For the longest time ever, mutton gravy and ‘jeera’ rice have been a Sunday staple for lunch in my life. And, although I’ve relished several variations of it over the years, the best mutton gravy I’ve had was always in the small town of M.P when we used to visit our relatives during the summer holidays.
One of my early childhood memories of this dish are about how my aunt used to get everything ready.. The ginger and garlic would be ground to a coarse paste on a large black stone slab and the coals in the ‘angeethi’ would be carefully arranged and lit, while one of my uncles would leave for the market to buy fresh mutton (any vegetarians reading this, feel free to avert your eyes!). Then finely sliced onions would be fried in plenty of oil till they turned a golden brown. Next, in would go the ginger-garlic paste and other spices, which would again be fried, till they assumed that rich brownish-red colour that all good gravies must have. Finally, the mutton pieces would be added and turned over several times till they were well coated with the ‘masala’.
At this point, my aunt would cover the vessel and we would all go off to church, leaving the mutton simmering away gently in its juices over the slowly burning coals, wood and cow-dung chips! When we returned from church, it was to the welcoming aroma of nicely roasted mutton (my mouth is watering even as I write this!). My aunt and mother would bustle around, adding water to the dish to make the gravy, frying and cooking the rice, slicing cucumbers for the salad and so on. And finally, finally, we would all sit down to a satisfactory lunch of tender fragrant long-grained rice, gleaming with golden gravy interspersed with chunks of mutton.
As the years passed, the stone slab and the ‘angeethi’ made way for the prosaic but more efficient mixer and gas stove. But my aunt still managed to make the Sunday lunch in her usual unhurried and meticulous way, which ensured that the flavours and taste remained the same. These are now a fixture in my mind’s album of childhood memories.
Sunday lunches are drastically different now .Preferences have changed along with our lifestyle. All meals are cooked and consumed in a hurry, regardless of what day it is. My breakfast is cold cereal eaten on the run, cooking is now a chore that is done while attending to a dozen other things.
Rarely there comes a Sunday when I have the time and inclination to cook mutton gravy with rice the way my aunt and mother used to. Well, today was one such Sunday! And in spite of the satisfaction it gave me to cook without keeping an eye on the clock, I don’t think I’ll be doing this again any time soon. But until then, I’m off to enjoy my Sunday lunch! Bon Appetit!
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