An Elder Millennial’s Love Letter to the Bandra Iftaar Party

There’s something about an iftaar party that keeps the best of faith and community alive, writes Rehana Munir. The Bandra iftaar party, which has more layers than a well-made biryani, is no different.

I was born on a rainy morning in 1981 close to the trusty Modern Mutton Shop (born in 1964, the year of The Beatles’ first world tour), and not far from where Toto’s Garage Pub would be born ten years later. And so, I suppose, I’ll have to acquiesce to the label of ‘elder millennial’. Pleasure-seekers of my generation, when they’re not pre-gaming, are serious after-party chasers. But to my ears, nothing comes close to the excitement the words ‘iftaar party’ conjure.  

Yes, yes. The term carries an unmistakeable association with politicians and their seasonal Muslim performance/appeasement. This can be quite entertaining. Who can forget ex-Bandra MLA Baba Siddique’s famous iftaar party ten ramzans ago where a matter of national importance was finally settled? Shah Rukh Khan and Salman Khan were photographed hugging one another after a fierce altercation, each having stood his silent ground on either end of Bandstand for five long years.

Urdu Meets Marathi

Usually, iftaar parties are all about the food. My mind goes back to a fabled house on Perry Cross Road, the same lane now famous for the fortress that is Sachin Tendulkar’s home. My maternal grandparents, Kamrunissa and Abdul Rauf, and their brood of eight children, born between the early ‘50s and ‘60s, are the iftaar OGs in my mind. To them I owe my earliest memories of this feast spread out at the end of a long day of fasting, the roza that began with the sehri — or meal before dawn — and ended with the iftaar — or breaking of the fast at sunset. In between, the faithful — and this family had a few — ate or drank absolutely nothing. Some went so far as to not swallow their own saliva. Take that, intermittent fasting.

The family disbanded in the mid-‘80s, and now there were three sisters left in Bombay, one of whom I call ‘mother’, and the others, ‘khaala’; the latter have maintained the iftaar tradition of the Perry Cross family. There are as many iftaar variations as there are Muslim communities in the world, united by faith but divided by ethnography. My own web of references — or dastarkhwan of delights — encompasses the Bandra Sunni Muslim variety, a mishmash of cultures and influences, just like the languages I grew up hearing. My maternal grandfather was a sonorous reciter of Ghalib’s verse and Dilip Kumar’s dialogue, and spoke English with a British intonation. My nani, meanwhile, spoke Urdu almost exclusively; her English was of the charming iskool, istool variety. But what I found most fascinating was her use of Marathi words in Hindustani parlance: dadar for stairs; mori for toilet; kantaal for boredom; kothmir for coriander.   

The Biryani Debate

Ah, coriander. The garnish for what is my favourite iftaari dish of the nani variety. Christened chana batata (my Aligarh-born paternal grandmother would laugh at the use of batata instead of aloo), the Ramzan favourite from my nani’s kitchen involves black grams and boiled potatoes in a ginger-garlic paste granting the dish a hazy coating. It’s the tamarind kick that lifts the dish from the commonplace to the dramatic. Each of my nani’s daughters — five in all — has her own take on this common inheritance. One dials down the ginger-garlic paste, another leaves the chana slightly undercooked, and so on. I can’t pick a favourite. And the good part is, I don’t need to.

Which makes me jump patriotically to the defence of Bombay biryani, often ridiculed by Lucknow connoisseurs and Madras snobs whenever the pointless yet irresistible ‘best biryani’ conversation comes up. I’m a big fan of both anda and aloo in the dish, much like the Bengalis are used to. But that ends the similarities between the Bombay and Calcutta biryanis. Ours (it’s such a rare pleasure to claim something wholly in this world of endless equivocation) is unafraid of being bold, right from the masalas luxuriating between layers of basmati rice to the saffron colouring on the top layer, beloved for its fried onions. Shan Bombay Biryani Masala (but manufactured in Pakistan), easily available at grocery stores, does the trick. The tangy sweetness of the aloo bukhara is one of the highlights, while an elaichi encounter is always an unwelcome surprise.

Deep-Fried Delight

But there are plenty more layers to the Bandra iftaar before the showstopping biryani. As well-fed kids who showed up for family iftaar parties with great enthusiasm, my sisters, cousins and I loved uttering the iftaar-time prayer with those legitimately breaking their fast. We sped breathlessly forward to the closing words, ‘fataqabbal minni’, eagerly popping a date in our mouths — the prescribed way to break the roza. And so it all began, usually with fruit of the watermelon-pineapple-grape persuasion, giving the dehydrated a much-needed fillip. And then came the good stuff: plates of bhajiyas featuring onions, potatoes and green chillis. When the hostess was out to impress, we even had cauliflower, brinjal and spinach fritters, all with green chutney and ketchup, which we mixed together for that ineffable flavour. Never such innocence again.

Shami kebabs, I’ll admit, aren’t a Bombay specialty. But iftaar parties follow their own internal logic. My Chimbai village khaala makes them in a way I’ve never seen anywhere else. Stuffed with chopped onions and condiments, these crowd-pleasers are obscenely large, and in competition only with bheja cutlets, also fried in egg. Mutton chaap — with meat sourced from Modern Mutton, of course — is another must, washed down with glasses of Rooh Afza, in water or in milk. (Aside: A few years ago, when I was complaining about the price of meat at Modern Mutton to my mother, she accused me of being a communist.)

Postprandial Rituals

If biryani isn’t the grand finale, it’s either dal gosht (with lauki in a supporting role) or yakhni pulao (with that intoxicating fragrance). Chicken korma, with a yoghurt-softened gravy, is my Waterfield Road khaala’s delicious concession to the mutton denialists. As for dessert, homemade caramel custard and fruit custard are staples. Then there are the outsourced favourites: firni (chilled kheer with a nutty garnish in a clay bowl), gulaab jamun and rasmalaai. Postprandial chai, with adrak and lemongrass, is a tradition that unites even the most warring factions of this family; there seems to be a universal consensus on it. And to seal the deal, there’s paan. In between, namaaz is offered by the faithful, and unholy laughter is shared by the greedy and satisfied.

For someone who thinks of herself as a cultural Muslim, there’s something about an iftaar party that keeps the best of faith and community alive. Nothing fills my heart like the sight of dates and fruit laid out on the tables of budget restaurants and communal tables near Bandra station and elsewhere just before the sun goes down. As the azaan rings out, I’m transported to all the dastarkhwans I’ve been lucky enough to be invited to, so crowded there wasn’t even space to insert an Eid ka (crescent) chaand between dishes. The best ones are those where the diversity of dishes is reflected in the variety of humans enjoying them: people of different social backgrounds, faiths and ideologies mingling over a charmed meal. I have faith in iftaar parties, and so should we all. Ramzan Mubarak.   

Rehana Munir is a Mumbai-based novelist, columnist and culinary nostalgist.

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