Why your grocery list needs a makeover with hill produce

Recently, taking a complete U-turn from the usual vegetable bazaars, I decided to check out the indigenous vegetable shops in town. I love to shop for leafy greens and fresh vegetables, and I can never resist the tag of an organic farmer's market and jhum cultivation produce from the hills.

There are a handful of grocery shops that offer spices and cooking ingredients from the hills of Rangamati and Khagrachhari. Suchala Khisa, a hard-working entrepreneur, has run Hill's Fresh Food Bazar in Uttara for the last five years or more. Her small store has earned quite a reputation among the indigenous community and city dwellers.

"Shifting cultivation or jhum chash, practised by our indigenous communities, by clearing and cultivating the hill forests in plots of different sizes, and allowing them to regenerate naturally, yields the best vegetables," says Tenzing Chakma, a designer by profession who loves to cook.

So why do we love the cuisine and spices of the hills? Tenzing's answer to this query of mine was simple; the weather and soil up in the hill forests, and organic farming, brings in all the diversity. "Ginger from the hills has a definite kick in it, unlike the hybrid ones with pale taste grown elsewhere. Rangamati's turmeric is the most sought-after spice in our country. Our pumpkins have a distinct mushy texture, we use taro flowers, and turmeric flowers in our cuisine. We try to keep everything simple and only focus on bringing out the flavour of the vegetable or meat used in the dish," he says.

Khisa's small store is packed with fresh supplies from the hills and is re-stocked every Tuesday and Friday. "My stock of hill produce arrives early morning by bus and by mid-morning my stock is halved. Fuji or wild parsley, sabarang or lemon basil, taro and turmeric flowers, and seasonal roselle and roselle leaves, papaya, grapefruit, pumpkins, bamboo shoots, and many seasonal finds are available in my store," she explains.

The most expensive ingredients she stocks, besides the chilli and turmeric powder, are her jhum rice grains. Local rice varieties such as chakhao, aromatic black rice, and the most flavoured rice grain binni, which is sticky and sweet, are available in both white and brown variants. But the nutty-flavoured kalijira grain, used mostly for pilaf dishes, stands out for its distinct flavours and textures in her store.

Her store carries a special ghee, or a traditional clarified butter, made in the hills. Nappi or sidol, which is the fermented dried fish paste, used in most of their recipes, and pahari bon morog (red jungle fowl) are also available.

There is a distinct difference in jhum produce, which makes you want to go back again. While Hill's Fresh Food Bazar brings food produce from the green hills and rainforest areas of Chittagong Hill Tracts, there are many other stores in Dhaka, and online grocery pages too that carry specialised organic condiments and food ingredients from the hills. Community bazaars in Mohammadpur, Kamalapur, Mirpur, Kazipara, and Kalachandpur have been boasting such grocery stores for quite a while now. Besides fresh vegetables, such stores offer shaplapata (stingray), hangor (shark), narkeli (razorbelly minnow), kuchia (eel), and crabs by order only.

My favourite chef Arpon Chakma says that masala or spices are not the hero of Hill Tracts cuisine. "It is always the flavour of leafy herbs that are used at the last moment before finishing cooking that packs in the punch of our dishes. Shell fish and mud crabs cooked with fuji, Sabarang jhol with beef or chicken, fish paturi with wild basil, sabarang nappi side dish with gavi or rice flour; all these recipes use one flavour only. We do not mix too many herbs or spices in our cuisine, we just highlight the Indigenous produce," Arpon Chakma says.

The reason we love hill flavours and want to introduce the use of hilly herbs, spices, and ingredients in our cuisine is because of the characterised blend of flavours that are fresh and tangy giving our palate a distinct change of taste. So, this Friday check out one such store near you and try to make turmeric flower fritters. They are in season now.