Kadiru Habba(festival), tradition in coastal Karnataka, India

My son was asking me about the various harvest festivals in India, I was pondering about our own custom celebrated in Udupi regions.

Kadiru habba is a coastal Karnataka tradition found in the regions of Udupi and Mangalore districts more prominantly in the houses where people are into agriculture.  The main purpose of this festival is to thank the lord for paddy yields. It is usually celebrated in the month of  Sharad Rutu(usually in the month  Dasara/ Navaratri falls under).

The home is cleaned and made ready for the new yield(Kadiru). Usually the women in the household cleans the house floor and the pooja room using the cowdung and Rangoli is put.

The owner of the family performs pooja to TEN E(new corn) in the paddy field, and cuts a few of them. Rest of the family members follow him blowing Conch, Jagante. It's basically to announce the arrival of the yields. The daughter of the house washes his feet, does a small aarti to him and the new corns and welcomes him home.

All these corns are take to the place of worship inside house and worshipped. Later these new corns are tied along with each of the following:

*See Thumbe,

*One/two leaves of Jackfruit

*One/two leaves of Mango,

* Bamboo, 

All of above are tied with Saanthe(back side of middle of coconut leaf, yellowish green in color) 

Where are they tied to? They are tied to the pillars of:

*Hodimancha(an equipment used for thrashing paddy)

*Hatti(cow shed)

*Chavadi(courtyard inside the house)

*Kottige(a room where paddy, agricultural tools are kept)

*Pooja room(where worshipping of God takes place)

Now the second part of the festival.. this need not be on the same day and in our house it's done on the last day of Dasara.

The lady of the house picks up few new corns and prepares a dish called HOSATHU meaning new. This dish is prepared with little sugar, coconut milk and rice. Rice is usually the old one but few new corns are added to this dish just for the significance of the new begining. Its later served to the family members. There are few rules which are not may or may not be followed in all houses

*We should not eat hosathu of any other houses

*Only the house members should be served this dish, i.e. other people should not get to taste

*It's usually custom to eat the same thing as dinner too.

*It's customary to have beetle leaves and nuts after having hosathu.

"Kaavi Kale", traditional art of Konkan

India is a land of traditions and art. There are so many folk, traditional art forms which are still alive, specific to a particular region and being practiced. There are also few art forms which is struggling to find their place either due to lack of patronage or due to lack of people to carry forward the tradition. Once such art which was once popular and slowly declining is the 'Kaavi Kale' of the Konkan Region of India.
'Kaavi Kale' famous in the Konkan areas mainly in Goa, South Canara(Coastal Karnataka) and few parts of coastal Maharashtra. 'Kaavi' is the reddish brown pigment obtained from the laterite soil and 'Kale' means art. The ingredients for this art is abundant in the coastal regions and hence this art finds presence in the Konkan. This is the only color used in these murals and forms a fine example for the monochrome art.
This form of art is said to be originated in Goa and the Saraswats spread them to other regions in the Konkan.
A mixture of burnt snow white lime, river bed sand, jaggery is made initially and left to ferment for two weeks. This mixture is hand pounded to make it smooth, later mixed with Kaavi and smeared on the walls. The desired design is etched on this layer and its smoothened by river pebbles. Water is is sprayed frequently for couple of days while this layer is hardened(It may sound simple but one needs to be expert in etching as well as good in Material Science).
The main features in this art are the deities, floral motifs, and characters from the epics like Ramayana, and Mahabharata. Most of the time the engraving depends on the main deity of the temple.
These murals look outstanding on the white walls and there is no doubt you will be left impressed by their beauty. Sadly in the name of modernization, the Kaavi work is on the verge of getting extinct.

On the outer walls of Udupi Shri Krishna Temple

Besides the main entrance(Mukhya Dwara)  of a small temple in Chempi, Udupi

Marikamba Temple, Sirsi, Karnataka

Outside Kaniyoor Math, Udupi, Karnataka

Jasmines of Udupi..

Today I am sharing with you a flower which is famous for its fragrance, soothing beauty in and around the regions of Udupi, Coastal Karnataka and other places. Shankarapura mallige or jasmine is from the small place called Shankarapura in Udupi district, Karnataka, India. These flowers which recently acquired GI tag from the Horticulture Department of India are quite sought after during the festive, marriage seasons and their prices soar during such times.

These jasmines are plucked in the bud stage , stringed together and sold.
There are two ways to string these jasmine either through thread or by string made of plantain stalk. The latter one looks beautiful with brown plantain string in the middle of flowers.  What I observed was that stringing them through thread is easy, latest trend but with plantain stalk it is difficult as plantain fibre breaks in between. The stringed flowers are first measured as 'chidi' or a handspan. About 70 flowers make one chidi. As many as 800 flowers go into the making of one ‘chendu’(ball of flowers), while four chendus make one ‘atte’.
The attes are collected from farmers by agents and sold to retailers in Udupi, Mangalore and other places.

The humid climate is suitable for growing these flowers. Many people around the area of Udupi have cultivated either in large or in a small space of their garden.
Why I am writing so much about this? My mother is a small scale cultivator of this jasmine. Her daily routine includes plucking these flowers and stringing them together and then taking it to a local flower seller. Its about two to three hours of work daily and she earns reasonable amount of extra income.
All this time while I was at my moms place with my kids, I was helping mother with her jasmine routine and could not be an active blogger for a while.

Weekend snack fresh from garden.

The short spell of rains in B'lore has done well for my colocaesia leaves. There were almost 10-12 big leaves.We were expecting few guests next week, so before it caught thier eye, I decided to make Pathrode.
Pathrode is a coastal Karnataka recipe made mainly from Dosa rice and colocaesia leaves. As of I know people living in Western Indian Coastal area do similar kind of dish with colocaesia leaves.
Most of Colocaesia leaves when eaten produces itching in mouth. To reduce the itching remove the thick and thin veins at the back of leaves. My mom used to joke that those who are over smart, only they feel itching.

Well I am not posting the recipe here, but giving a good recipe over here. What I follow is almost similar except that I add more jaggery, cumin and coconut(almost double the quantity given).

There are many ways with Pathrode. For all these, the batter remains the same.

• You can either cut the colocaesia leaves to small pieces and add it to the batter. Dilute the batter and make dosa of it.
• You can paste the batter onto the leaves and then make small rolls. Cut rolls into thin slices, roast on heated tava applying lot of oil. 
• You can make rolls and steam them(healthiest way). Eat when still hot with dollop of butter.
• Steam the rolls, cut them to tiniest pieces,add tadka, shallow fry them using additional fresh coconut, jaggery.

Chenne Mane

I bought this Chenne Mane(traditional indoor game of coastal Karnataka, has different names in South India) from the car street of Udupi. People play this game in the rainy season when there is nothing much to do in the fields after sowing. People all over the world visit Udupi mainly being for  the darshan of Lord Krishna. But I visit Udupi for buying few traditional things like the below Chenne Mane. After bargaining for Rs 600 I bought it to B'lore. It was plain looking one and I wanted to paint and polish it.

This is how it looks after painting and varnishing. I gave a thick coat of varnish by mistake, so it looks too shiny.

Linking this to Colors Decor

Kumta Onions

If there is one thing common in the houses of coastal Karnataka it would be onions from Kumta. They are pink, medium sized and have long strands. These onions are sweet and less pungent unlike the regular ones.
These onions are grown in winter in few selected villages around Kumta, North Kanara. The coastal climate and the soil is best suited to grow these onions.
Since they have more water content they cannot be stored for long time unless one take lot of precautions to preserve them.
These onions come to market in the month of  April. They are available in most of the grocery shops in the coastal regions as well as few Mangalore stores in Bangalore.

Once we buy them from the shops, sun dry them for 3-4 days.

 Make a plait out of the stands.

 Tie them to any pole high near the ceiling.

These onions are a must when some non coconut dish is prepared at home. If you are from coastal Karnataka you would know what I mean -:)