ROUSES_JulyAug2019_Magazine

Curry Favor

by Sarah Baird

But what, exactly, is a curry? It’s not a word that appears in any of India’s numerous recognized national languages. How, then, has it become so synonymous with a country’s cuisine? “A lot has been written about the word ‘curry’ and whether it was actually an Indian word in the first place, or invented by the English,” writes chef Camellia Panjabi in her 1994 book, 50 Great Curries of India . “The Tamils…have the word kaari in their language. The Brahmins of Tamil Nadu, who are strict vegetarians, mean by kaari a vegetable dish cooked with spices and a dash of coconut. When the non-vegetarian communities of Tamil Nadu use the word kaari , it literally means meat, which they pronounce with more emphasis on the end of the word as in kaaree . The origin of the word curry seems to be a meat or vegetable dish to be eaten with rice, which is considered to be the main dish of the meal.” And while language experts love to debate the somewhat vague and meandering history of the word, it’s fairly widely agreed upon that kaari was morphed into the word “carel” by Portuguese merchants in the 1600s, which was then fumbled again by European tongues when the British arrived and made it into, yes, “curry.” Today, the term “curry” is most widely accepted as any sort of wet dish — an entrée with sauce or gravy, spiced or not — that incorporates techniques or tastes associated with India. Anglo-style curries are a source of national culinary pride for the British, with over 8,000 “curry houses” across the country and an incorporation into everyday cuisine that ranges back to 1747, when the first recipe for a curry appeared in Hannah Glasse’s The Art of Cookery Plain and Easy . For the next 200 years, you’d be hard-pressed to find a British cookbook without a curry recipe (or six) included, with Indian food now so deeply enmeshed in the culture that former Foreign Secretary Robin Cook described chicken tikka masala — a type of curry — as a “true British national dish.”

In our increasingly interconnected world, the spread of concepts and products across time zones and continents has become more commonplace than ever. In 1997, sociologist Roland Robertson described a by-product of this intricate global web as “glocalization” — a fun-to-say portmanteau of “global” and “localization” that refers to particular cultural touchstones that are characterized by both local and global considerations. Sound complicated? It’s not, really. Take McDonald’s. In the United States, a Mickey D’s menu without a Big Mac or Quarter Pounder listed would be bizarre; after all, hamburgers are founda- tional grab-and-go foods for Americans. But when McDonald’s entered the Indian market in 1996, it created a menu that looked quite different due to the fact that cows are sacred in Hindu tradition. Instead, there’s the McAloo Tikki, a toasted bun with a samosa- spiced veggie patty made from potatoes and peas, and the Chicken Maharaja Mac — a Big Mac riff that uses chicken or vegetarian patties instead of traditional beef. The menu swaps continue the world over. Headed to China? Look for Fried Taro Pies — not apple — on the menu. And in Korea, the Bulgogi Burger speaks directly to a nationwide culinary staple reworked in burger form. McDonald’s, a global phenomenon, has customized its cuisine to reflect local taste in all of these instances and, in turn, has become a classic case study for glocalization. The original “glocal” cuisine, though, is curry. Due to expansive trade networks and colonization throughout the 18th and 19th centuries by Portugal and Great Britain, curries traveled from India alongside tradesmen, slaves and servants across the seas. Today, country-specific curries of every flavor, color and texture can be found from the Caribbean to Fiji, each with Indian roots but its own local mark.

54

JULY•AUGUST 2019