Cookbook author Bhanu Hajratawala's food straddles many countries -- India, since her parents belong to Gujarat, Fiji, where she was born, and the United States, where she migrated to as a young bride. From Surat, she learnt the ingredients of delicious non-vegetarian preparations, from Fiji, the joys of community cooking, and the US taught her to improvise in times of scarcity. Sunday MiD DAY turns a few pages of Gujarati Kitchen for you to read

Surat nu jaman ane Kashi nu maran: The food of Surat is like dying in the holy city of Kashi," is the opening line of Gujarati Kitchen, a cook book by US-resident Bhanu Hajratwala that recently hit the shelves. What caught our eye, as we thumbed through our review copy, was the presence of mouth-watering non-vegetarian preparations in a Gujarati cuisine book. Yes mother, you're right. Our education is lacking in gastronomical proportions.



We speak to Hajratwala over a cracking line from California. Excerpts of the interview:

One of the things I found startling was the existence of non vegetarian dishes in a Gujarati cook book. Clearly, Gujarati cuisine isn't all vegetarian. Where do your non vegetarian dishes originate from, and what are the main ingredients?
A majority of Fijians are non-vegetarian, including my family. Also, I belong to the Kshatriya clan, which eats non vegetarian dishes. We made sure that the girls in our family knew how to cook these dishes, as they'd marry into other Kshatriya families. In fact, if I invited another Kshatriya family and served them vegetarian food, they wouldn't be very happy. Having said that, non vegetarianism isn't restricted to the clan. As Gujaratis shift abroad, many have begun to eat non vegetarian dishes.