Nestled among the tall buildings and serenity of a gated community in South Bengaluru is a cosy apartment where a 68-year-old and her granddaughter’s small business serves up the taste of home alongside fun games. While guests anticipate Triveni Nagappa’s piping hot bajjis, bondas, pallyas and jolada rottis served up on banana leaves, her 9-year-old granddaughter Natya Adrika keeps guests company , teaching them traditional board games like ali guli mane, chowka bara, daya (pagade) and aadu huli aata.
Oota and Aata came to be when Nagappa’s family moved back to Bengaluru after residing in Chennai, just before the pandemic hit. Cooped up at home, Nagappa felt a calling to utilise her cooking skills while supporting her family . “ Around this time, my husband fell sick and I wanted to be financially independent,” explains Nagappa, adding, “I started making pudis, chutneys, other snacks and sometimes breakfast for people in our gated community . And since my son and daughter-in-law were also at home, they pitched in and helped me set up the business.”
Six months ago, the family started hosting a lunch club on weekends, spreading the word in their gated community. Around three to four months ago, they opened up their home to the larger public. Why yele oota? Nagappa answers, “Because usually everyone enjoys it!”
Putting together the meal is no quick task, with yele oota traditionally served only during special occasions. Nagappa says, “After finishing breakfast around 8am, I get started with the food preparation and it goes on until 11 or 11.30am. Without any hired help, it’s just me and my daughter-in-law with some help from my son.”
The spread she offers is a full deal. Her son Jaswant, who helps her with the business, explains, “ Apart from the standard pickle and salt, we have two vegetables or ‘pallyas’ with jolada (jowar) roti or akki (rice) roti. For the main course, we’ve had dishes like mini masala dose, shavige, lemon rice, vangi baath and anna saaru. We end with curd rice and two types of sweets – recently we made wheat laddus, which are made purely with wheat and dry fruits. Of course, we also have a vada or bajji. The menu changes every day .”
Apart from the mother’s touch that sets her apart from typical South Indian meals served across the city’s restau-rants, is the lesser-known reci-pes she sometimes features on the menu. “There’s ‘lablab unde’ – I don’t know where the name came from, but it’s made with rice flour with a bit of chilli in it and eaten with chutney . This and a few other dishes are drawn from our roots in North Karnataka,” says Jaswant.
*Putting the Aata in the Oota
Adrika got involved in the business through her love for traditional board games. Jaswant explains, “Our house often gets filled with grandmothers as my mom has four sisters and my wife’s mother visits often. So Adrika grew up spending a lot of time with them and picked up these games through them.
My wife, too, is very passionate about traditional games and has stitched all the boards we use with silk. As an only child, my daughter has always missed having siblings. Since she loves these games, we thought, why not blend the two? She’s happy to always have someone to play with now .”
The stream of guests into Nagappa’s home has been diverse, according to Jaswant, with Karnataka natives and Bengalureans who have moved from elsewhere seeking them out, especially after a reel about them received some attention online. “Surprisingly , we’ve had all kinds of people come who mainly heard about us through word of mouth because we haven’t done much marketing. We’ve had old cou-ples coming, younger ones who want a homely meal, as well as lots of people from out of state and foreigners who are visiting the city .”
(Oota and Aata takes reservations for six at a time on week-ends between 12.15pm and 1.15pm and 1.30pm and 2.30pm. Contact:
Trivenis Kitchen on Instagram)