Food and music: An Indian perspective

Food occupies an essential place in Indian culture. Beyond the plate itself sit many other elements that shape the experience – ingredients, growing methods, utensils, sounds, aromas, and the environment where meals are prepared and eaten. Music, too, weaves through this web. Across communities, songs accompany farming, cooking, serving, and feeding, revealing customs, beliefs, and deep-rooted attitudes toward food.

Editorial: Indian cuisine as a meeting of cultures

Food is habit, memory, craving, and identity. Indian cuisine enjoys global fame for its uniqueness and healthfulness. Its charm lies in a spectrum of tastes, colours, and aromas. Over centuries, India absorbed influences from Mughals, British, Turks, Portuguese, and other Europeans, each adding their own cooking styles and ingredients. The country also hosts diverse religious groups – Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism, Islam, Jainism, Christianity, Zoroastrianism – and their culinary traditions. This fusion has produced a cuisine of unmatched variety.

The journal examines Indian cuisine as a meeting point of cultures. The reputation of Indian cooking rests on exotic masalas and gravies, with strong flavours coming from spices, seasonings, and nutrient-rich staples such as leafy vegetables, grains, fruits, and legumes. Modern India is experiencing rapid culinary change, and these articles offer a glimpse into historic meals and preparations.

As Terdiman wrote, “Memory is central to understanding cultural life, not because it is the past, but because it is the modality of our relation to it.” Memory shapes cultural history by transmitting shared knowledge across generations. Collective memory defines shared identity within a social group despite differing interests.

This commemorative volume honours Professor Mohsina Mukadam on the 60th anniversary of her association with Ramnarain Ruia Autonomous College, Mumbai. Contributors capture food history through primary and contemporary sources, interviews, and intergenerational memory, analyzing the values, ideas, and practices embedded within them.

Dear Prof. Mohsina Mukadam, we hope you relish these dishes collected by friends and students, and that you invite us to share them too, now that retirement grants you time to cook.

Wishing you a joyful, healthy, and fruitful retired life.

Prof. Dr. Louiza Rodrigues, Chief Editor

• Editorial Board: Prof. Dr. Louiza Rodrigues, Ms. Riddhi Joshi
• Compilation, Alignment, Page Setup: Ms. Riddhi Joshi
• Cover Design

Food and music: An Indian perspective

Riddhi Joshi

Food is deeply woven into Indian culture and functions as a marker of identity. Yet the dish itself represents only one dimension; many other factors matter. Music contributes greatly. Around food in all its forms, a musical tradition has developed. This paper examines several food-centric songs from different communities and considers how they have become integral to culinary identity.

The German philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach famously said, “We are, what we eat.” He spoke during the turmoil of the 1848 German revolution, connecting human essence, stress, and nutrition. The phrase resonates in many contexts. Food is not mere necessity; it signals geography, history, beliefs, social rank, political stance, and economic position. Food acts as the greatest mnemonic, forging identity for individuals and communities. Someone at the highest or lowest social rank still has food that anchors their existence.

Within India, this idea carries added weight. The country’s immense diversity in geography, history, religions, languages, climate, and resources influences food – and food shapes those elements in return. Combined, they build the nation’s cultural identity. When considering food’s impact on culture, taste alone is not enough. Ingredients, how they are grown and who grows them, how they travel, the processes involved, who cooks, what utensils are used, the sound of cooking, the smell, appearance, and the environment of cooking and eating – all these matter greatly.

Since surroundings play such a pivotal role, many Indian regions feature songs specifically composed during these processes. Across communities, songs revolve around food. Some address farming, others cooking, serving, or eating. Special-occasion songs also tie to particular foods. This paper discusses several such songs, illustrating how they have become indispensable to culinary identity.

Farming songs

India remains an agrarian nation, making farmers its lifeblood. Music composed during farming is more than entertainment. Songs address prevailing weather. For instance, a Marathi song sung during drought pleads with the monsoon: “Pad ra panya, pad ra panya, kar pani pani, shet mazha lay chalala chataka vani.” The farmer compares his field to the chatak bird, which drinks only rainwater from the sky.

Other songs accompany different farming tasks. The Bhaleri folk song cheers farmers ploughing fields in Maharashtra. Special harvest songs also exist. Ploughing is mainly men’s work; tasks like tilling, sowing, irrigating, weeding, reaping, manure spreading, fetching, winnowing, transplanting, and processing are largely done by women. They, too, sing while working.

In Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, women labouring in fields sing the kajli or kajri genre. Sung during the rainy season when farm work lulls, these songs express women’s emotions and relationships. Ropani songs accompany paddy transplanting in the month of Aashadh; sohani songs go along with weeding. At later weeding stages, nirwahi songs are sung. Tasks like transplanting rice, harvesting, threshing, winnowing, and building water channels all have musical accompaniment across the entire crop cycle.

The tradition of Ovee, Jaata, and Jatsaar

The Marathi word ovee literally means “strung together.” It is a poetic metre performed without rhythm in its literary (granthik) form, which carries saintly messages. Women’s ovees are different, forming couplets sung while grinding grains on a jaata (grinding stone). This style is also called jatyavarchi ovi (grinding stone songs). Grinding demands physical effort; women sit on the courtyard floor, the stone between their legs. Singing lightens the task, and usually two women – one older, one younger – sing together. Unlike literary ovees, these rhythm follows the grinding stone’s sound. Themes range across daily life: unequal land ownership, caste oppression, childbirth, child loss, marriage, family, poverty, history, religion, complaints of hard work, and politics.

In earlier times, grinding stones stood in every household. Morning air carried both the stone’s sound and a woman’s voice singing to its beat, expressing joy and sorrow. For example, Saint Janabai wrote an ovee translated as “My grinding stone is very beautiful. It turns everywhere. I will sing ovees in your praise. Please come, O Vitthala.”

These compositions reveal language, vocabulary, customs, and methods – for instance, the timing of grinding. One begins “Wake my son’s wife – my daughter-in-law has risen – one paayli of grain has been ground.” Another, by Saint Bahinabai, compares life’s hardships to heating a pan: “First it burns the hand, only then does one get the bread (bhakar).” Women expressed feelings about husbands, siblings, children, in-laws, the longing for their maternal home, and family. The songs gave relief from domestic strain and mental burden, even temporary escape from hard daily life. Through jatyarchi ovi, women voiced sentiments. Often two would grind opposite each other, pulling the heavy jaata together, happily singing and sharing struggles. Sometimes they even competed, adapting new verses from one another. This oral tradition passed down generations. Songs were also sung while using mortar and pestle, the manual water wheel (rahat), while cooking, and doing other chores.

With the arrival of grinding mills and ready-made flour, this tradition declined. Though it relieved women from some work, now it survives mainly as a performing art representing Maharashtra’s folk heritage. A parallel North Indian tradition calls these compositions Jatsaar.

People transporting food and grains also sing. Fisherfolk sing when heading to catch fish. A Bengali song captures the spirit: “Halka haoway megher chhayay / ilshey gurir naachh / ilshey gurir nachon dekhe / nachchey ilish maachh.” This describes how, under cloudy breezes, rain dances, and the hilsa (ilish) fish, watching, joins the dance.

Songs sung while cooking

A distinct tradition in India involves singing while cooking. Some lyrics describe dishes, ingredients, and processes; others are not about food at all but are sung to the rhythms of preparation. During festivals, weddings, and celebrations, entire families and neighbours gather, spending long hours cooking. Women would entertain each other with songs, sometimes staying awake all night preparing prasad during festivals. These verses were often devotional, praising gods and describing favourite foods and how they are made. One popular song for Janmashtami begins: “Ghaans Khaave Gaiya, Dhudh Peevay Gwaal, Maakhan Khaave Mero Madan Gopal.” This means cows eat grass, cowherds drink milk, but my beloved Krishna eats butter. Singing such songs was considered auspicious.

These songs also taught young girls heirloom recipes or used food as metaphor for worldly wisdom. A Bengali example advises: “Dail paak koro re kanchlonka diya, gurur naam shoron koro niralay boshiya” – lentils should be cooked with green chillies while remembering God in solitude. Men also sang songs not directly associated with cooking.

Songs accompany cleaning, chopping, and dressing food. A Tamil song sung while slicing mangoes counsels: “Mela irrukkum thol, kasakum maadhalal / mella kathiyaal, cheeva vendume” – peel the bitter skin delicately with a knife. Every Indian community thus weaves a musical tradition around cooking.

Songs sung while serving and feeding

In Rajasthan, a wife might sing while serving her husband, naming each dish she has prepared. These songs sometimes convey the wife’s feelings and the effort involved. One Marwadi song translates: “Come my King, I am waiting for you; eat the baati, choorma, dal, and falli. Please come.”

Songs also calm babies and children during mealtime. A famous Hindi children’s rhyme says: “Chandaa maama door ke, puye pakaayen boor ke, aap khaayen thaali mein, munne ko den pyaali mein.” Translated: mother tells the child that the moon uncle, far away, will cook pancakes with powdered sugar – eating from a plate himself but serving the child from their little cup.

Other folk songs that describe qualities of food also exist — not necessarily linked to a specific task. They rather dwell on the vegetable’s properties, cultural significance, and everyday usage. A Bengali song about bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria, locally lau) exemplifies this. Lau is a beloved vegetable in Bengal and serves many purposes beyond being edible. The song goes:

“Shadher laau banailo more boiragi
Laauer aaga khailam doga go khailam
Laau dia banailam dugdugi” (The Retro Feeling 2019).

Its meaning: Beloved lau has turned me into a wandering ascetic. Having eaten every part of this tasty vegetable, from skin to stem, I made a little two-headed damroo drum from its remnants.

A Marwadi folk song describes how a woman grows and manages mint (podina, Mentha) and screw pine (kevda, Pandanus odorifer). The former is valued for its leaves, the latter for its flowers. The singer notes which family members prefer which plant and how she carries the flowers on her head and the leaves in a cloth pouch. Selected lines read:

“… Kyarya me baau kevdo, kheta me baau hariyo podino…
… Matha pe laai, kevdo, jholi me laayi hariyo podino…
… Sasuji ne bhave kevdo, susra ji ne bhave hariyo podino…”

Translation: I sowed kevda in the flower bed and mint in the field. I brought the kevda flowers on my head and the mint leaves in a small cloth bag. My mother-in-law likes kevda; my father-in-law likes mint. Thus many communities have songs rooted in their regional foods.

Evolution of food-related songs

Today songs about food appear across all media: cinema, dance performances, music shows, and children’s rhymes. In children’s rhymes especially, food serves as a tool to teach numbers, the alphabet, health benefits, and the value of sharing.

A well-known Tamil nursery rhyme illustrates this:

“Dosai amma dosai, neyyila sutta dosai
arisi maavum, ulundhu mavum, kalandhu sutta dosai
appavukku anju, ammavukku naalu
annanukku moonu, akkalukku rendu
paappavukku onnu, thinna thinna aasai
innum kettal poosai!” (Bouncing Bubble 2010).

Translation: Dosa (a thin south Indian pancake), dosa cooked in ghee, using rice flour and black gram flour – five for dad, four for mom, three for older brother, two for older sister, one for baby; if someone asks for more, they get scolded. This rhyme was designed to teach children backward counting.

Bollywood film songs also employ food as a favourite descriptor. Appetisers, main courses, desserts, ingredients, drinks, and flavours all find mention, serving to express emotions, describe life stages, or characterise people. A famous number from the Hindi movie Hum Aapke Hain Kaun? (Who am I to you?) runs:

“Chocolate, lime juice, ice cream, toffeeyan
Pehle jaise ab mere shauk hai kahan
Gudiya khilone meri saheliyan
Ab mujhe lagti hai sari paheliyan
Yeh kaun sa modh hai umrr ka” (Ahuja 2019).

Translation: Chocolate, lime juice, ice cream, toffees – my desires from before are nowhere to be found. Dolls and toys that used to be my friends now seem like riddles; what turning point in life is this? Here the craving for sweets and treats symbolises childhood, while losing those cravings signals the transition to youth.

Analysis and conclusion

Music plays an integral role in every domain connected with food. Farming songs relieve monotony and lighten repetitive chores, while women’s work songs remove the weariness of tedious cooking processes. For the countless women who created these tunes, they formed a creative outlet — a personal sphere of free expression. Such traditions are so deep-rooted that they seem inseparable from the food rituals themselves. They carry powerful memories of meals and not only showcase regional culinary habits but also the personalities of the singers. Moreover, they indicate a region’s socio-economic and political dynamics and serve as markers of cultural identity.

With modern technology, elaborate cooking methods and the time they demand have decreased. Owing to time constraints, the tradition of singing such songs has become more symbolic. Indian culinary belief holds that the cook’s spirit is reflected in the taste; thus these songs were sung to keep cooks and helpers cheerful. Handed down orally across generations, these songs now face the risk of being forgotten. Today most have retreated into folk tradition, visible only as performing art. They constitute an important part of India’s intangible heritage. Given the limited data that remains, more extensive collection, study, and classification is urgently needed for better insight. Nonetheless, one thing is certain: music’s presence in every aspect of food remains both indispensable and beautiful.