential cluster, it is hard to resist their trademark bright colors and individual quirks.

On a muggy monsoon morning, plying the back roads of a sleepy hamlet a few hundred kilometers outside Mumbai, I keep noticing the cottage style houses with simple mud and brick exteriors and thatched roofs. Until a bright crimson door  into a equally vibrant blue coloured squat adobe construction completely stops me in my tracks.

Walking into other peoples homes unannounced, just like that is never without a risk of rejection and embarrassment. This time as in the past, I just go ahead and take that chance anyway..

Inside, an elderly lady has just sit down to her lunch on a simple yet sturdy jhoola swinging from the roof.  I could not have chosen a worse hour to walk in, unannounced.

Luckily for me, home owner- Sailesh Kamath, does not seem to mind. Mr Kamath owns a sweet shop around the corner in Revdanda. He lives in the house with his aged mother and younger brother. Without much ado I am  invited  into his family home with the same warm hospitality I have experienced in countless homes in the region.

The structure,  bright and beautiful on the outside is astounding from the inside. Almost 150 years old I am told!   Its adobe and brick walls painted a vivid sea green are  sturdy and unscathed by time. Various generations have used the houses says Mr Kamat. Not so long ago,  an extended family of 17 would live in that space until demands of livelyhoods and education scattered them within the region and other parts of the country, he adds.

The old matriarch of the house- the gentleman's mother- quietly follows me on my explorations through the interiors. Offering, little nuggets  of information about the space and the family.  The decor, mostly functional and very simple has changed over  the years she says. Her younger son's political leanings and love for 1950's bollywood reflects in bright coloured bazar prints framed and hung as display in the  central foyer and elsewhere in the  house.

The fact that the house goes back years and  has changed hands many times during its history is evident in the way the orientation of the different living spaces is completely mixed up.  What used to be the main door is now permanently barred, and one of the original side entrances  is used for the purpose instead. A  separate cooking area and aangan has been turned into outhouse, segregated from the main structure. I try to take  in as much about the house and its people in the brief time I have inside the little blue house.

A jhoola encountered earlier,  in the kitchen also serves as an informal seating at meal times along with various coloured chowkis stacked neatly against the house.  All rooms have built in shelves and niches in the walls which serve both functional and decorative purposes.

The flooring of the house is made of hard baked clay to which   a coating  of dung fine straw and earth is applied  with the hands once a week. Although tiles would be far more convenient,  (which is why dung floors are vanishing fast across homes such as this every where) the owners say they prefer the old floor to cheap ceramic tiles.

Having taken a lot of the family's time, I take their  leave with a promise of stopping by when I am in these parts next.

  Getting back to the quote by Charles Correa I started the post with - One  thinks about  Mumbai and its built environment. Not so long ago, there was much to choose for the migrant into the city, bungalows, waadis , chawls even village style living . The city's  settlements dating back to the colonial times -( Khotachiwadi) or even  most of Bandra's quaint fishing villages boast structures built in various permutations available within the  Konkan coastal vernacular  mixed with  Portuguese and east Indian styles of housebuilding.  

Unfortunately for us city dwellers, residential architecture is being increasingly governed by singular ideologies of  development that generate high rise vertical housing as Mumbai's colonial diversity and heritage housing festers.

The way we live : Mud houses of Jaiselmer

A little away from the city enclosed within the honey coloured walls of the Jaiselmer fort, Rajasthan,  lie  tiny little villages lost in the desert wilderness. As opposed to the opulent havelis of the city- some of which are said to be among the most ostentatious in all of Rajasthan - these villages house the local peasant and pastoral communities. In a sharp contrast to most newly built, modern habitats  that scar  the landscape of urban India - ugly haphazard concretized neighbourhoods- these villages with their little mud houses offer   quality housing in resonance with the local climate and needs.

Painted in striking yellow and white lime wash, the mud houses of Jaiselmer take one back in time:  to the earliest forms of human habitation perhaps. Simple  and pertinent, these homes are mostly constructed using adobe and readily available mud mixed with straw and cow dung.
The womenfolk take particular pride in their houses, painting the exterior walls and adorning the interiors with elaborate patterns and designs drawn from local experience. The paint and pattern is renewed each year during the festive season, ensuring bright  and beautified neighbourhoods.

Mud –a resource plentiful in the  region, is malleable  when wet and strong when dry, particularly when mixed with straw and cow dung. It is an easy-to-use, strong, cheap, renewable resource.  The material  helps insulate the buildings against the extremes of summer heat  and winter cold making it a logical choice for the hot- arid local conditions.

With time however, the popularity of  adobe is waning. Each village comprises of a cluster of houses usually interspersed by  an odd flat roofed, concrete structure, called a pucca or permanent dwelling. In the recent years,  concrete- a material  neither suitable for the climate, less eco-friendly and sorely lacking in the aesthetic quality of mud- has gained favour with the local population that sees it as a  status symbol.

Even as  concrete cubes proliferate the rural landscape, it is interesting to note  that most of these  constructions mimic their mud counterparts in essential features (the square house with ample open to sky spaces around) and external adornment !

A cement- brick structure adorned to look like its mud counterparts in Sam village  40 kms from Jaiselmer.

Humble and  non-aspirational as they may be, the mud huts represent  an ancient way of life, living within the environment rather than challenge it. Built by the home owners themselves without  formal architectural inputs, using locally available materials, these lend a distinct character to the villages. A factor that attracts  tourists,  students of architecture, designers and artists  alike.

With the change over to modern sensibility, age old techniques  and traditional know how  are  fading from memory.  Its a tragedy. Compared to busy, bustling chaotic modern developments,  old  habitats such as  the mud houses of Jaiselmer exhibit a  shared aesthetic and  love for elegance and beauty. The visuality of such a neighbourhood is more in the form of a collective choice,  creativity and consciousness.  Is it these choices that  reflect in how clean most of these neighborhoods are..?

An interesting term coined by architect Charles Correa comes to mind.  Describing  rural habitats such as the mud houses,  he uses the words: ' Low energy-high visual'. That is succinct. Responding to the position that -an aesthetic  sense is something  the poor cannot afford- he says-

“Nothing could be further from the truth! Improving our habitats requires visual skills. The poor have always understood this.  With one stroke of a pink brush, a Mexican artist transforms a clay pot. It costs him nothing… And the Arab had only the simplest tools: mud and sky- so he had to be inventive! In the process producing the most glorious oasis towns ever seen. And it is not a coincidence that  the best  handicraft comes from the poorest countries of the world.”