Tag Archives: Mughal Food

A manuscript that the Madras government published on the skills of Shahjahan’s cooks

March 12, 2025Books (incl.Biographies - w.e.f.01 jan 2018 ), Royal Families, PreIndependence -Descendants (wef. Jan 02nd,2022)36 Recipes fo Qaliah, 56 Recipes of Pulao, Ain Al Akbari, Alwan e Nemat, Book - Nuskha e Shah Jahani, Book - The Mughal Feast - Recipes from the Kitchen of Emperor Shah Jahan, Mir Bakaul, Mughal Food, Nawab Salarjung, Nawab Shujauddaulah, Nawabs of Awadh, Nimatnama i Nasiruddin Shahi, Nuskha e Shah Jahani, Persian Compilation of Recipes from the Royal Kitchen of Mughal Emperor Shahjahan, Salam Yusuf Husain - Author and Food Historian, Salma Yusuf Husain, Syed Muhammad Fazlullah, Zer Biryanmpositiveone@gmail.com

TAMIL NADU :

Nuskha-e-Shahjahani, published by the government under its Oriental Series in 1956, hopes to make readers “eat with their eyes” as there are no photographs in the book to illustrate the dishes. It contains recipes for ‘pulao’, roast meats, pottage and omelettes, puff pastry savouries, sweetmeats, and yogurts.

The unnamed author describes 56 ways of preparing ‘pulao’ in Nuskha-e-Shahjahani. | Photo Credit: Ruth Dhanaraj

Any mention of the Mughal empire would not be complete without a reference to its rich cuisines. It is interesting to note that as early as 1956, the Government of Madras had brought out a Persian compilation of recipes from the royal kitchen of Mughal Emperor Shahjahan.

Nuskha-e-Shahjahani, published by the government under its Oriental Series, is a cookbook that hopes to make readers “eat with their eyes”, though there are no photographs to illustrate the dishes. The compendium relies on word power to conjure up images of what may have transpired as expert cooks went about creating repasts fit for a king.

Nuskha-e-Shahjahani is based on two source materials. The first is a single Persian paper manuscript described under No. D.596, containing 186 pages with 11 to 14 lines on a page, dated 1263 A. H., from the Government Oriental Manuscripts Library in Madras. The other is from the India Office Library in London, which is incomplete, with nine sections that are written in the Shikista (a ‘broken’ version of the nasta’liq calligraphic script), and titled Nan-O-Namak (Bread and Salt).

Its 10 sections contain detailed recipes for ‘pulao’ (rice and meat dishes), roast meats, pottage and omelettes, puff pastry savouries, sweetmeats, and yogurts. Colouring of food and oil, with natural methods, besides the preparations of jams and condiments from fresh fruit, all find a mention in Nuskha-e-Shahjahani.

The unnamed author is a man familiar with culinary arts. He describes 56 ways of preparing ‘pulao’ and 36 recipes for ‘Qaliah’, a flavourful thin curry.

Love of display

In his introduction to the 1956 volume, editor Syed Muhammad Fazlullah writes, “Shahjahan is considered to be a lover of display in all matters compared to the other Mughal emperors. His reign was a period of peace and plenty… His table was very extensive and displayed a variety of rich dishes. The high degree of excellence of the royal kitchen can be imagined from the study of Nuskha-e-Shahjahani.”

The Mughals were known to pay considerable attention to their food and its presentation. Emperor Akbar, for instance, appointed experienced men to look after the cooking, and also devised rules for the conduct of the royal kitchen, which was administered by the Prime Minister. The officer-in-charge was called ‘Mir Bakaul’, who would oversee the work of subordinate expert cooks appointed from different countries. A separate budget was maintained for the kitchens.

Written down by scribes

“After translating a collection of ‘pulao’ recipes in 2007 from Nuskha-e-Shahjahani, I realised that there may be other manuscripts related to recipes from the Mughal era,” Gurgaon-based food historian and author Salma Yusuf Husain told The Hindu. The Persian language scholar’s English translation of Nuskha-e-Shahjahani was published in 2019 as The Mughal Feast: Recipes from the Kitchen of Emperor Shah Jahan.

Ms. Husain’s search led her to noted libraries and museums in India and abroad. “Most of the recipes were written down by the official scribe known as ‘Munshi’. Besides Nuskha-e-Shahjahani, Ain-al-Akbari, Alwan-e-Nemat and Nimatnama-i-Nasiruddin-Shahi are among the handful of food-related manuscripts from this era,” she said.

The Nawabs of Awadh followed the Mughals by opting for elaborate menus. Editor Fazlullah mentions that the food expenditure in the kitchen of Nawab Shujauddaulah came up to ₹7 lakh per year, apart from the salaries of the cooks and other staff. It is said that Nawab Salarjung’s cook earned ₹1,200 per month.

But what passes for Mughal food is just an Indianised version of the original, said Ms. Husain. “The Mughals used only three to four spices, such as cumin, coriander, and saffron, besides a variety of dry fruits in their dishes, so their dishes would have been bland. The Portuguese brought chillies to the Indian platter during the latter half of Shahjahan’s reign. Mughal food in India today tastes more of spicy gravies cooked in oil rather than the base ingredient,” she said.

Though the taste profile may have changed, some techniques have lingered. The Mughals had a penchant for slow cooking and grilling, allowing ingredients to stew in their own juices.

“‘Zer biryan’ was a technique where wooden sticks would be laid out on the base of the pan, and marinated meat would be placed on top. The pot would be heated slowly and the meat would cook without coming into contact with the vessel. When half-done, par-boiled rice would be spread over the meat, and the vessel would be sealed and cooked on dum (heat compress),” said Ms. Husain. Contrary to perception, vegetarian recipes were plentiful. Dishes like ‘navratan pulao’ and ‘pulao-e-anardana’ (made with pomegranate seeds) and gravies with chickpeas were commonly prepared.

Government initiative

Nuskha-e-Shahjahani was among the many rare manuscripts to be taken up for publication by the Government of Madras from early 1948. Lists were made from the collections of Sarasvati Mahal Library in Thanjavur and the Government Oriental Manuscripts Library in Madras and publication was overseen by expert committees drawn from the academia of the time.

The Madras Government Oriental Series published rare manuscripts in Tamil, Sanskrit, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Persian, and Arabic from the Madras institution, while those in Tamil, Telugu, Marathi, and Sanskrit were selected from the Sarasvati Mahal Library. In a world where food is integral to televised entertainment, with nearly everyone a ‘master chef’, thanks to social media, Nuskha-e-Shahjahani harks back to a time when cooking was as much an art as a science.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> India> Tamil Nadu / by Nahla Nainar / January 24th, 2024

The Aam Admi’s Mughal Feast

January 26, 2020Arts, Culture & EntertainmentMughal Era Foods, Mughal Food, Mughal Food for Commoners, Mughal Food for Commoners by Shubra Chatterjimpositiveone@gmail.com

Mumbai, MAHARASHTRA :

A food historian goes beyond the tables of badshahs and sahibs to decode what the common man ate in the Mughal and post-Mughal colonial India. And it’s not starkly different from what we eat today

Shubra Chatterji channeled her research into Mughlai food for commoners for a recent talk at a food conference. Pic/ Ashish Raje

When we think Mughlai food, we think rich eats ranging from galouti kebabs to biryani and korma. Television producer, director, writer, and founder of food blog Historywali, Shubra Chatterji travelled the length and breadth of the country, shooting people in their homes to trace and document the food habits of people during the Mughal era.

“If you eat a particular food, it says something about where you come from, your ancestry, who you are. The Mughal period spanned 1530 to 1857, with the last 100 years being considered as the post-Mughal era, after the emergence of the East India Company, along with the Dutch, Portugese and French colonists. Over the next couple of centuries, a lot of new foods came to India, including potato, tomato and chilli, which are now a staple in Indian homes,” says Chatterji, adding, “This was also a period when documentation was on a high due to what was recorded as part of court documentation.”

But, most Mughal texts focus on royal life, and foods whenever mentioned, only illustrate elaborate feasts and the workings of imperial kitchens. “There was always a connection to royalty. We didn’t have any recipes used by commoners,” she adds. Chatterji says that by the late 1800s, women began to turn to education and that was the start of literary texts surrounding food. “This is when we so we see the emergence of recipe books.”

Folk art, including Warli paintings, show deer being hunted. Poems, especially by Ghalib, describe shami kebabs

At a two-day conference organised by the Kama Institute of Oriental Studies in Kala Ghoda, Chatterji presented a paper that focussed on the sources to study the common man’s diet in the Mughal period. First, she researched prominent Mughal chronicles, Baburnama and Ain E Akbari. She found scant descriptions that helped her make a start. “The main diet of the people then comprised eggplant, fish and rice. Rice was cooked on one day and eaten the next; similar to Pakhala in Odisha today. Khichdi was also important, and finds mention in several texts, especially for the military troops, who survived on it instead of meat.”

Travellers’ accounts were another clue. And art, with illustrations of dishes and utensils. “A painting in the Victoria and Albert museum depicts a poor pilgrim in Ajmer being given food, with boondi and kachori clearly visible in the picture. We also find different fruits, like pomegranate, in inlay work in architecture; and folk art, including Warli paintings, show deer being hunted. Poems, especially by Ghalib, describe shami kebabs. There was food for feasting and fasting, and the latter didn’t use tomatoes,” she shares.

The biggest misnomer is that the Mughal diet was predominantly non-vegetarian. There are entire sections in the Ain E Akbari, dedicated to vegetarian recipes made for days of abstinence, with Akbar banning the consumption of beef during the time. Also, their food was very delicately prepared and not heavily spiced.

Chatterji adds that we continue to consume a lot of what they ate back then, but preparation methods have changed.

The nutritious khichdi was an important food and finds mention in several texts

And, we’ve added potato, tomato, onion to our diet.

While pepper was used to spice foods, we now use more chilli. They also ate the humble dal-chawal, but an even simpler preparation. ” We are now slowly discovering the benefits of original methods and moving back to basics.

Over the last five years, the food conversation has surrounded heirloom family recipes.

The common man didn’t have much back then, there was abject poverty. The poor were very poor, and their food was not elaborate. They ate maacher jhol bhaat (fish-curry-rice).

And food wasn’t a conversation starter like it is now.”

source: http://www.mid-day.com / Mid-Day / Home> Lifestyle News> Sunday Mid Day News / by Ela Das, Mumbai / January 26th, 2020