I was with an old friend when he got an invitation for a marriage feast. I was also invited—mainly because I happened to be there. Not much about himachali food is known even to the rest of the Indians. The food is still today, I am sure, not available in any restaurant—even in Himachal Pradesh. Best way of savouring the cuisine is to be in one of the towns during the marriage, birthday, or maybe a promotion celebration. Getting an invite in the district of Kangra is very easy. Almost always the entire village takes part in the festivities.
When we reached the venue we could see a flurry of activities—ladies in colourful attire, rows and rows of people busy eating on a plate made with palm sized leaves joined with thin shoots, bearers busy serving the delicacies. Only rice was being served ( no bread) . It did not take me long to see that there were around 14 different dishes. The bearers were serving them in a fixed sequence. Some people were standing just behind the rows getting ready to take the seats. We were told that the feast starts with a dish made with fried curds later a lot of lentils in myriad of colours and smells are served, a curry made with curds, and gram flour signals the end of the main course and people get ready for the desert—sweet rice with nuts, dried milk and saffron.
This being my first experience , I did not want to eat in a hurry, especially with a lot of people standing on my back waiting for me to finish! But that was not to be, it looked like the entire village was invited, hordes and hordes of people went on coming. The entire set of rows start and end the lunch at the same time. The bearers were able to identify big eaters and they were given bigger portions of rice. This way every one finished the meal at the same time. When I started eating I discovered that all the items are tasty, the only problem was that if you like a certain dish—already served—and want some more of it, then it is a problem because you will have to specially request for it and thus break a programmed sequence. Of course, as you go to your second feast you will know what to take more of! Same dishes in the same sequence are served in all the marriages—a difference between a rich man's feast could be in the quantity of the dry fruit or may be free flowing fat, that's all.
The food is made by a special brahmin—a long trench is made and wood is burnt in it—big couldrons of brass are put on it, powder made of the roasted hard cover of walnut is used to give flavour to one of the dishes, a herb called ratan jyot is put in hot oil to give red colour to one of the dishes, some of the pulses are cooked for entire night , fresh plain yoghurts are roasted in butter till it dries to make the base of one of the dishes, dried mango is used to impart a tangy flavour to one of the items. I was told that contrary to popular belief, no non-veg food is served during these festivities.