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.

Chholey are to Amritsar, what Dal Makhni is to Delhi. Every corner has an eatery that will serve kulcha-chholey, matthi-chholey or their own version of the traditional, masala-spiked Amritsari chholey. In Amritsar, when a woman is not in the mood to cook, she’ll just order in some chholey to go with roti or rice and serve up a delightful meal. When guests are over, it’s chholey that are put on the table first. Then it’s only understandable that Amritsaris have perfected the art of cooking chholey.

Ammiji has her own recipes for chholey. There’s the curry that goes well with rice, or the dry, spicy version she makes to go with halwa-puri. Or there’s this semi-dry version that can be had with kulchas, matthis, rotis or even rice – and that version is our particular favorite. Dunk a plain kulcha in, top it with some chutney and raw onions, and you’re in foodie heaven. Or heap the chholey onto a crisp, thin matthi and there, heaven again. This recipe calls for a ground masala, which Ammiji makes herself. After much bantering, we got her to divulge the details of the masala, and here it is!

This masala will add spice to your chholey, and a whole lot of tang; and flavours, layers of flavours, that will make you lick your bowl clean.

How to Use: Boil chholey. Don’t keep too much water since this masala is best in a semi-wet, lipta hua gravy. You can add the masala directly to the boiled chholey and let it simmer for a while. Or if you want to make it Ammiji’s way, make a tadka of onions, tomatoes, garlic and ginger, and add the masala to that before adding to the chholey. Let us know which way you prefer!

Add 1 tablespoon for about 100 gms of uncooked chickpeas.

Ingredients: Corainder, Cumin, Dry Mango, Caraway, Dry Ginger, Cinnamon, Cloves, Nutmeg, Black pepper, Fenugreek, Hing, Salt.

Contains no onion or garlic. This masala is ground at home, using premium spices. Contains salt, so check before adding more.

Weight: 200 gms

Store in a cool, dry place, away from direct sunlight.

Good for: 6 months.

Include a delicious dose of health in your daily meals. This pickle harnesses the massive power of garlic in tiny, delicious and intensely addictive bites.

 Who hasn’t heard about the multifarious benefits of garlic? From curing colds to increasing longevity, garlic and the compounds present in it have been credited with myriad health benefits by civilizations through the ages. Maybe that is why this aromatic is revered and included in almost every cuisine around the world.

 And of course, Ammiji is all for the wisdom passed down through generations! While ginger is her favourite remedy for anything that ails you, garlic is her steady way of ensuring that nothing ever ails you. And her garlic pickle is our way of ensuring that you get a regular dose of good health!

 Ammiji’s Garlic Pickle has fat cloves of desi garlic, pickled with mild spices. It’s not very spicy – Ammiji believed in letting the flavour and umami of garlic shine through in this pickle. It will go well with almost anything – from theplas to paranthas, and from dal-chawal to sabzi-roti. Just make sure that you eat it every single day, as Ammiji intended!

 Ingredients: Garlic, Salt, Red Chilli, Fenugreek seeds, Mustard seeds, Fennel seeds, Nigella seeds, Vinegar, Mustard Oil.

 Weight: 175 gm

 Price: Rs 400 300 (inclusive of taxes)

 Good for: 8 months

Refrigerate after opening. (This pickle contains no preservatives.)

Always use a clean, dry spoon while scooping out Ammiji’s delicious pickles!

The famous Amritsari wadiyan, hand-made at home. Sun-dried dumplings of fiery goodness that add a subtly delicious flavor to any curry or pulao.

Who hasn’t heard about Amritsari papad wadiyan? Any tourist worth her or his salt will pick up a pack or two from the ubiquitous papad shops that surround the Golden Temple. These papad and wadiyan, though delicious, are mass produced under questionable hygiene conditions. Ammiji visited these shops only if it were an emergency and if she had run out of her own homemade papad wadiyan. Even now, when her arthritic fingers will not let her roll out papad or shape the wadiyan properly, she will sit on a chair in her verandah, and get these made by her helper under her eagle-eyed supervision.

These papad and wadiyan come to you from Amritsar, made under Ammiji’s supervision, from ingredients that are hand-picked by her. They are made from premium urad dal and use the choicest spices.
Amritsari wadiyan are famous around the world. Put them in a simple potato curry and they take on the shape of a gourmet dish. Add them to a plain pulao, and the rice obtains a kick it never had. Pair them with any kind of string beans as a dry dish, and you’ll have a side dish that’ll hog center stage. Wadiyan are that spicy part of traditional Amritsari cuisine that the rest of the world has yet to emulate. And Ammiji’s wadiyan are definitely the best you can get. Dumplings made from ground urad dal and spices and then sun dried under Ammiji’s supervision, according to the recipe that was passed down to her from her mother-in-law. We kid you not, these are that particular bomb of flavor that will leave you wanting more even as you marvel at the spice level.

Weight: 250gms

Big, fat red chillies, stuffed to the gills with a delicious khatta-teekha achaari masala. Can there be anything better? 

If there’s one thing that Ammiji loves, it’s her chillies. Green ones, red ones, big ones, small ones, teekha ones, sweet ones – all chillies are equal in her eyes. So we’ve taken one of her favorite chillies and used her classic recipe of stuffed chilli pickle to make this traditional Banarasi pickle.

The pleasure of this pickle does not come with biting into it. It comes from slowly coaxing the masala out from the chilli with the help of a spoon, a parantha or your finger, and then mixing it into your food to achieve a heavenly combination. The magic of this pickle does not come from simply eating it. The magic comes from that whole sensory experience of smelling it, deciding upon how much masala you want with each bite, and when you want to break off a piece of the chilli. Our Banarasi Mirch Achaar is just an instrument – you decide how you create magic out of it!

Seasonal fresh red chillies are stuffed with the usual culprits – our pickling spices (mixed in a secret ratio) – to achieve a pickle that will take the place of pride on your dining table. Not only will you enjoy pairing this pickle with your food, but you’ll also enjoy using the excess masala in it in your recipes while cooking in the kitchen. ;)

Ingredients: Fresh Red Chillies, Salt, Black Salt, Red Chilli Powder, Nigella Seeds, Carom Seeds, Mustard Seeds, Fenugreek Seeds, Fennel, Cumin, Black Pepper, Asafoetida, Turmeric, Mustard Oil.

Weight: 300 gms

Price: Rs 400 350

Good for: 12 months

Store in a cool, dry place. Refrigerate for longer shelf life.

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.