Dahi-licious!

With the mercury levels rising high, summer season just can not be taken for granted. We feel intensely hot as our body keeps on looking for food that is cooling, soothing and thirst quenching. Here I have a food item which is deliciously coolant and keeps our energy levels stable. Also let me share my food love with you all! 😊

I grew up in a typical Indian household where, being the youngest child, the kitchen was off-bound for me. I would do the swift-wielding of spoons and spatulas and smell the delicious aromas while impatiently waiting to gobble down the appetizers. Cooking was portrayed as a dedicated zone of expertise handled by my mother.

From all these years, I started noticing something unusual happening in our kitchen. Something that is completely different from the process that it’s made. Yes, it is the most enjoyed and almost every day served milk product called ‘Dahi’ or ‘Curd’. The fascination to curiously wait for milk to become Dahi over the time made me discover my love for food and realize that food is the purest form of itself!

Have we ever wondered how the process of Dahi is made overnight and still treated as an entirely normal & unexceptional? Had I been more inquisitive as a child, I would have asked how the milk turned into Dahi or why we needed to add a little bit of the previous day’s curd into the new lot.

Dahi or curd what we call it in India is known as ‘Yogurt’ across the world. The Turkish term refers to tart, thick milk. When the fresh milk is left in a container with friendly bacteria, the milk gets thick and develops a sour taste. However since the bacteria is not the curd, it tastes a lot more different than our Indian Dahi.

As we all know, for the course of making curd, we need to add the same curd that was made earlier in the milk. So, can we ask how the first ever curd was made? Confusion of Murgi pehle aayi ya Anda right? If Google is to be believed, according to a popular legend, while travelling across a desert, some Turks kept milk in a goat skin bag and slung it across the back of a camel. On opening the bag few hours later, they found that it has been transformed into thick tangy custard. The desert sun and the bacteria in the bag had enabled preparation of Yogurt or Curd. And from then, the process of making curd out of milk evolved.

In India, curd is regarded as an ingredient that is very good for stomach as it aids digestion and gives a cooling relief from spicy foods. It has become an important part of Indian meals, while traditions vary. Plain curd can be a component of a cooked dish, in some parts it is eaten first, some with the meal and some eat it at the end of a meal. Some also use it as an ingredient in dessert savory dishes. From what I have been seeing around our cultural food, we combine this snack with maximum of our dishes. With theplas, in kadhi, for buttermilk, with biryani or pulav as raita, in chat like dahipuri or dahiwada... Dahi is something everybody everywhere makes almost every day! 

Besides coming with a long list of “Good for Health” properties, it is just simply tasty! So go on, beat this summer heat with this refreshing milk product and treat your taste buds with all the amazing dahi-licious dishes! 😍