BENGALURU: If it is winter in Bengaluru, can avarekaai be far behind? No self-respecting Bengaluru Kannadiga can ever escape the lure of the avarekaai.
A familiar ritual among my aunt, mother and grandmother is to call up each other every day and exchange notes on what they have cooked. No conversation can start without, “Yenu adige?” (what have you made for lunch?) or variations of it. And if it is avarekaai, it is a matter of great pride. “Avarekaalu huli,” one aunt is bound to say, while someone else will say “Avarekaalu rotti” or “Avarekaalu uppittu.” Someone else might quip that they haven’t yet found the time to cook avarekaalu not once this season. Shame, really!
Cooking avarekaalu takes pride of place in families like ours. Something like the Thanksgiving turkey. Our harvest festival, Sankranthi, which arrives soon would definitely mean a meal planned around avarekaalu. There is even an avare bele mela on in the city’s VV Puram right now. It’s a fair where everything avarekaalu is celebrated, from the mixture made with deep fried avarebele to avarekaalu uppittu and rotti. There’s even avare bele jamoon on offer at the fair! Just goes to show how crazy Bangaloreans are about this bean.
Step into any market in the city, from Malleswaram to Basavanagudi, and you will spot heaps of avarekaai being sold. Much like it is difficult to put into the words the experience of hithakida avarebele huli, it is also difficult to explain the word sogadu used to judge if the beans are aromatic enough. Impossible to capture the essence of sogadu in English. A lingering heady aroma?
The smell of avarekaai needs to stay on your palm long after you’ve washed your hands. The best avarekaalu huli is one where the beans have that strong smell.
Winter in Bengaluru is best described by the sight of avarekaai, and the lingering sogadu of avarekaalu. The avare bele mela is on between 10 am to 11 pm at VV Puram till January 14
(Savitha Karthik is a writer)