Pongal and a vegetarian feast

Last Saturday, Indians celebrated the festival of Pongal. Though in Singapore, the government does not recognize it as a festival, it is still widely celebrated in many Indian homes. Basically, it’s the harvest festival, where rice is cooked and presented to God to thank for a bountiful crop that year.

It is celebrated on a grand scale in India where the whole family comes together to make Pongal, a sweet rice pudding with cashews and raisins, and streets get decorated with Kolams, (patterns drawn on the floor with rice flour), sometimes these Kolams also get colourful when they are filled with colored powder.

Every year my mom would be in charge of doing everything but as she could not do so this year, I did everything. I spent Friday night preparing everything for prayers in the following morning. Cleaned the house and even put up mango leaves above the door and sugar canes. After everything was prepared for the next day, mom and me sat down to watch TV. There was such an interesting programme on Sun TV, the cable channel from India. But I was just so tired that I fell asleep on the sofa. I love my sofa, it’s so comfy =)

Morning came and it was time for prayers. After my shower, I cleaned the prayer room and put garlands for the various deities. Then I made the Pongal. My mom usually makes Pongal with red sugar but I like to make Pongal with jaggery. It’s a matter of personal taste honestly. I also add quite a lot of whole cashews and less raisins. Many like to break the cashews in half so that they can get away with using a little. I left them whole and delightful. Anyway after that was done, it was time to offer it to the deities. The offerings were the Pongal, fruits , most importantly the trinity fruits of mango, jackfruit and banana and some Indian sweet meats.

The offerings

After the prayers, it was time to cook for the family. Mom and me started at around 8 am and we cooked non-stop … making one dish after another… on auspicious days like this Indians tend to be vegetarian. So we ended up making six vegetable dishes, sambar, coconut chutney, vadai, papadums , payasam and gulab jamuns. There was honestly a lot of food.

Pots and Pans filled with veges

Finally at around 1 pm i sat down for lunch, my uncle L joined me as well. The traditional way of eating a vegetarian feast like this would be on a banana leave. First the pongal is served. Then hot steaming rice is put. The sambar is poured over and i like to put ghee on the sambar and rice. The heat melts the ghee and the flavour just oozes into the rice. Then all the vegetable dishes are served. Then finally the vadai and the papadums.Yum !

The feast