Mumbai Food: Gosht stories in Marol

Khaara gosht

Anyone attending a Kokani Muslim food pop-up scheduled for this weekend will get to sample a dish that isn't made anywhere else in the world outside of the home where the event will be held. "Not even the rest of my own family members make it," Shabana Gajjar, the home chef hosting the lunch, tells us about khaara gosht, the dish in question. This, she adds, is because only she and her mother know the recipe, after the latter created it at a time when Gajjar's grandparents were facing a financial crisis, which goes to show that at least in this case, necessity was the mother of invention.

Gosht biryani

"My grandfather had made some pretty big losses in his chemical plant business, and he didn't have any money. Now, this was during Bakri-id, which is when Muslims gift each other goat meat. So, my grandfather received some mutton from his friends and he brought it back home, asking my mother to cook it. But my mom wondered, 'What do I make, because I don't have anything at home?' The only things she had were whole spices and salt, that's all. But she eventually used just those ingredients and some ginger to come up with this recipe. And I'm telling you, even while speaking to you about it, my mouth is watering," Gajjar reveals.

Sandaan

She adds that people have flocked to her house over the years just to have khaara gosht on Bakri Eid, because that's the only time she makes it. She will make an exception for the pop-up, of course. But all the other items on the menu are typical Kokani Muslim delicacies. These include tikone parathe - a triangular paratha made with wheat flour kneaded in milk - and sikori dhaan, a mutton dish made with a rich, red gravy that has fine rice, or dhaan, accompanying it.

Bagare chawal

"Sikori dhaan is a wedding specialty and if you go to a Kokani Muslim one, you will find people judging the food only on how that one dish is made," Gajjar informs, adding, "If the rice is a little puffed up, people automatically assume that the host can't afford the finer version. And the gravy has to have a noticeable layer of ghee floating on it, while the meat can't be too soft or fall off the bone. It has to be cooked just right."

Shabana Gajjar

Food, she adds, is in fact such an integral part of the community's culture that even everyday lunches and dinners look more or less like a feast. And since the history of Kokani Muslims dates back to Arab traders who stayed back along Maharashtra's coastline, reaching here even before the Mughal era, fish and rice form their staple diet. "We actually love to eat non-veg so much that we have to have it 364-and-a-half days a year, that half-a-day falling on Muharram, which is a period of mourning," Gajjar tells us. She also says that while meals for those based in Mumbai are heavy on chicken and mutton, the community's members - unlike most other Muslims - don't eat beef, since they consider the texture to be too tough for their liking.

"But vegetables are also a must for us, because we like to have a complete meal," Gajjar continues, ending with, "That's why if you ever go to a Kokani Muslim's place, you will find roti, sabzi, salan - which is the gravy - rice, papad, achaar and kachumbar. And for foodie families like ours, we also have a starter before and desserts after the meal, which can even be a banana if nothing else. That's how it has to be every single day. In fact, when friends come visiting our house for the first time, they think that we have made a special meal just for them. But that's not the case at all. It's just how we eat."

On March 17, 1 pm
At Blue Monarch CHS, Military Road, Marol, Andheri East.
Log on to openout.in
Cost Rs 1,380

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