Fo, Fo and More Fo

I called a friend who grew up Goa and she told me about all the Goan Diwali customs, including the making of 5 different fau (the Konkani word for poha and pronounced fo) on Diwali day. Armed with the recipes and the history behind their being made on this particular day, I was ready to cook for my story. I made 5 different pohas. Dahi poha, milk poha and batata poha were easy to make. Even rosathle fau – poha in coconut milk and liquid gur is a simple recipe. For the kaliyale fau or mixed poha, there has to be a special masala made, but aside from this, this poha is also not difficult to make. Apparently, the morning meal of poha was not supposed to take too much time to make because so many other preparations for Diwali needed to be done by the women on that day, so they purposely kept simple.

However, by the end of the day I had enough of poha and felt like I had come concrete in my stomach. I forgot the rule of moderation that day and was reminded that too much a good thing is no longer a good thing! Check out my Goan Diwali story in Pune Mirror here.