It was that time of the year! The world around seemed fresh, the earth renewed, and hopes refreshed with the thoughts of a brand new beginning once again! Bengali New Year arrives each year on April 14th bringing with it the festivities of a bygone era, old-world charm of yesteryear traditions and most importantly for me the sweets that were hand made only at this time of each year. One of these delectable treats that invoke such warmth, sweetness and comfort is the ‘patishapta’, a crepe filled with rich, gooey delicious goodness that screams old world and tradition. The warm, sweet aroma whiffs through the kitchen, steaming pots create a romantic mist, the beautiful sound of a grinding stone as it pestles milky coconut into a snowy pulp fills the air.
”Time stands still, there is no rush, no quick buttons to push, and everything is made from scratch. Slowly, methodically, simply. But there is energy, there is excitement, there is happiness, there is life in that soft pace!

I miss all this!
This was the scene at my grandmother’s home when I was a child every Spring. Everyone around the home or neighborhood partook in the festivities. Everyone added a little piece of themselves to the tradition like it belonged to them. This and many unique traditions that repeated every year in my childhood and youth seemed like a certainty forever until we moved away, modernized, adapted and changed our ways to faster, quicker and convenient. Alas!
Don’t get me wrong, I embrace every bit of efficiency and technology as the next person

”I may have adopted the Vitamix as my best friend while cooking, but the ancestral grinding stone which I painstakingly carried across seven seas is a treasured piece of décor and a piece of my history. I am not ready to let go of the old. It is my heritage.
time stands still⚬
time stands still⚬
time stands still⚬
time stands still⚬
time stands still⚬
it is my heritage⚬
it is my heritage⚬
it is my heritage⚬
it is my heritage⚬
it is my heritage⚬
The old that gave birth to the new, the old that tells stories, the old that fills our heart and mind with memories of love, nurturing, warmth and kindness, the old that inspires us to strive for better. Sitting here and lamenting on what was, what might have been or what I missed seemed a wasted effort, so I resolved quietly to recapture this very essence of my heritage, my traditions, my memories, my childhood.
I didn’t have a recipe, nor instructions or tips of how to make it. But I had my dadi (grandmother) in my heart, the aromas in my deepest memory, visuals of the moments I can still recall as if they were yesterday. I had seen it done so many times. I had seen her hands measure, sift, stir, fry, shape and patiently fold, roll and create these delicious sweets. Gathering all these images and memories so deeply ingrained in my mind’s eye I began to prepare the oh so cherished ‘patishapta’.

I remembered that she would first call for the freshest ingredients from the bazaar. The ingredients were basic: milk rice, flour, sugar, coconut. My grandmother’s ingredients would come from the nearby farm, mills and groves, literally farm to table, but I will make do with my local Whole Foods markets. Now the tricky part of how much of each ingredient to make the magical sweet appear from these humble ingredients. Deep breath Anna, you got this! As I quietened my mind and racing heart, I sifted the flour, poured in milk till the batter looked exactly like she had it. She would say, “don’t let the batter run away from you. You will know it’s perfect when it flows back freely into the bowl like ribbons.” I could hear her whisper, “it is perfect.” Next, I had to cook the scrumptious filling of fresh coconut, milk and sugar. Here was the real test as this process required me to be slow and low demanding a great deal of perseverance. “Don’t rush this part,” she would say. “You want the mixture to remain white as snow, you wan to do it slow so all the freshness is preserved.”
How do I remember all of this? It has been years and eons. Our traditions turns into heritage, our culture is ingrained into us slowly and steady, unknowingly, and seeps in deep. And even though the noise of life makes us forget sometimes, they are always with us. I had never made a ‘patisapta’ nor had I been taught how to make it, neither forced to follow the traditions of yesterday. Today I chose to preserve this memory, to give it a new life in a new land, to share my heritage with my family and friends and rediscovered a new part of myself.
Our heritage is allotted to us. We all have it. We grant it new life. Each generation comes with a host of ideas, creations, traditions. We meld one set into the next, interweave them through time and space to pass our own creations down to those that come after. Some traditions fade away as they serve no purpose in the new world as we gain more knowledge and wisdom to be better humans and an improved society but the kindness and love and stories we share and teach and learn are carried on through time.
SPHEEHA Blog Guest Author

Anna Venkatesh
My name is Anna Venkatesh. I am a personal chef at Amlu Tastings, a pop up fine dining establishment in the Chicagoland area. I love to discover, create, learn, preserve and meld cultures together in my food. Food for me is not only sustenance but it’s a form of memory, its artistry, its beautiful stories unfolding on your plate.