When I first came to Delhi in 2016, I asked my daughter’s North Indian cook to make chapatis for dinner. What she served me was thick like leather and was not the chapathi I had visualized. It was thick and was what we call rotis in the South. Later I realized that in the North ‘rotis’ mean ‘phulkas’ and the chapatis I had wanted is actually called parathas in Delhi. A simple recipe consumed all over India, with just a few ingredients - wheat flour, salt, oil and water- assumes different avatars and different names in various parts of India. Just as the Indian pizza is very different from the Italian pizza or the Chinese chowmein is quite a stranger to the chowmein served in Indian restaurants so also every food item in the World incarnates in unusual ways in different parts of the World.
The Indian cuisine is as varied as the World cuisine due to its diversity (from Kashmir to Kanyakumari or Arunachal Pradesh to Gujarat) of geography (soil, climate and crop availability of grains, millets, fruits, vegetables as also the spices and herbs), culture (ethnic groups & occupation) and religion. Within each region, there is again a mind-boggling variety dictated by caste, customs and traditions, e.g. in Tamilnadu, the Chettinad cuisine is quite different from the Brahmin cuisine. In the past when communication and transport were restricted, you could not even dream of eating food from any area other than your immediate neighbourhood. Within the region, every family standardizes the recipes in different ways to suit the requirements of the various members of the family. Very often the cuisine is a blend of the methods followed by the mother and the mother-in-law of the homemaker. Often men mistakenly think it’s a compliment when they tell their wives “Your sambhar/chole is exactly the same as my mother’s”, little realizing that the statement for some women may be like a red rag waved in front of a bull. The cooking process also changes from one generation to the other for various reasons.
An individual’s acceptance depends on the enjoyment he/she derives from the food being eaten. That level of satisfaction will depend upon the ambience of the environment, his/her physiological status (i.e., hunger, thirst, and presence/absence of illness), related factors like a method of serving and others but the most important factor is the prior experience, which will determine his anticipation. If you had eaten jasmine soft idlis when you were younger, then chances are you will want similar idlis later in life.
The prior experience will depend on personal, cultural, social, religious, economic,
environmental, and even political factors, which determines the cuisine that
he/she is accustomed to. The Keralites, for example, were not amused when beef
was ostracized by the ruling party recently since they have consumed it without
taboo from times unknown. The cuisine varies according to various cultures,
geographic availability of foods and the customs, traditions, which dictate the
ingredients, used as also the methods of cooking. The cuisine is not static but
evolves over time assuming different forms at different times and places.
My mother, as well as my mother-in-law, lived with us during the end of their life. Both the ladies were not happy with my cooking though my children and husband had no complaints. My mother-in-law’s complaints I could understand since my cooking (South Indian style but with inputs from Andhra and North Indian cuisine) was quite different from her ways of cooking (typical Chennai non-Brahmin cooking). I could not understand why my mother complained since she had taught me cooking when I was young and it was South Indian cuisine with inputs from North India and some Andhra cuisine. My mother-in-law was not as vociferous as my mother since, by the time she came to my home, she was not mobile. My mother, on the other hand, was quite active and wanted to cook but after one or two instances of her forgetting to switch off the stove, I refused to allow her that freedom so she grumbled endlessly about my cooking till her last day. Now I have reached their stage of life and stay with my daughter. I have the same complaints about cooking in my daughter’s house that those two ladies had with me in my house. I am usually very adaptable (even if I say so) having lived in various hostels during the course of my studies so as a Nutritionist, I wanted to know why?
Several studies do point to the fact that Physiological,
Psychological and sociological changes due to ageing, affect food acceptance
and habits of elderly people. The physiological factors include a change in
dentition, hearing, smell and taste apart from general health and changes in
gastrointestinal system. Quite apart from this, Edfors and Albert Westergren (2012) reported the
following feedback from the geriatric subjects they studied – “food
for us, elderly people is probably supposed to be cooked with care, but it
happens that some food is not properly cooked; Now that I have reached this
age, I should be allowed to… have things I like, and not… food that makes me
think: ‘Ugh, what is that, that’s no good’.”
Most old people describe a longing for appetizing meals and often they long for the traditional foods that they were accustomed to during their younger days. Another factor that needs to be considered is that in most cases the older ladies have always been gatekeepers of what the family eats and enjoyed the role. However, as they age and cannot cook, they feel the control slipping away. They are unable to do the little tricks they used to make the food more attractive and appetizing – my mother always added a dollop of ghee to the upma she made, to make it smell fragrant and non-sticky. Others may not be able to control the dollop size the way she could. As was said earlier, every individual adds his/her own spell to the recipe which makes it unique. There are certain recipes which they ate when they were younger but the recipe is not known to the younger generation or cannot be prepared. My mother-in-law wanted to have “Dried fish curry” but living in a Brahmin neighbourhood, I could not oblige her until a colleague very kindly got it made by her mother at her house. And in the modern world, where many career women depend upon paid help or take away food from restaurants, it is not easy to satisfy the taste buds of older people. Men especially can become very vociferous because they have always been pampered by their wives, who tried their best to imply, "your every word is my command”.
There is no easy solution
to this problem. It will do a world of good to remember that the human tongue
is only 3-3.5 inches. Once the food crosses the tongue and enters the
oesophagus, all food is the same – a blend of nutrients to keep the body
healthy. Eat to nourish the body and not for the taste!
