Bygone days of the Bengali wedding feasts

The first recollection of a wedding was my aunt's in December 1971. Then days weddings were like a festival, not that they aren't these days, but it was different then. There were no wedding planners, no catering companies, no fancy decorations and yet everyone had loads of fun.

The weddings were planned by the elders of the family making sure that no one was neglected. The presence of the senior members was mandatory to ensure that the rituals, which were fairly elaborate, were adhered to. The menu was planned meticulously, the trousseau was equally well planned for both the bride and the groom. And all this was done not by a wedding planner but by the family members themselves.

Since this is essentially a blog on food let me now look at the menu that was served in the yester years and how they differ from the present day menus. Let me start with the 70’s, the wedding festivities would start at least 3 to 4 days prior to the D-day then. The food was prepared by the “bheins” or cooks and the sweetmeats by the “moiras” or the sweetmeat makers. There was one person in the family who had complete control and knowledge about what was to happen in the kitchen. Huge stoves were created with brick and mud and coal, cowdung and wood was used as fuel, not LPG and essentially mustard oil was used to cook the food barring of course the luchis which was fried in peanut oil (Postman - that's the name that crosses my mind). Thus the food tasted different and people were not calorie conscious!

The days leading to the D-day usually started with luchi along with kalojeera kancha lonka phoron diye alur torkari (potato bhaji with kalonji and green chillies) and bonde – sweet boondi (albeit made in house). Lunch a simple affair of daal, bhaat, either a bhaja (fried brinjal/potatoes/cauliflower) or a mixed vegetable sabzi made with or without the fish heads, and maach (fish curry) followed by sweets. For tea there would be either samosas (shingara) or khasta kochuri or radha bhallabi with aloo dum along with whatever was the sweet of the day. Usually there would be a sweet of the day – bonde, pantua, rosogolla being the favoured ones.  The dinner menu would usually be a repeat of the lunch.

On the D-day itself, lunch would be slightly more elaborate. It would start with a shaak bhaaja (fried greens), followed by daal made with or without the fish head (a bhaaja moonger daal was usually the choice), along with a round of bhaajas (fried brinjals/potatoes/caulifowers etc.) followed by either by a potoler dolma (parwal or pointed gourd dolma) or fulkopi aloor torkari (cauliflower and potato sabzi) or a mixed vegetable (chyancchra), then came fish (usually rui/rohu or katla) made into a kalia or with shorshe bata (mustard paste) or with doi (curd), followed by chutney made from whatever sour vegetables available during the season (green mangoes) or tender tamarind or chaalta (elephant apple) or jolpai (Indian olives) or tomatoes or even with raw papayas or dates) served with papads, and finally mishit doi (sweet curd) and sweets of the day followed by paan. This was a sit down meal and the food was always served on banana leaves and water in conical mud baked glasses. The banana leaves were laid on long tables lined with paper, the youngsters were given the task of serving water, salt and lime wedges to the guests. The food came in brass buckets and the one serving the rice had an important role to play. He ensured that the guests were offered a second helping of whatever item they liked best. The elders (senior citizens) along with the children were served first, then generation wise with the ladies of the household eating last. It was the men folk who served everyone, and when it came to their turn to eat it was the women who served them. However, when the ladies of the household ate it was their husbands or brothers in law who served them and that too with a lot of pride. The cousins and siblings of the bride or the groom use to compete with each other while they ate, who could eat the maximum number of fish or sweets etc., and it was taken for granted that this would happen.

The dinner on the D-day was slightly more elaborate. The meal started with luchi, cholar daal (chana dal made with fried bits of coconuts) and begun bhaja (fried aubergines – cut not in roundels but lengthwise). This was then followed by fish fry or fish roll (indigenous to the Bengali cuisine) or chingri cultlets (tiger prawn cutlets) served with kasundi (mustard sauce again indigenous to the Bengali cuisine). The pulao was then served with katla macher kalia (katla fish cooked in a rich gravy) followed by kosha mangsho (mutton curry). Chicken was looked down upon in those days as it was considered a meat for the poor (mainly Muslims – I apologise to all my Muslim friends who might read this, I don’t mean to be a racists but that’s how it was) and it was not served in any Bengali wedding. The more affluent would serve at least 2 – 3 varieties of fish and mutton. Chutney and papad then followed after which was served mishit doi and at least 2 – 3 varieties of sweets. The meal was finished off with the paan. Food was served on banana leaves, water in mud baked glasses, and the concept of a fingerbowl was the glasses itself. People used lime and salt that was served in the beginning of the meal to cut down the grease and used the water in the glass as their fingerbowls and tore a part of the paper which was used to line the tables to wipe their hands. Priority was given to the groom’s family and friends (bor jatri) followed by the friends and extended family and finally the immediate family when serving the meal. When the bor jatri and outsiders were being served the elders used to be present to ensure that everyone ate well and never was this a rushed affair. The person in charge of the kitchen always went ahead with over a 20% extra on certain food items to factor in the competitive youngsters.

The day after the D-day (Baashi Biye) is particularly important for the Bangals (people from East Bengal, today’s Bangladesh) as the groom would take his bride home only after sunset and there would be a fair number of rituals held on that morning. With the grooms immediate family being present for the rituals it was only natural that they were invited for lunch. Lunch was similar on this day to the dinner of the previous day except that the meal did not start with luchi and daal but with plain rice served with ghee and shaak bhaaj (fried greens) followed by the bhaaja moong daal with fish head served with bhaajas like before, fish like topse (mango fish) or bhetki fry, followed by at least 2 – 3 varieties of fish made in different ways, with chutney, doi and mishti (sweets) to finish off as always.

I have been all this while writing about the feast from the perspective of the bride’s family. It is really not much different in the groom’s house just that on D-day dinner is evaded. The lunch on the day of the bou bhaat, which is on 2^nd day following the D-day, is meant for both the families (bride and groom) and their very close relatives. Bou bhaat is a ceremony where the bride serves food (rice) to her new family to gain acceptance amongst them. The menu that is served on this day is fairly elaborate and similar to the one served on the day after the D-day (baashi biye). The dinner on this day was also a replica of the one served by the bride’s family on the D-day with minor changes.

So far I have documented what the wedding feasts were like in the 70’s. The early 80’s saw a change creeping in with families getting smaller. The catering companies started coming into being and the spread started changing as a result. Bengalis started getting more adventurous. Mughlai dishes, especially biriyani and chaap made its way into the menu especially on the D-day and bou bhaat dinners. The service was also taken care of by helping hands employed by the catering companies to do so. By the 90’s it was the catering companies who were given the task of managing the food for the weddings. The menus started changing and so did the service pattern, and an essentially Bengali menu that was served in the yester years moved on to accommodate the changing palate. The turn of the century saw more changes, sit down dinners on the D-day and the bou bhaat gave way to buffets and theme weddings came into being. Bengalis started emulating the cultures of the Marwaris and Punjabis to include ceremonies like Mehendi and Sangeet. Likewise they also started including food from the world cuisines to be different. However, there are some families like my aunts (who has been mentioned earlier), who have still maintained the tradition of the Bengali wedding feasts.

This article would have been best expressed in Bengali, but for the larger segment of my readers. Hope I have been able to give an insight to the Bengali food culture. Keep looking out for more!!!