Mangal Naik wakes up
at 5. A middle aged woman with two children she starts by working on the spices
for her famed sungta bhaji, for hordes in the Dabolim, Zuarinagar area. When
she and her husband Sunil Naik, who used to work for a local battery company
decided that a salary of Rs 1400 wasn’t going to take them far, they decided to
convert their love for cooking home cooked snacks and finger food into a littl
e business.
Over time the little extension in
front of their home, opposite the Naval Supplies depot at the Vales junction at
the airport highway, has become like a family kitchen for many – from drivers
of cars, to workers in factories, to footballers including some from the FC Goa
team and a growing number of folks who take a quick pit stop to pack a real
home cooked Goan meal and take it with them when they fly out.
In this really tiny place with around
six to eight tables, many wait for Mangal and her sister in-law (Sunil’s
younger brother’s wife) to supervise the making of curries, the veggies and the
fi sh frys to be churned out. Every morsel freshly cooked, there are no deep
freezers and because of this constant buzz of people from breakfast to diner,
at times stuff runs out and cooked on the run where people actually wait.
Sunil and Mangal’s place has a name,
the name of their son Saurish. Returning to the start of Mangal’s day, it’s
pretty focussed on her prawn bhaji, which quite clearly has no parallel in Goa.
Lightly spiced prawns cooked in onions and oil with a hint of spices and had with
thick chapattis (which too is her speciality) are made in an assembly line as
everyone from office goers, factory workers and even mothers in a hurry to pack
tiffins for their children rush in and rush out. The prawn bhaji assembly line
slows down by 11, but doesn’t really stop through the day.
The scene then rapidly shifts to lunch
preparations when the all ladies team in the family kitchen of Naiks get the
spices going for the fish and the curries. Mangal adds another touch to the t
hali which stands out – a mildly spiced chicken in thick coconut gravy which
should be poured over the rice for it to be totally soaked in.
By lunch there’s a queue outside with
those who have booked before, getting a better chance to secure their orders.
On some afternoons the food simply runs out because there’s nothing stocked or
stored, it’s literally a fridge-less operation. And yet no one goes hungry.
Hubby Sunil quickly rushes to get fresh supplies including fish and sea food if
the need arises in between from dropping his children to school or ferrying
them to tuitions.
Sunil’s role is no less exemplary. At
the crack of dawn he rises to head to Margao to get the best fish, prawns and
shell fish. He then performs his role of designated driver for the children, Saurish
and his sister. Between picking Saurish from school and dropping the daughter
for the first of her tuitions, he darts to augment supplies in the kitchen.
Saurish, won’t make it to any food
awards, it doesn’t have a Facebook page you need to ‘like’, or show that you’ve
‘checked in’, there are no fancy reviews or recommendations, nor does its menu
go viral. And yet when the BRICS summit was held, food used to be packed from
the same humble kitchen for many in different delegations who wanted the real
taste of Goa. And the locals do not need any other stamp of approval barring
the local chatter which at times catches the attention of FC Goa’s Goalkeeper
Laxmikant Kattimani as he drops in for his prawn bhajis and thalis at times.
Rumour has it that he needs this fix before he boards a flight to play an away
game.
The story of Sunil and Mangal is of
enterprise and determination and of keeping cooking really simple so that even
small slices of what they offer become the big picture in many homes. For instance,
many drop by to pack just the curry and take it home to have with rice.
Places like Saurish and Ramesh (at
Sancoale) which was the pit stop of this wanderer a couple of weeks ago take
you back to places where Goan food should always belong, in the kitchens of
Goan families who cook for the sheer pleasure of feeding.
And in the lovely old fashioned
genuine way, they are liked, experiences of those who eat are shared and their
name and fame goes viral though village chatter. No social media can do what a
village can.
More power to these home kitchens. Let them never change.
