Memories On A Plate: New Anthology Explores Food & Familial Ties

THE anthology Memories on a Plate, curated by Shruthi Taneja and Rohini Kejriwal, is just as wholesome as a home-cooked meal with loved ones. Featuring anecdotes, memories, recipes, art, poetry, and photo essays, the book invites readers into 100 kitchens across the globe to sample food steeped in tradition that connects people.

When Shruthi, founder of Nivaala, a media and publishing company that is dedicated to documenting family recipes from across India, and Rohini, the creator of The Alipore Post, a weekly journal, came together, their shared passion for preserving culinary heritage resulted in the collaboration.

Together, they have crafted a book that forges bonds among strangers owing to the universal language of food and the role of a kitchen in being a vanguard of culinary legacy. “The idea for Memories on a Plate stemmed from a shared vision to preserve the culinary heritage hidden in family kitchens across India and the world,” shares Rohini and adds, “It began as an intention to capture the deep-rooted emotional ties people have with food.”

The duo held an open call for submissions in January 2023 across different formats—poetry, essays, recipes, photography, art, and comics—and what began as a small idea quickly grew into a collaborative project involving 100 contributors worldwide after they received 350+ submissions.

The stories from submissions were chosen for their emotional depth, the recipe's uniqueness or cultural significance. Shruthi adds, “We prioritised narratives that emphasised intergenerational bonds, rituals, and culinary traditions and gave each submission its own visual identity while sticking to an overarching design language.”

A deeply personal narrative

At the heart of the book are its moving stories. One story evokes a narrator’s small kitchen at her mother-in-law’s home in 1979, which was a place of love. It speaks fondly of preparing dishes like vorn (a Mangalorean dish made of moong dal, jaggery, coconut milk, cardamom, a few cashews, and some raisins) for a family of seven in a cramped kitchen.

Another vividly recalls childhood meals of ilish maach carefully cooked and packed in Tupperware containers sent by extended family members. These memories evoke a deep nostalgia, a reminder of the warmth and love embedded in every shared meal.

Nostalgia, in fact, is the theme of this anthology. As Rohini adds, “For many people, certain dishes evoke powerful memories, like a dish cooked by a grandparent during festivals, the taste of one’s mother’s cooking, and, of course, dishes we associate as comfort food that we keep returning to.”

This anthology leans heavily into that nostalgia, reflecting how food ties us to moments and people that shaped us. It also shines a light on the diversity of Indian food and culinary heritage by celebrating cuisines from every corner of the country and beyond. From regional and traditional preparations to more modern-day takes on recipes, the selection includes a range of popular and lesser-known dishes that reflect unique flavours and stories.

“By capturing recipes from diverse cultural backgrounds, from the remotest of villages to the heart of the cities, we showcase India’s culinary depth beyond mainstream dishes, showcasing dishes the readers may have never even heard of—be it a Marathi-styled tomato cha loncha or a chicken stew flavoured with Old Monk,” says Sruthi.

From a food connoisseur’s perspective, there’s something to discover on each page, through the 100 different food cultures described within the pages of the book.

Linking food and family

Each recipe shared has a story behind it—be it a coriander chutney or a besan chila. Since food is intrinsically tied to memory and culture, these recipes transcend mere ingredients, becoming a journey through time, geography, and personal connections.

For Rohini, the story she felt closest to was one by Srishti Sareen, in which she reminisces about her Dadima’s mango pickle. Being a pickle fiend, she visited Shristi’s family in Varanasi and sampled the mango pickle mentioned in the story!

The story ‘making rasam is an act of prayer’ resonated deeply with Shristi because it becomes a practice of reflection and connection. She states, “The ingredients are not measured but felt, as if each step is about invoking memories and traditions. For me, this submission beautifully captures how cooking can ground us in our histories while giving us space to make the dish our own, making every repetition of the recipe both a personal act and a tribute.”

Apart from the stories, what stands out is the design filled with stunning artworks that fit cohesively within the anthology’s structure. The delicate palette of the dishes mentioned finds a perfect partner in the colourful and detailed images.

The running theme between the stories in the book is that food, family, and memories are intricately linked. It showcases the invisible connection we have when we cook a dish that carries the essence of those who have prepared it over the generations—a connection that bridges the past and present in a fundamental way.

This anthology celebrates personal stories by presenting recipes as narratives and sharing the memories and context associated with the food. Each dish becomes an heirloom, a nod to family ties and shared experiences, immortalising the familial bonds that keep loved ones close, even as time passes.

Memories on a Plate is not a cookbook but has recipes sprinkled around, with the silent hope that those reading and cooking from it may enter someone else’s kitchen, creating a larger family, a larger kitchen for everyone.