I f there was ever an award for the most secular of spices, mustard would have a strong case going for it. It is one of those rare spices that has been referred to in the scriptures of almost every major religion. Gautam Buddha asked a grieving mother to bring him a handful of mustard seeds from the house where nobody had ever died, to show her the folly of crying over a dead son in a world where every household has seen death. The Quran assures us that even the equivalent of a mustard seed will be accounted for on the Day of Judgement. The Torah compares the knowable universe to the size of a mustard seed and there are no fewer than five different instances in the New Testament where mustard seeds are referred to.
And, while all spices have their origins in antiquity, mustard is thought to be one of the oldest, having been found at pre-historic sites ranging from Europe to China. Pythagoras (570–495 BCE) used a poultice of mustard seeds as a cure for scorpion bites, while Hippocrates (460–370 BCE) praised the efficacy of mustard paste in healing aches and pains.
According to K.T. Achaya, author of the monumental A Historical Dictionary of Indian Food, Brassica juncea (brown Indian mustard) was found carbonized at the site of Chanhudaro, a part of the Indus Civilization, and can be dated to 1500 BCE. Early Sanskrit literature also mentions it, though for written references of mustard oil pressed in India, we have to turn to the Arthashastra , written around 500 BCE.
Even the name mustard has origins in the ancient world. The term does not have anything to do with the genus of the plant, Brassica, which includes cauliflower, broccoli, turnips and cabbage. Instead, the name is derived from the preparation that has been made in Europe since Roman times by the addition of freshly fermented wine (mustum ) to the pungent (ardens ) seeds, which leads one to wonder what the plant was called before that time.
In India, mustard is hardly the most assertive of spices as far as cooking is concerned in most parts of the country, unlike the West where, next to black or white pepper, it is the second most widely used spice, mainly as a condiment. The world’s largest producer of mustard is Canada; other countries include USA, Germany, Czech Republic, Nepal, Russia and Ukraine, with India, Pakistan and Bangladesh producing relatively small amounts, and using it more as a cooking oil than a spice. Mustard is characterized by that peculiar nose-tingling pungency that is quite different from the pungency of chillies and black pepper, but more akin to horseradish and wasabi.
Mustard comes in three colours – yellow, brown and black – and is graded by pungency according to colour: yellow being the least pungent, black the most. Each colour has its own characteristic size, with black being the largest and brown the smallest. Interestingly enough, mustard seeds have little aroma when whole or even ground. The spice releases its trademark pungency when its two components – myrosinase and sinigrin – come into contact with a liquid: water, vinegar, wine or even beer! It takes 15 minutes for the full flavour of soaked mustard to develop, so if you want instant results, add milk, not water, and never hot water. Hot water retards the potency of mustard, so adding cold water is mandatory if you want the full punch of flavour. After 15 minutes or so, however, the pungency starts to decline. This can be delayed by adding an acidic element, which is why the French add vinegar to their Dijon mustard .
If there’s one community in India that is inextricably linked to mustard, it’s the Bengalis. According to Chef Sharad Dewan of The Park, Kolkata, Bengalis are the only Indian community to eat mustard in both its forms – as a spice as well as a condiment, not to mention cooking almost everything they eat in mustard oil. They eat the whole seed as shorshe bata, where the seed is ground till it becomes a fine paste as well as kashundi – a pounded paste to which a bit of vinegar has been added: The Bengali version of the French Dijon mustard and just as addictive, especially alongside breaded, fried fish.
All over Bengal, mustard is pounded before being added to the cooking pot, whereas in most other states, it is used whole as a tempering. So elemental is shorshe bata to the cuisine that a couple of enterprising local brands like Cookme package it to make life easier. However, old habits in Bengal really do die hard, as I learn quickly. For Salmoli Mukerji and her husband – a young, thirty-something power couple based in Kolkata – like most young working professionals these days, coming home from work at 11 p.m. is not uncommon. You would think that they would be sitting ducks for every household shortcut known to man, but even to them using ready-powdered mustard seeds is unthinkable. They only buy whole seeds – part of which they use in that signature Bengali five-spice mix, panch phoron – and have them ground on the shil nora, Bengal’s version of the sil batta, or batan. They assure me that they are hardly unique in their city: The average home-cook, no matter how harried, considers five minutes of grinding mustard well worth the value addition it makes to fish curries.
On the other hand, kashundi, an accompaniment to snacks, is almost always store-bought. In Kolkata, there at least three different brands of kashundi including Elmac, Druk and Tai. However, it is the unbranded ones that are preferred. There is one that is sold in half-litre brandy bottles that you’ll see on most dining tables in private homes.
But surprisingly, for a community that loves its mustard, the leaves of the plant are rarely consumed in West Bengal. In contrast, mustard leaves (sarson ka saag) is the ultimate Punjabi winter treat. North India, as a whole, does not use mustard in cooking to any significant extent, except for rai, the smaller, brown version of mustard seeds. The larger, dark mustard seeds are preferred in Bengal, Maharashtra, Assam, Odisha, and most of South India. Even then, rai is used mostly in modest quantities, usually only for tempering. In Gujarat, dhokla is always sprinkled over with rai; in UP, patod, a besan dish, also has rai sprinkled over it. Patod, a dish made with colocasia leaves and besan, can be found in most Indian cuisines albeit with slightly different names. While the names may vary, along with the main ingredients depending upon the community and the geographical area, surprisingly, the dish is always cooked with the same spicing. Besan, according to ancient wisdom, is a heavy ingredient and needs a digestive agent to balance it out and this is where mustard comes into the picture. Since it's an extremely good digestive agent, it is always an integral part of patod.
In Kashmir, rai, known as javed, is used exclusively for pickles, in combination with ajwain, known as asur.Referred to in the same breath as javed-asur, about a teaspoon is used by the average Kashmiri in the entire year, and that too, only if they make their own pickles, so far is it from the cuisine. There is one theory in the valley that fish dishes can be given a hint of sourness by sprinkling raw rai over the almost finished dish, bringing it to the boil, and then taking it off the fire. My sister-in-law, Shafiqa, the best cook in the Reshi clan, swears that this is her secret ingredient, but I myself have never heard of this being a general practice.
Unlike North India and Maharashtra, black mustard seeds are used ubiquitously in the five South Indian states: Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, to temper each and every single dish except biryani.
Tamil Brahmin Chitra Narayanan uses mustard seeds in conjunction with methi seeds and hing for all her tamarind-based dishes. She makes a pachadi (which I can only describe as a Tamil Nadu raita) with curd as its base, to which she adds coconut and a generous quantity of mustard seeds that have been ground in an electric grinder. This is the only instance I’ve encountered where uncooked mustard seeds have made their way into a dish, besides the kashundi of Bengal.
The ultra simple moru kachiyathu or mor kuzhambu, depending whether you are speaking in Malayalam or Tamil, also has curd as its base, though this version is cooked the way kadhi is cooked. Mustard seeds go into this one too, accompanied by methi, zeera and haldi. And while sambar has mustard seeds in a tempering along with a whole red chilli and methi powder, rasam uses mustard seeds too, though along with zeera, black pepper and chillies. The other way mustard seed is consumed across the country is of course, through mustard oil: The cold pressed, strongly-flavoured oil that has never been marketed as successfully as its Western cousin, olive oil. Its strong, distinctive taste stands up to Indian spices and its ability to withstand high heat makes it ideal for Indian cooking. Apart from Bengal, only Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh have a pronounced use of mustard oil. In my home in Kashmir, we typically heat the oil to smoking point once a week, and then store it for later use. Without this smoking process, mustard oil has a rather bitter edge, and tends to catch the back of one’s throat. While no self-respecting Kashmiri would use mustard oil without bringing it to smoking point, there are several dishes in Bengal that rely on the pungency of ‘raw’ mustard oil for their appeal. One such is posto bata – ground poppy seeds flavoured with pungent mustard oil and occasionally, green chillies. As marriages go, this one is an exceptionally fiery one!
But the prize for the most eye-watering mustard preparation, in my opinion, goes to the Dogras of Jammu. Jyoti Singh, artist, sculptor and daughter of Maharajah Karan Singh of the erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir princely state, served me a stunning potatoes-and-curd-based dish in her villa that overlooks the Dal Lake in Srinagar. The colour was a sunny custard yellow, to which mustard seeds, crushed in a mortar and pestle or a food processor, had been added. The curd itself had been kept out in the sun for a couple of hours so that its pungency had increased exponentially. This sour, fermented appeal reminded me of Korean food.
While all spices are ancient, mustard seems to be so steeped in antiquity that no scientist is sure exactly which country it originated in. All we know is that besides being mentioned in the world’s religious books, a feat it doesn’t share with too many kitchen ingredients, it grows in every continent, is used as a spice, a medicine, an oil and a condiment and has a large number of ‘relatives’ like turnip and radish.
The last word on mustard has to be my friend Sangeeta Khanna’s: ‘Mustard is used all over the world because of its ability to increase digestion. So strong is the action of these tiny seeds that even grinding them and using them in a poultice on the skin can increase your metabolic rate. How many other kitchen ingredients can do that?’
CHEF VINEET BHATIA’S MUSTARD INFUSED CHICKEN TIKKA
Michelin-starred Chef Vineet Bhatia's legendary reputation precedes him. This is his signature mustard infused chicken tikka recipe.
INGREDIENTS
• 8 pcs of 40 g chicken tikka, cut from the boneless breast
1st Marinade:
• ½ tbsp ginger paste
• ½ tbsp garlic paste
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• Salt, to taste
• 4 tbsp thick yogurt
• 1 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 tsp mustard seeds
• 1 sprig curry leaves
• 1 tsp turmeric powder
• 1 tsp green chillies, chopped
• 1 tbsp grainy mustard paste
• Salt, to taste
METHOD
• In a bowl, marinate the chicken with the first marinade. Allow it to rest for 20 minutes.
• In a pan, heat the vegetable oil and add the mustard seeds. As they begin to pop, add the curry leaves, turmeric powder and chopped green chillies. Sauté for 30 seconds and pour this oil on to the chicken.
• Rub this flavoured oil into the chicken.
• Spoon the thick yogurt and the grainy mustard paste on to the chicken, mix them together. Check the seasoning and leave in the refrigerator for 6 hours to marinate.
• Thread the chicken on to skewers and roast in a preheated oven at 190o C for 12 minutes.
• Baste with left over marinade.
• Remove from the oven, rest for 2 minutes and serve.
CHEF SOUMYA GOSWAMI’S SHORSHE BATA MAACH
This recipe is ideally for rohu fish, but any fish can be used. It takes about 20 minutes or so to cook.
INGREDIENTS
• 800 g fish, ideally rohu, cut into medium-sized pieces
• 3 tbsp mustard seeds
• 2 green chillies
• Mustard oil to fry the fish plus 2 tbsp for making the gravy
• 2 to 3 cups of water
• Salt, to taste
Preparing the fish:
• Ask your fishmonger to cut darnes of a rohu around 1.2 kilogram in weight. If the fish pieces are too big they will break while frying or cooking, so make sure the pieces are not too big.
• Also make sure the fish scales are trimmed. Fishmongers usually trim the scales and leave the skin on the fish.
METHOD
• Soak the black mustard seeds in warm water for 2 hours.
• After the mustard seeds are swollen and soft, add the green chillies and use a sheel nora, Bengali stone grinder, to make a paste. Add a generous pinch of salt and about 3 tablespoons of water and grind it to a smooth paste. Keep the paste aside for future use.
• After washing the fish and getting rid of any lingering scales, pat dry with a kitchen towel.
• Sprinkle about a tablespoon of turmeric powder and equal amount of salt and coat each fish piece.
• In a pan, heat some mustard oil and once the oil is smoking hot, sprinkle in a pinch of salt. This will help the oil remain calm when the fish pieces are added.
• Fry the fishes till light brown and remove them.
• Drain away the extra oil, leaving about 2 tablespoons in the pan, add back the fish pieces. Add 3 to 4 cups of water, completely submerging the fish pieces.
• Cover the pan and let it come to a boil.
• Once the water starts to boil, add a broken green chilli and then add the masala paste and let the fish cook for about 10 minutes.
• Keep checking in between to make sure that the water has not dried. If the water dries, add some more. This way you can control the amount of gravy.
• Once the excess water has evaporated you will be left with a thick gravy with well-cooked pieces of fish.
SALMOLI MUKERJI’S CHINGRI AND LAL SAAGER CHECHKI
INGREDIENTS
• 1 bundle or 250 g laal saag (red amaranth)
• 50 g small shrimp
• 2 tsp whole black mustard
• 1 tsp vegetable oil
• Salt and sugar, to taste
• A pinch of turmeric powder
• Slit green chillies, to taste
METHOD
• Wash the laal saag thoroughly and chop them. Keep aside.
• Clean shrimp. Add a pinch of turmeric and salt and keep aside. In a hot kadhai, add hot oil and temper with black mustard seeds till spluttering.
• Add shrimp and stir till cooked.
• Add the leafy mass. Mix well and cover. Cook for 5–10 minutes till the leaves are blended and well cooked.
• Add splashes of water only if too dry.
• Add salt and sugar to taste.
• Add slit or chopped green chillies just before turning off the heat.
• Serve hot with steamed rice.