This is a little glimpse of Turkey’s street food. We have Lahmacun Mila, a Turkish pizza with mashed potato topping and chicken topping for non-vegetarians and Ayran which is like buttermilk,” says Kamuran Elbeyoglu from Turkey, who participated in the just concluded 13th National Street Food Festival organised by the National Association of Street Vendors of India (NASVI) at Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium. The 40-year-old is accompanied by her husband and sister-in-law, who are busy rolling out dough, spreading the mix, and baking the pizza in perfect sync.
A psychologist, Kamuran has been associated with the NASVI since 2018-19 though they are participating in the food festival for the first time. “Our objective is to bridge the gap between Turkey and India, and food is just the right medium,” she adds.
The food festival also saw participants from Nepal and Afghanistan. Rahmatullah and his family, who run a cloud kitchen in Delhi’s Jangpura called Afghani Kitchen, have lived here since 2016. It is their first time at the food festival as well. The most popular item on their stall is the Afghan mantu (dumplings), while it also has baked items like baklava, Afghani cookies, plum cakes, and saffron tea.
Authentic regional foods of India were also served at the event. Vendors from 27 states, from Kerala to Kashmir and Assam to Gujarat, had set up stalls at the JLN Stadium. Nellore kaju karam dosa and lemon idli from Andhra Pradesh, Himachali siddu (a kind of stuffed bread), kangadi dham (a vegetarian meal consisting of rice, lentils, kidney beans and sweet rice) from Dharamshala, zhunka bhakari (besan sabji and flatbread) from Pune, Champaran meat, kawa puri from Nagpur, tamatar chaat from Varanasi, Uttarakhand’s pahadi pakode and Kerala fish fry along with food items like chole bhature, momos, kulhad pizza, samosa, rabdi-jalebi and much more were available.
Srinivas, a vendor from Hyderabad participating in the festival for the first time says,“Patthar ka gosht and Hyderabadi Biryani are in huge demand. People are fascinated to see how we are cooking chicken on a stone. You won’t find this anywhere in Delhi.”
“Every dish is top-notch. It is difficult to pick a favourite, but Patthar ka Gosht from Hyderabad has stolen my heart. Three days are not enough to explore the variety of food here; it should have been for a week at least,” says Taranpreet Lamba, who attended the street food festival with his children and friends for three straight days.
The event is billed as India’s first zero-waste food festival. Dr Sanjay K Gupta, advisor, NASVI and a consultant on Integrated Waste Management Systems says it was a disposal-free event, with adequate number of dustbins provided for both organic and inorganic waste.
“After the festival”, Gupta says, “all organic waste was transported to a compost shed, and the recyclables were sent to the Materials Recovery Facility for authorised recyclers. A team of 30 waste pickers continuously collected the waste. Not even a single piece of waste was left unattended, and all the garbage generated from the event is sent for either recycling, composting or upcycling.”