Think about Dahi Vada and Kheer and every Indian will immediately assume these to be sattvik favourites that you can eat during any vrat. But ask any knowledgeable Bengali, and your assumptions will go for a toss when you come across Thakurbari classics like Keemar Doi Boda and Peyajer Payesh. In case you didn’t know, Thakurbari refers to the Jorashanko home of the illustrious Tagore family. While scions of the family like Rabindranath Tagore and Abanindranath Tagore are known for being artists, poets and writers of global renown, many are unaware of the family’s immense contributions to Bengali food.
What makes culinary classics from Thakurbari unique are the uninhibited experiments the women (and men too) conducted with ingredients to come up with dishes that taste delicious and yet boggle the mind even today. And yet, these recipes are getting lost in the mist of time as the practice of cooking Thakurbari dishes is out of vogue and knowledge about the dishes still scarce. To address this and to mark the occasion of Rabindra Jayanti on May 9, Slurrp caught up with Chef Abhimanyu Sen and his sister, Banalata Sen, distant descendants of the Tagore family who run a food business called Breaking Basmati in Pune.
Related to the Tagores by marriage, the duo whip up Thakurbari recipes passed down by their grandmother and mother even today. What’s more, the Sens also admit that preserving Thakurbari dishes is not as easy as it may sound, and a lot of adaptations are required. Here’s what the duo had to say, along with a classic Thakurbari sweet dish from their repertoire.
Thakurbari Recipe Inheritance & Recreations
Chef Abhimanyu Sen, a seasoned chef who has had an impactful career across Delhi and Mumbai before shifting to Pune, first explains their connection to the Tagores. Their great grandmother, Sulajini Bandyopadhyay, was the niece of Rabindranath Tagore’s wife, Mrinalini Devi. “Our great grandmother and grandmother spent their childhood in Santiniketan and visited Jorasanko frequently,” he explains. “Through that family connection, many recipes and food practices were orally passed down to my mother when she married into the family. Then our mother taught us many of these recipes.”
Banalata Sen, a lawyer and entrepreneur, explains that apart from the dishes they were taught, they also recreated many from memory. For example, you are unlikely to find their Amsotto Morich Pulao mentioned in any Thakurbari recipe book—not even in Pragyasundari Devi’s 1902 book or Purnima Thakur’s 1985 one. “The recipe was never documented, but we heard all about it from our mother and grandmother,” she says. “The natural next step for us was to use our own imagination to recreate the dish today with Amsotto or mango leather from Kolkata.”
The Tagores also enjoyed picnics, the Sens say, and another favourite that isn’t mentioned in any recipe collection is Bagan Pulao—a veggie-packed winter pulao that travels well. “We have heard so much about these dishes while growing up that recreating them came naturally to us,” Abhimanyu says. “Of course, cooking the ones that are well known is much easier, like the whole range of stews and roasts inspired from English, Irish and other Continental cuisines.”
And yet, Banalata opines, many recipes which have been passed down the generations are incomplete. “Some of them are three-four lines long and lack measurements,” she says. “So, you have to utilize a lot of imagination to fill in the blanks. You have to work with both culinary instinct and imagination to recreate these Thakurbari gems from those available books.” How, then, can we recreate Thakurbari recipes in our own homes today like the Sens do?
Keeping Thakurbari Culinary Gems Alive
“When we started our Breaking Basmati cloud kitchen in 2020, we always intended to present Thakurbari classics to people,” Abhimanyu says. “We curated our first Thakurbari-special menu in 2021, on Rabindra Jayanti, and met with immediate success. So, we have continued with the tradition ever since by curating a menu that presents classics with a modern take. For example, Thakurbarir Mohur Luchi has always been served on the side of a Kumror Chokka, but we decided to present them like vegan tacos to appeal to modern sensibilities.”
So, the Tagore classic idea of making tiny Luchis that are equated with Mohurs or gems got a 2020s upgrade in this way. The elements remain the same, but the dish is easier to eat—and that’s the method the Sens are using to keep Thakurbari culinary traditions alive. “While curating Thakurbari recipes, I also came across a Beet Bata recipe that I’m sure will appeal to people today as much as a Beetroot Hummus does,” Banalata says. “The recipe does not call for any straining, but I would do it because that’s going to enhance the taste and look.”
A closer look at the dishes Banalata curates and Abhimanyu cooks up shows that they have adapted Thakurbari classics to not just modern Indian sensibilities, but also to location and Bengali nostalgia. A good example is their Bhetki Roast. “A Thakurbari classic, this dish is traditionally made with Ilish or Hilsa,” Abhimanyu explains. “But that’s next to impossible to get in Pune right now, so we are using Bhetki instead.” And nostalgia, that typical Bengali source of inspiration, also comes into play here.
“Because Thakurbari recipes are not found freely and widely across India, or even Bengal, people don’t have any reference point for many dishes,” Banalata explains. “So, while the mention of Thakurbari does evoke nostalgia, the flavour of the most experimental Thakurbari recipes don’t. That’s why, while recreating these Thakurbari dishes, I focus on describing them on the menu with words that evoke nostalgia, emotions and memories of known Bengali food flavours. Instead of looking at it all with a conventional point of view, adapting is the best way to preserve these recipes I feel.”
A Thakurbari Classic Everyone Can Make
The point both Abhimanyu and Banalata Sen drive through is that running after perfection and authenticity may be the reason why Thakurbari recipes are now known as lost recipes or rare recipes. The practice instead, they say, should be to experiment with recipes and work with culinary instincts just like the Tagores did! To help you get into this process, the duo shared their recipe for Peyajer Payesh. “As bizarre as it sounds, this dessert with onions is a testament to the culinary experiments the Tagore household was so notably known for,” Abhimanyu says. Here’s the recipe.
Ingredients:
1 litre buffalo milk
250g white onions
55g batasha or mishri
50ml condensed milk
3g dried rose petals
¼ tsp salt
2 nos green cardamoms
1 bay leaf
For garnish:-
3-4 green pistachios, blanched and chopped
¼ tsp green cardamom powder
Method:
1. Soak pistachios in hot water for 5 minutes. Remove their outer covering to reveal bright-green pistachios. Set aside.
2. Dice the white onions into small cubes and gently separate the onion petals. Do not forget to discard the core. Wash the onions under running tap water several times to minimize the intensity of their sharp taste.
3. Blanche the cut onions (i.e., put the cut onions into boiling salted water) for not more than 2 mins. Remove the onions, drain the water and run them under tap water.
4. Take a muslin cloth and make a tiny potli with the dried rose petals. Bring water and that dried rose petal potli to a boil. Add the blanched onions and keep them on high flame for not more than 2 mins. Remove the onions, drain and set aside.
5. Set 1 L milk to boil in a thick-bottomed saucepan along with 2 whole cardamoms and 1 bay leaf. Add the batasha or the sugar crystals (as per availability). Keep stirring milk and reduce it to 30% of its original volume on low heat, about 30 to 40 minutes.
6. Add the condensed milk and reduce it further on low flame for another 10 mins.
7. Then add the twice-blanched onions and stir them continuously on low flame till it reaches a creamy and silky texture.
8. Turn off the heat, add the green cardamom powder and transfer to a dish to cool.
9. Refrigerate for 3 hours, and serve preferably chilled with a garnish of blanched, peeled and chopped pistachios.