Bengalis have gone "non-vegetarian" with a vengeance

The surprise lunch at Sati Aunty's house in Calcutta last week was an epiphany. Served on golden-hued kansha thalis and bowls – as gleaming as the deep red oxide floors and teakwood banisters of her house – it was a vegetarian treat. Fried potols (pointed gourds) with their skins indented to resemble fish scales, subtly mustard flavoured potatoes, peas mildly spiced, a jackfruit preparation...

But for most of our week's stay in Calcutta, vegetarian food was hardly on the menu. It's as if Bengalis have gone "non-vegetarian" with a vengeance. In the cartes du jour of the city's restaurants and clubs, the 'NV' options outnumber the 'V' hugely. And the vegetarian dishes are conventionally thought to be included only to humour that catch-all genre the Bengalis call "non-Bengalis".

Actually, the Bengali words for the two poles of cuisine are a give-away. Unlike the herbivorous default English term used in most of India, with a 'non' added to indicate the carnivorous "other", in Bengali 'aamish' is the meaty norm with a 'nir' prefixed to the former to indicate "without meat". It would seem that the Bengalis in Calcutta are more determined than ever to live up to that contrarian classification.

Yet Bengali cuisine is replete with vegetarian dishes. When our late family cook used to come over to Delhi for a month every year, an all-vegetarian meal for our (admittedly) "non-Bengali" friends was a fixture. And every time he would whip up at least a dozen vegetarian dishes from his repertoire, from the traditional shaaks, chechkis and charcharis to dals, jhols and even baked vegetables.

But if we had asked him to do the same for Bengali friends, they would be quite insulted. In that respect Bengalis are similar to their comrade in arts – the French. In France, the invariable reply to my "Is there anything vegetarian" question was a concerned/annoyed "Why, are you ill?" That vegetables can be on par with meats is only now dawning on the French but the Bengali aversion persists.

This could partly be due to the association of vegetarianism with enforced austerities as widows were traditionally forbidden to partake of fish, meat – and indeed onion, garlic, masoor dal and anything else deemed aphrodisiacal. Bereaved families also had to stick to a spartan vegetarian diet till funeral rites were over, and the re-entry of fish into meals signalled a return to "normal" life.

Also, Bengali Hindus are among the very few communities in India in which all castes are "non-vegetarian", including the mercantile ones as well as the Brahmins. So there has never been any whiff of exclusivity attached to the sole consumption of vegetarian food – as the priestly and trading classes were also relatively more prosperous everywhere – for the average aspirational Bengali.

However, as Bengalis take great pride in being at the forefront of intellectual trends (though they kept turning left for far too long before figuring out they were going round in circles) their mental block about vegetarian food is surprising. Given that vegetarianism is the zeitgeist of the times and they have an enviable repertoire, Bengalis should have been saying "We told you so!" instead of, "What's that?"

A word here about non-resident Bengalis (both within India and abroad) – they are honorable exceptions. Cookery blogs and websites have enthusiastic exchange and the recipes for vegetarian fare at least equal those for non-veg. Maybe it is the result of a yen for the childhood veggie fare cooked by longgone grannies coupled with the pressure to lead more "healthy" lives (read, less red meats).

For those health-conscious Indians who turn up their noses at desi dals and sabzis, other major metros are awash in vegetables, legumes, grains and dairy products from near and far. Many stores now stock quinoa and couscous, edamame and chia seeds, avocados, asparagus and artichokes, bocconcini and shiitake. In Calcutta, these make only guest appearances at the bigger Spencer's stores.

Maybe chauvinism prevents Bengalis (at least in Bengal) from adopting these 'feringhi' vegetarian entrants. But there is every reason then, for Bengalis to recall and rechannel their once-famous ability – now very au courant – to forage for leaves, stems, roots and flowers besides vegetables themselves and meld them into memorable dishes. What Rene Redzepi's Noma has now made trendy, Bengalis did ages ago.

Banana and pumpkin flowers, the leaves and stems of all manner of creepers and trees, berries and nuts – all ingredients that are now a gourmet chef's dream. But once upon a time, all thrifty Bengali housewives routinely turned them into delectable fritters and lightly spiced stir fries, or simply wilted greens to be had as starters along with bitter gourd and neem leaves on sultry summer days.

The new Bengali cuisine restaurants in Calcutta are doing a commendable job of resuscitating forgotten or simply tootedious-to-make fish dishes, from chitol maccher muitha (chitol fish kofta curry) to kochu pata diye chingri (shrimp with colocassia leaves). They should revive the vegetarian repertoire too. Also, a "farmer's market" for organic items is on the cards for Calcutta this week, I hear. That's one encouraging "green shoot"!