Angoor khattey hain? Not quite! Khatti, meethi, teekhi and finger-lickin’ good!

 Ammiji made a chutney out of every fruit that ever crossed her tongue. And while we slowly weasel out her precious recipes from her, we bring to you her favourite chutney recipes that she’s already shared with us.

Her one instruction when we tried this Black Grape chutney recipe out for the first time was, “Cheeni hath khich ke!” or “Be stingy with the sugar!” And we were. We not only used minimal sugar in our first try, but we replaced three-fourths of the sugar with jaggery in the second try. What resulted was a chutney that tasted distinctly of earthy black grapes, with the kick of mustard and white pepper and the umami of jaggery, all neatly bound together with a tinge of lemon.

 This delicious chutney can be paired with paranthas, roti, dal-chawal, biryani…anything, really! Or take a tip from us – eat it with some wholewheat crackers. Yes, you can use it as part of your cheeseboard too – it tastes awesome with brie!

Made from fresh seasonal black grapes, this chutney is proof that wine is not the only delicious thing that can be made with black grapes. :D

 Ingredients: Black grapes, Jaggery, Sugar, Salt, White Pepper, Lemon, Bay leaves, Cumin, Yellow Mustard, Mustard Oil

Weight: 140 gm

 Price: Rs 350

Good for: 3 months

Keep this chutney refrigerated. Use only a clean, dry spoon to scoop out Ammiji’s deliciousness.

Back in January 2021, Ammiji’s health saw a sudden decline. That was the first time we saw her look slightly defeated. On one of our visits to her, while we sat in her verandah on a cold and sunny winter afternoon, she suddenly popped the question we were not prepared for, “So when are you doing my phaalsa chutney? After I die?”

That led to a promise, and here’s fulfilling that promise…

Phalsaas are those short-lived little morsels of happiness that bless us with their presence for about a month every year in North India, and then they disappear, leaving us craving for that tangy, crunchy, titillating feel in our mouth. Tiny little berries that range from a dull pick to a deep purple in colour, they are best had dusted with some rock salt. We’ve already made a sherbet out of them, and this year, because of the promise, we’ve cooked them into Ammiji’s favorite chutney.

This recipe is classic Ammiji. It’s simple, it uses minimal ingredients, it has a slightly spicy kick and it’s fragrant. The end result is a chutney that has layers of flavour and the subtle hint of the spices we use in our garam masala.

This chutney brings back memories of baskets of phalsaas, fresh from the orchard. We’d eat some (ok, a lot) and the rest would be purloined by Ammiji to make her phaalsa sherbet and chutney. According to her, these were precious little berries and they had to be preserved in some form or the other so we could enjoy them for a longer time.

So here’s Ammiji’s favorite chutney, in her classic recipe, with her loving blessings.

Goes well with any meal. Best had with ajwain paranthas. Or better still, by the spoonful!

Ingredients: Phalsaa berries, organic raw cane sugar, Rock salt, Ammiji’s garam masala, brown cardamom.

Caution: These berries contain tiny seeds that may be a choking hazard for small children.

Weight: 200 gm

Refrigerate upon opening. Keep refrigerated for longer shelf life.

We turn onions into gold with this chutney. Layers of slowly built flavor; a sweet and spicy umami taste that you won’t be able to resist.

Any seasoned cook will tell you the magic that a medium slow flame will do to onions. Slowly browning them till science takes over – caramelization turns the natural sugar present in onions into new, simpler sugar molecules and the Maillard reaction ensures that layers upon layers of flavor and aroma are built up. You don’t need to know the science to know that the result is a mellow, melting, soft hot mess! Pungent raw onions have turned into sweet, brown gold.

Ammiji’s recipe for her classic Onion Chutney takes that sweet, brown gold, adds more layers of flavor to it with garlic and ginger, and then even more with curry leaves, resulting in a condiment that’s too complex to describe, but is one of the best things you’ll ever scoop out of a jar. The natural sweetness of caramelized onions is magnified by the addition of organic jaggery, and then balanced by the tanginess of amchur, anardana and tamarind. So much goodness in one little jar – you have to taste it to believe it!

Ammiji’s Caramelized Onion Chutney is as desi as it comes – so it’ll go with any of your regular meals. But it’s also versatile, so there’s ample room to get inventive with it. Layer your burgers and sandwiches with it for a seriously good umami kick. Add it to your cheeseboard (pair it with cheddar and you’ll be in heaven!), add it to a marinade instead of barbeque sauce, stir it into a stir-fry, or just eat it plain. The sky is literally the limit when it comes to this gorgeous chutney. One of our favorites here at Ammiji’s kitchen, as you can undoubtedly tell. :)

Ingredients: Onion, Garlic, Ginger, Jaggery, Dry Mango Powder, Pomegranate seeds, Tamarind, Curry Leaves

Weight: 175 gms

Price: Rs 500 400

Good for: 6 months

Keep Refrigerated. (This chutney contains no preservatives.)

Always use a clean, dry spoon while scooping out Ammiji’s legendary chutneys!

The perfect way to add some spice and tang to your meals. And so much deliciousness!

This one’s for those of you who appreciate the yin and yang of life. The black and white. The khatta and meetha. The teekha and addictive. Okay, we could go on and on.

Ammiji’s intolerance for bland, unaccompanied meals is legendary. We, her grandkids, knew that we’d never be served a meal at her table that wasn’t accompanied by a chutney, a pickle or some special thing that she had brewed up. And as kids, one of our favorites was this addictive Lemon Chutney. It was khatta enough to make your toes curl, and meetha enough to have with the last bite of our meal. And it was totally addictive. So much so, that we finished it faster than Ammiji could make it, often making her mutter, “Khasma nu khaaney, sungh lende ne inoo!” (Roughly translates too: *Mild slur*, they inhale this chutney!) That we did.

And once you get your hands on this spectacular chutney, we’re sure you’ll be inhaling it too. It took us a while to tweak Ammiji’s original recipe so that we could substitute sugar with jaggery and still make it as delicious, and we seem to have done it. 

Slow-cooked lemon pulp and juice, sweetened with jaggery and spiced up sparingly. Put this on your shelf stat!

Ingredients: Lemon, Jaggery, Salt, Black Salt, Red Chilli, Garam Masala, Mustard Oil.

Weight: 225 gms

Price: Rs 450 350 (inclusive of taxes)

Good for: 3 months

Keep Refrigerated. (This chutney contains no preservatives.)

Always use a clean, dry spoon while scooping out Ammiji’s legendary chutneys!

This is a simple anardana chutney made with home-dried anardana. Correction: This is a BOMB chutney, with a nostalgic, addictive flavour, and powerful digestion properties. Ek baar iska chaska lagake dekhiye!

As children, each time we used to get an anardana churan or goli home from the vendors sitting outside our school, Ammiji used to shake her head in disgust and make us throw the lot in the bin. But, of course, we were irascible. We returned home day after day with our pockets full of the stuff. “Mitti daalte hain ismein!” Ammiji would scream as she chased us to get us to empty our pockets. And then, seeing that we were not to be deterred from having those vile anardana golis, she came up with this homemade anardana concoction and called it “Churan Chutney” just to get us to have it. And boy, did we love it!

We are calling it the Chaska Chutney though. Chaska, a word that has no exact translation in the English language. The closest you can get to a direct meaning is “addiction”. But this is so much more than that. It’s addictive, hell yes, but it’s a good kind of addictive. It’s an addiction that you wish you’d taken up earlier. It’s an addiction that you’re not going to want to let go of. And it’s an addiction that you’ll happily indulge in, day after day after day.

Ammiji made her own anardana at home from the seeds of wild, sour pomegranates. She sun-dried the seeds at home, and we do the same. (Okay, we’ll admit we dry them out in the oven too when the sun-drying is not going fast enough!) The anardana is then ground up with salt and sugar and digestive spices like jeera and hing are added to enhance the inherently powerful digestive properties of anardana.

This churan-chutney is a supremely efficient digestive. And it’s delicious enough to replace all your heavy, creamy desserts. A small spoonful after every meal will not only help you digest your meal, but will also fulfil any craving for sweets you might have. (Of course, you’ll start craving for this after every meal, but that’s a side-effect you’re just going to have to live with! ;))

The taste is sour and sweet and it’ll make you click your tongue against the roof of your mouth and pucker your lips and WANT MORE!

But a warning: This is a mild laxative when eaten in large quantities. Please, please don’t finish the jar in one sitting, no matter how much you’re tempted to…

Ingredients: Home-dried Anardana, Salt, Black Salt, Sugar, Cumin, Asafoetida

Weight: 220 gms

Good For: 12 months

Store in a cool, dry place, away from sunlight. Always use a dry spoon.

They say that the Bengalis have a chutney for every season. But for the post monsoon season, when the mangoes have faded away, raw papaya shines in the chutney section of the Bengali meal. Crisp raw papaya is cooked till it becomes transparent – and some call it the “Plastic Chutney” for just this reason. We prefer to call it the Pepe Chutney. “Pepe” is Bengali for papaya.

The unpretentious Plastic Chutney was elevated to a royal level when a prominent hospitality chain started serving it in their opulent Indian restaurant. We’ve taken that recipe, added our own saffron-flavored twist to it, and come up with a deliciously luxuriant version that no one will believe is made from the humble papaya.

When Ammiji tasted this chutney (yes, the recipe is not hers but she will vet anything that goes out in her name) she closed her eyes and then opened them hurriedly before we caught her at it. Of course, we didn’t miss the expression of satisfaction on her face but declined to comment on it. “Is it good?” we asked. She pretended to think for a bit. We waited on feigned tenterhooks. “Theek hai,” she finally said, which in her language meant that it was wholeheartedly approved. She kept the jar in her kitchen, pretending that it was an ordinary thing to do. We knew then that what we had in this chutney was pure love.

This sweet chutney is flavored strongly with nigella seeds and saffron, and it has added raisins for texture play. It goes well with all your meals – with paranthas, with dal chawal, even atop crackers with feta cheese! (The aforementioned restaurant served it with rich Awadhi biryanis and curries!)

We bet you – one spoonful of this chutney will definitely not be enough.

Ingredients: Raw Papaya, Raisins, Sugar, Himalayan pink salt, Lemon Juice, Red chilli, Cumin, Nigella seeds, Aniseed, Saffron

Weight: 150 gms

Good for: 3 months when refrigerated

Usage: Store in Refrigerator.