Asafetida, India’s Odorous Style of Residence

Europeans in India referred to as it Satan’s Dung. It’s maybe essentially the most pungent spice on this planet. Even its identify contains “fetid,” as truthful warning. But Indians have been devoted shoppers of asafetida since historical instances, utilizing pinches of it to help within the digestion of beans and greens. There’s a story from sixteenth-century India—present in “Hobson-Jobson,” a vital glossary of Anglo-Indian phrases and phrases—a few Portuguese man who had a horse of nice worth that the king needed to purchase, besides that the animal had a foul case of flatulence. When the proprietor cured the horse by feeding it asafetida, the king exclaimed, “ ’Tis nothing then to marvel at for you’ve gotten given it to eat the meals of the gods.” To which the Portuguese man, no fan of the sulfurous spice, replied, “Higher name it the meals of the devils!”

Asafetida, or heeng in Hindi, is a resin, yellowish-white and sticky. A lump of it jogs my memory of the rosin that my violinist husband makes use of on his bow to assist draw out the sound of his instrument’s strings. However, whereas rosin comes from tapping widespread pine bushes, the gum resin for asafetida is extracted from the decrease stem and roots of a uncommon wild member of the carrot household. The plant requires a chilly local weather, arid however sunny. It’s discovered largely within the desert-like larger areas of Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Iran. It is rather finicky and grows stubbornly by itself. Many consider that it was being imported to India as early as 600 B.C.

In India, asafetida resin is “stabilized” with the addition of an edible substance, corresponding to wheat or rice flour, after which fashioned into lumps, granules, and powders. I bear in mind my mom would purchase solely the “purest” lump of asafetida. She would hack off a tiny piece, cowl it with cotton wool, maintain it with tongs over a flame to roast it—the burning cotton helped management the browning course of—after which crush it right into a powder. My mom’s mom and grandmother had performed the identical earlier than her, and had handed down data of the resin’s medicinal elements. In folklore and mythology, asafetida can push back evil spirits. In trendy drugs, it’s used to assist deal with ulcers, bronchial asthma, and bronchitis. My mom knew the spice’s sulfur compounds as an antiseptic, an antispasmodic, a digestive, a diuretic, an expectorant, a sedative, and a laxative.

What mattered most to us youngsters was that my mom’s retailer of knowledge led her to organize essentially the most luscious of meals. After I left India and went to London as a drama pupil, in my early twenties, I didn’t know how one can cook dinner in any respect. I used to be homesick, and my homesickness took the type of a deep eager for Indian meals. I wrote to my mom for recipes, and among the many first I requested for was potatoes cooked with asafetida and cumin. The broth, which included tomatoes, was heaven. To me, that was the style of house. When a cousin came visiting, my mom despatched her with a lump of asafetida in a tightly sealed field. I nonetheless have it, virtually fifty years later, and it nonetheless smells.

What’s it about asafetida that so haunts the senses? Many spices and seasonings change when they’re toasted. Cumin seeds flip nutty. Chili skins flip darkish purple and deepen in taste. However one thing virtually miraculously transformative occurs to asafetida when it hits sizzling oil or ghee. It’s usually mixed, at all times in small quantities, with different seasonings in a cookery step identified in northern India as tarka. To make my model, I put two tablespoons of ghee right into a small frying pan and let it get actually sizzling. Then I put in a beneficiant pinch of floor asafetida, which sends up its sulfurous and fart-like funk. Inside seconds, I add 1 / 4 teaspoon of entire cumin seeds and an entire sizzling dried chili. Then I swirl the pan round and instantly pour the combination right into a pot of freshly cooked, still-hot beans or lentils. I put the lid on shortly to entrap all of the aromas and flavors. What occurs subsequent is as if some pesky individual had farted after which slyly left the kitchen. The odor might linger, however contained in the pot the asafetida odor vanishes and is changed by one thing tantalizing and new.

When James Beard was getting outdated, I helped him educate his final courses, at his home within the West Village, down the block from me. The topic was “style.” We sampled all types of meals—caviars, meats, oils, salts—with college students carrying blindfolds to see what they might establish and what they appreciated. After one class, when Beard and I had been stress-free with buddies, I requested him to odor and style asafetida, freshly dropped into sizzling oil. He sniffed the air and stated instantly, “Truffles! It’s truffles.”

A couple of years in the past, with buying and selling routes in Afghanistan, India’s important exporter, disrupted, Indians started to contemplate the unthinkable: they might develop asafetida on their very own. The method takes 4 to 5 years. The crops go dormant on the first signal of unhappiness. Seeds had been purchased from Iran. Chilly, desert-like areas of India’s western Himalaya mountains had been chosen for trials. The crops are actually of their second 12 months of development. Indians are praying that ultimately their beloved “truffles” will bloom.

Candy, Bitter, and Spicy Black-Eyed Peas

Serves 4–5

Components

• 1 ½ cups dried black-eyed peas

• 3 medium tomatoes

• 3 Tbsp. ghee (clarified butter), peanut oil, or olive oil

• 1 to three entire dried sizzling purple chilies, relying on desired warmth

• ½ tsp. entire black mustard seeds (accessible at Indian markets and specialty grocers)

• ½ tsp. entire cumin seeds

• Beneficiant pinch of floor asafetida

• 15 contemporary curry leaves, if you will discover them at a specialty retailer

• ¼ tsp. floor turmeric

• 1 tsp. floor coriander

• 1 tsp. floor cumin

• 2 tsp. finely grated, peeled contemporary ginger

• 2 tsp. finely grated or crushed garlic (2 massive cloves)

• 1 ½ tsp. sugar

• 1 ½ tsp. Diamond Crystal kosher salt

• Handful of cilantro leaves, for garnish

Instructions

1. Put the black-eyed peas in a bowl. Wash in a number of modifications of water and drain.

2. Soak the peas in 4 cups water in a single day. Drain them the subsequent morning and put them in a medium-sized pan. Add 4 ½ cups water and convey to a boil. Don’t let it boil over. Take away as a lot of the white froth as you’ll be able to with a skimmer or slotted spoon, cowl partially and simmer gently for about 50 minutes or till the peas are comfortable however nonetheless retain their form. Older black-eyed peas will take longer.

3. Whereas the peas cook dinner, grate the tomatoes right into a bowl: reduce the caps off the tomatoes. Utilizing the coarsest aspect of a field grater, begin grating the tomatoes on the cap finish and maintain going till your hand is nearly flat towards the grater and solely the tomato pores and skin stays. Do all of the tomatoes. Prepared all of your different components.

4. As soon as the black-eyed peas are cooked, set them apart. Take a medium-sized nonstick frying pan. Pour within the ghee or oil and set the pan on medium-high warmth.

5. When the ghee is sizzling, put within the purple chilies, mustard seeds, cumin seeds, and asafetida. As quickly because the mustard seeds begin to pop (a matter of seconds), stir as soon as and add the curry leaves, if utilizing. They are going to splatter a bit, so stand again. Add the tomatoes. Stir a couple of instances. Add the turmeric, coriander, cumin, ginger, garlic, sugar, and salt.

6. Preserve stirring and cooking till you see the ghee glimmering alongside the perimeters and on the highest. Add all of the components within the frying pan to the pan with the black-eyed peas. Carry to a boil. Prepare dinner, uncovered, stirring every now and then, over medium warmth for 20 minutes, or till the liquid creates a skinny movie above the peas.

7. Garnish with the cilantro leaves. The peas might be served in a bowl with rice or a bread corresponding to naan or pita. Plain yogurt frivolously seasoned with salt and pepper and a fast salad of chopped onions, cucumbers, and tomatoes are good accompaniments. ♦