CHENNAI: As a picky eater, my worst nightmare was seated at the looming dinner table, with an unfinished plate of now-cold rice and poriyal. I resorted to dashing away, hiding underneath beds, and depositing morsels into pockets. Paati’s first remedy for my stomach was a hushed thinly veiled threat in folklore format, that if I didn’t finish eating, the mosquitoes, scorpions, and other poochies would assemble, steal my food and grow large, and sneak into my bed when I was asleep.
Her second remedy was shooing me into her lush garden lined with herbs, weeds, almond and chikoo trees, and streets, to pick out herbs. She transformed our pickings of manathakkali into sour kuzhambu, leaves and weeds into keerai side-dishes, and amla into jam.
Bitter, wholesome, and carefully picked, these herbs — never entering restaurant or urban home menus — revived my absent appetite, and warded away nightmares of Kafkaesque bugs. Gardens, indigenous knowledge passed down through communities, and plants dotting our landscapes harbour remedies. Herbs growing at the ground level have many medicinal and herbal properties to offer, explains Shruti Tharayil, founder of Forgotten Greens, at the Chennai Wild Food Walk, held a week ago.
In nature’s company
Shruti led 20-odd participants, whose eyes were glued to the ground level at Kotturpuram Corporation Park. We were on a mission to unlearn ideas of food and forage and discover magic in seemingly unassuming biodiversity. “Parks are good places to forage, and it’s manicured here and there but there are nooks and corners to find it.
There’s nature in the city, you just need to find it by looking at herbaceous plants which grow at ground level,” points out the writer, educator, and researcher, whose world-view is shaped by her experiences of journeying with a multitude of communities — Indigenous, Dalit, and pastoral communities across south India.
In 2018, Shruti began Forgotten Green as an expression of the joy of discovering wild edible plants in neighborhoods. A Facebook page teeming with information transformed into a project to revive traditional knowledge. “Traditionally part of India’s food systems, these plants have gradually been forgotten due to rapidly changing foodscapes.
Forgotten Greens conducts ethnographic research with diverse communities to document their knowledge and offers unique walks. “Wild Food Walks,” curated by Forgotten Greens, empower CITY-zens to come together, learn about, and build collective knowledge of their ecosystems,” explains her bio.
Rooted legacies
When the first thunder of the season arrives, many would go in search of bamboo and mushrooms in Kerala, recalls Shruti. In our city’s concrete jungle, for those in search of forage, the rule of thumb is to pursue stubborn weeds, creeping plants, and green spots. Over an hour, the writer uncovered how this park alone has 14+ herbs to offer — each with a bitter taste, a telltale root, and a story.
A participant pointed out that if one is stranded in the middle of a forest or a trek, one need not look further than plans for sustenance. From Indian Nettle or kuppaimeni whose leaves can be used for poriyals, hair oils, and root for catnip, the tubers of nut grass or korai kizhangu which is used for skin to mookirattai which is used in home food, each plant has immense edible or medicinal or edible value, packed with health benefits.
“The local names of plants tell you so much more about how it looks, its uses and origins,” says Shruti. For instance, a plant that looks like a snake ready to attack is the asthma plant or Amman pacharisi. With a wart-like flower, the plant “itself tells you what it is used for” as the milky latex can be used to treat warts and insect bites. The leaves are edible and are high in iron.
In a time before grocery stores and pushcarts, families resorted to growing vegetables and foraging. One such local herb, for the Bengal Day Flower — reminiscent of a miniature banana leaf kana vaazhai keerai — was used for bajjis instead of potato and onion. “A farmer told me a story of how a guru asked his disciple to look for vaazhai on the farm. Then he kept looking and found this, and called it kana vaazhai,” explains the writer, adding that this keerai aids in lactation.
Cities and parks are potentially spaces of green magic, home to many beneficial weeds. As policies and ‘development’ move towards wiping out biodiversity and green cover, these resilient weeds continue to crop up, a reminder of local knowledge systems. While traditional knowledge may be sparsely passed on orally, these weeds await our return for remedies.