City sees a unique cooking contest to revive traditional recipes

In a move to collectively gather food knowledge that is traditional, nutritious and above all relevant to local situations, the city on Friday saw a cooking contest 'Meri Poushtik Rasoi'. The categories for sending entries were divided in three sections - NGOs/ Civil Society, Professionals / Students and Individuals / Open. The contest was judged by chef Varun Inamdar, food consultant Rushina Munshaw-Ghildiyal and Professor Mahesh Kamble who quizzed each contestant about the recipes, method of cooking and its nutritional values.

The pan-India contest received 267 applications from 16 states in India from which three from each sections were selected. The total number of 15 contestants then put their cooking skills to best use to come up with traditional and nutritious recipes which have been forgotten in recent times. The finale had the contestants cooking the dish, plating it and serving it to the judges who had a tough time to declare the winner as each dish was unique and rich in nutrition.

The contestants used a lot of traditional ingredients, also implementing local ways of cooking to get the authentic flavours. Using variety of millets, jaggery, fresh vegetables, local spices saw a delicious spread.

The winners were Garima Jain for the NGO category for the Millet magic thali, Neha Sathe from the professional category for her Poushtik chikki and Divya Divakafran from the open category for her Moong matki kanji. The organisers plan to reach out to NGOs to incorporate these recipes into the daily diet for mal-nourished children in the rural areas. The recipes are also useful for the urban crowd which sees a high rate of obesity.