Food and Beverage: “Namakdaani,” by Lavanya Arora
Namakdaani
No matter the holder’s shape
salt was always central—a fundamental flaw in design.
Ma’s dowry-laden boatspoon shuffled
between spices like naani’s kahaniyaan—
interweaving spices across porous borders.
No wonder we never followed recipes.
Tell me, how does one account for the grains
of salt hiding in the silk of vermillion
chilli powder? The unmistakable shock
of turmeric in the desert of black pepper?
Dried and ground coriander seeds soil
for cumin seeds to vernalize until their accidental
invocation for baingan ka bharta. Carom seeds
sit silently until ma asked us
whether we’d like to eat aloo pyaaz paranthe
on Sunday. Mustard seeds burst out of pans
on school mornings and we told her, “see,
even they don’t want anything to do with upma.”
There was a separate cylindrical steel container
for whole spices. We won’t talk about them,
their tongue-twisting wrestling matches
that ended with thu-thu-thu-thu yuckkkk.
All the calcium released from the receptors
on our taste buds at once, a reminder
that overabundance is as bad as deprivation.
No wonder ma’s frequent fishing from the side
of the blazing kadhai, licking the spoon for taste.
No wonder that namak in our house was always
svaad anusaar.
About Lavanya Arora
Lavanya Arora (they/he) is an independent biology & food researcher and writer from India. Nominated for the Forward Prize for Poetry, their literary work has found a home in several journals like Josephine, Thimble, ANMLY, Tamarind, and Frontier Poetry. A 2024 Himalayan Emerging Writer, they dream of extensive dinner dates with fictional characters while (begrudgingly) editing their debut novel and poetry manuscript.