Curdly Tales

As a South Indian in a predominantly North Indian family and friends circle, there is a lot of adjusting I have to do. It is not just coming to terms with rotis for dinner but also indulging I-love-South-Indian-cuisine guests who will build a formidable mountain of rice on their plate, create a big crater in the middle, and pour rasam-sambar-palya-gojju-kosambri-payasam-curd all together into one holy mess till I am almost begging to serve them a bowl of matar paneer.
But even my patience snaps when someone points an accusing finger at my, mostly harmless, curd rice. I have found, ever since I started feeding it to my young daughter K, that unless the curd is sugared or boiled like in a kadhi, their tolerance to curd is pretty low. My Bengali mother-in-law is often distressed by it and spends a lot of time moping over the fact that I give my daughter curd rice in the evening, thus creating thanda-lage-jabe risks for the child. She enjoys listing the little one’s accomplishments but the chummy way she chomps down curd rice has pointedly been ignored in her list. Meanwhile, another friend frowned when I refused to give K chips along with it. “You will make her a South Indian like you,” she exclaimed in mock horror, making me wonder if she really had a problem with my South Indian-ness. Yet another pinged my husband to advise us to expose K to other foods as well and not limit ourselves to curd rice.
There is more than enough literature online that talks about the goodness of curd rice to those who care to read about it. The health benefits of yogurt for children include ease of digestion, remedy from gastric troubles, boosting the immune system, remedy for diarrhoea and dysentery, good food during hepatitis and jaundice, treatment for insomnia, and a remedy for urinary tract infections. K raises a delightful pungent stink promptly every morning and I owe this to the simple curd rice+veggies+pickle I give her. She takes curd rice enthusiastically, without complaint, while I coo my agenda-laden ditty:
“Who needs chips, when I have majji (curd)
Who needs ice cream, when I have majji
Who needs chocolate, when I have majji
Ah Ah Ah, I love my majji
Give me more, more of majji”
PS: Substituted by khichdi/ragi at will