Pallu Kolukattai: Celebrating the Joy of Eating
Photo Courtesy of A. Saravanapavan
By Shanthy Milne
My son’s arrival in this world was not marked with any welcoming traditions or cultural practices. He was not Christened as his father had been, nor did we hold a naming ceremony or shave his head as is customary in Sri Lankan Tamil culture – a purification ritual believed to rid a child of any ills from a past life (and encourage a thicker re-growth of hair). But when our son’s beautiful gummy smile gave way to reveal his first incisor, it became the symbolic moment in which we wanted to draw on my family’s cultural traditions and come together to celebrate.
Food plays a significant role in the cultural practices of Sri Lankan Tamil communities. Many religious rituals begin with the symbolic breaking of a coconut, representing the destruction of the ego and the pursuit of purity from within. In Hindu temples, Prasadam in the form of fruit or specially prepared rice dishes are placed before deities as an offering. Following poojas (ritual prayers), these offerings – now consecrated – are shared and consumed among devotees.
Whether religious or secular, each ceremonial gathering culminates with the sharing of food. But there is also one occasion where it is the very act of eating and the embarkation on a lifelong relationship with food that is the cause for celebration itself. It was this, the Pallu Kolukattai (Teething Ceremony), which my husband and I felt the most affinity towards and desire to celebrate.
In Western culture, teething tends to be met with ambivalence. Albeit a recognisable milestone, it is often bemoaned for the accompanying sleepless nights and ever-present fussiness of a baby with sore gums. Typically, it is the loss of the milk tooth that is given precedence. Though children revel at the prospect of a nocturnal visit from the Tooth Fairy, the tradition of exchanging the lost tooth for money or gifts fails to pay homage to the joys of eating facilitated by these teeth or their successors. Comparatively, Asian and Middle-Eastern traditions marking the eruption of the first tooth are grander affairs, involving the wider community and celebrating the possibilities opening up to the tooth bearer – including but not limited to the culinary fares they might enjoy.
The pursuit of food had taken my husband and I to far-off destinations and through food, we had transcended linguistic, social and cultural barriers, connecting with people in the most fundamental of ways. We all eat, and in doing so together, we can be unified by our similarities whilst appreciating each other’s differences. Having experienced this, we were united in our desire to raise a child who could derive the same joys and pleasures from food that we’d experienced.
During his wedding speech, my husband (who I had never before seen cry) shed tears whilst recollecting the moment he first met my grandmother. They had found themselves alone together and in the absence of words, she had carved and fed him jackfruit. The intimacy of her actions tapped into the most primitive form of human connection, echoing the way a mother connects non-verbally with her child through the act of feeding. Without words, my husband had understood he was being embraced and welcomed into the family.
On the day of my son’s Pallu Kollukattai, we gathered in my parent’s house. Never one to miss an opportunity, my dad had made his trademark spiced rum punch, which he distributed in glasses piled high with fruit. My auntie, Lalitha, had spent the previous day (and night) prepping the most important part of the day – the kolukattai.
Kolukattai is a steamed dumpling found in South Indian and Sri Lankan cuisine. Traditionally, it is shaped like a half moon and filled with a mix of mung dal, cocunut, jagerry and cardamom. Preparing this delicacy is something of an art form and requires a certain amount of dexterity in order to achieve a perfectly uniform twisted seal along the kolukattai’s outer edge.
As more aunties gathered to put the finishing touches on a final batch of ceremonial kolukattai, the kitchen was soon filled with the sound of laughter. This special batch was embellished with small pieces of coconut representing the new teeth we had gathered to celebrate. My husband’s family, albeit new to these traditions, quickly found themselves embraced within the hive of kitchen activity. It was heart-warming to see my in-laws with their sleeves rolled up, enthusiastically constructing dumplings alongside my aunties.
Even when food is not abundant and plentiful, I have witnessed how, when shared, the value of food can transcend its nutritional purposes, taking on a greater meaning and power. In our early days together, my husband and I visited one of Sri Lanka’s most remote tea plantation communities. The plantation workers had offered us shelter in one of their small mud homes and fed us a humble meal comprising a single roti accompanied by a fried egg – though it was delicious, it was meagre compared to what we were used to. That night was one of the coldest of our lives, huddled together in the hut, we had to pull on all of our available clothes and though we were still hungry, our hearts were full, understanding the depths of the generosity we’d been shown. In the days after, as we encountered the struggles and resilience of the plantation community, we carried with us the weight of knowing someone had likely sacrificed their own meal in order for us to be fed and welcomed into the folds of their community. Time and again, food had served as a means for us to integrate into different communities, proving itself unparalleled in it’s ability to transcend differences. Though we had arrived on that plantation as strangers, we left feeling like family.
Stood in the kitchen, watching my aunties teaching my in-laws the age-old traditions of our community, I was once again witnessing this coming together.
Once the ceremonial kolukattai had been steamed, they were placed on an arisi murum – a hand woven rice sieve commonplace in Sri Lankan homes. The guests formed a circle around our son and a white lace cloth was placed over his head. His uncles then shared the duty of gently pouring the kollukatai over him. Intuitively, he reached for a fallen dumpling and raised it to his mouth, rousing cheers from family members. Unperturbed by his audience and having acquired a taste for the kolukattai, he continued to chew on it, much to the delight of those around him.
A few symbolic items had been placed around my son in preparation for a playful, fortune-telling custom which would follow. Typically, these objects would represent professions held in high esteem. In a break with tradition, we had selected items that represented the interests of family members, hoping they might one day be shared with our son. It was now up to him to appease the desires of some and dash the hopes of others through the choice of item he reached for.
When he finally surrendered his kollukatai, his hand grasped the petals of a nearby gerbera, prompting an outpouring of applause from my mother-in-law, a keen florist. Diplomatically, he did not linger for long on the flower and was soon in pursuit of another kolukuttai – a decision which appeased us all.
With food occupying such a functional role in our everyday lives, it’s easy to overlook its significance beyond nutritional sustenance. Yet across cultures, food is vital to the emotional attachment we have to family and home. Our food practices are closely tied to our history and upbringing and play an important role in maintaining cultural and ethnic identities. It is a means through which we can connect, display and share our culture and heritage to a wider audience and invite them to partake in our customs through the universal act of eating. Though this aspect of food appreciation was more prevalent in my upbringing than my husband’s, it was my husband who instigated one of the most valuable food practices within our own family: eating together around the dinner table.
Photo Courtesy of A. Saravanapavan
In my childhood home, food was very much the language of love. Though we were not always the best at talking to one another, even in the midst of arguments and in the silence of their aftermath, unconditional love would emanate through the abundance of hearty, nutritious food prepared in our family kitchen. Our meals were cooked in big pans, which everyone dipped into at their own convenience. Though there was always extra for unexpected visitors, only on very special occasions was the dining table pulled out for us to eat together.
Now, as a parent, I recognise the importance of sitting together around the dinner table. It has been instrumental in socialising our son and nurturing his willingness to try different foods. But eating together hasn’t just fostered a healthy relationship with food; during our dinnertime conversations our son also experiments with new words and it is often in this space that his intellectual curiosity becomes most evident. Most of all, I have come to cherish the moments of togetherness and the cohesion derived from eating together at the dinner table.
In the Netherlands, (where we now live), it’s considered impolite to turn up at someone’s house during dinnertime. Apparently it’s not uncommon to be left outside the door or made to wait in another room until the family meal is over. Whilst this is thoroughly at odds with the way I grew up, where regardless of when you knocked at the door you would be handed a plate of food (or find yourself leaving with a Tupperware container full of it), I’m also coming to understand the sacrosanct view of the family meal held by the Dutch. With the pressures of modern life pulling both parents and children out of the home for hours on end, time spent together around the dinner table is all the more precious.
Happily, our way of eating now falls between these two traditions. As a family of three, our shared love of food ensures we can experience great joy exploring new cuisines together, but we also find it incredibly cathartic returning to and sharing the dishes of our childhoods. By tapping into the histories preserved in these foods and sharing the stories and memories which accompany them, we are also meaningfully sharing our cultural identities and heritage with our son and involving him in those family narratives. I hope that as he grows older and ventures further away from our family home, we will continue to return and gather around the dinner table together. I also hope that friends and family will continue to knock at our door, safe in the knowledge that there will always be enough food and a space for them at our table.
SHANTHY MILNE is a writer, journalist and documentary producer with ten years’ experience producing films focused on marginalised communities for UK broadcasters such as the BBC and Channel 4.
She now resides in Amsterdam where she occasionally writes and teaches documentary film making to undocumented migrants. She also serves on the policy council of Liberty - a UK based human rights organisation.