Churma

Unique to Indian cuisine, every region of the nation holds a splendid culinary history and a standalone signature dish that embodies the socio-cultural advancement of its people. For the vibrant land of Rajasthan, the Dal-Bati-Churma is the unquestionable symbol of heritage and the indisputable gateway to Rajasthan’s illustrious past. This three-in-one globe of fried, sautéed, and baked deliciousness encapsulates more flavours than entire cuisines can hold in their repositories. The dish consists of the baked Bati, the spicy Panchmel Dal, and the crumbly Churma, all melting together into a pot of unparalleled taste and fascinating stories of creation.

The ground Churma that lends the Dal-Bati-Churma its characteristic texture is prepared by crushing the baked or deep-fried Bati, a coarse whole wheat flour bread made with semolina, clarified butter, milk, cardamom, fennel, and carom seeds, into a fine powder and then thoroughly mixing it with more clarified butter, sugar, and dry fruits. This sweet delicacy is best enjoyed as a part of the three-tier Dal-Bati-Churma, where the Dal-Bati is prepared by topping the Bati with spicy thick Panchmel Dal, made from a culmination of five distinct pulses.

Each of the three dishes of the Rajasthani palette is so interdependent that their histories, too, have interwoven into one grand narrative. As the story goes, Bati originated during the time of Mewar’s founding patriarch Bappa Rawal. The Rajput soldiers of Mewar back then would break the Bati into chunks and dig them in the sand to sun-cook so that they could return from battle and have the bread with Ghee and milk. The addition of the Panchmel Dal took place later in history when traders from the Gupta Empire settled in Mewar. This brings us to the accidental creation of the Churma. Legend has it that a cook from Mewar’s Guhilot clan once poured a generous amount of sugarcane juice into some Batis by accident. Noticing that the syrup had made the Batis softer and more sumptuous, the women of the clan began the practice of dunking the Batis into a sugarcane juice that eventually led to the modern Churma.

The dish received its pan-India recognition when Mewar’s Rani Jodha Bai married Akbar and carried with her the recipe of the Rajasthani delicacy to the Mughal court. Interestingly, the Churma was recreated by the Mughals into numerous dishes like the Bafla and even led to the creation of Bihar’s signature delicacy, the Litti Chokha.