Kedgeree

Not to be confused with the Indian village Kedgeree or Khijri.
Kedgeree

Kedgeree
Place of origin India/United Kingdom
Main ingredients rice, smoked haddock, eggs, parsley, butter or cream
Variations tuna or salmon
Cookbook: Kedgeree  Media: Kedgeree

This article is about Western kedgeree (or occasionally kitcherie, kitchari, kidgeree, kedgaree, kitchiri, or khichuri), which is not to be confused with the Indian rice-and-legume dish from which it is descended, khichdi.

In India, khichari (among other English spellings) usually refers to any of a large variety of legume-and-rice dishes. They range from quite moist and mildly seasoned (geeli khichari) to thick, spicy and fairly dry (sookhi khichari), both often including other vegetables; the latter sometimes includes nuts and fruit. These dishes are not made with curry powder, since most Indian cooks do not use it, creating instead a separate spice mixture designed for each recipe and either dry-toasted or fried in oil before inclusion.

This dish moved to Victorian Britain and changed dramatically. In the West, Kedgeree is a dish consisting of cooked, flaked fish (traditionally smoked haddock), boiled rice, parsley, hard-boiled eggs, curry powder, butter or cream and occasionally sultanas.

History

Kedgeree is thought to have originated with an Indian rice-and-bean or rice-and-lentil dish Khichri, traced back to 1340 or earlier.[1] It is widely believed that the dish was brought to the United Kingdom by returning British colonials who had enjoyed it in India and introduced it to the UK as a breakfast dish in Victorian times, part of the then fashionable Anglo-Indian cuisine.[2] However the dish was listed as early as 1790 in the recipe book of Stephana Malcolm of Burnfoot, Dumfriesshire.[3] The National Trust for Scotland's book The Scottish Kitchen by Christopher Trotter notes the Malcolm recipe and other old examples, expressing the belief that the dish was devised by Scottish regiments hankering for the tastes of India.[4]

Hobson-Jobson cites Ibn Battuta (c. 1340) mentioning a dish of munj (moong) boiled with rice called Kishrī, and cites a recipe for Khichri from Ain-i-Akbari (c. 1590). In Gujarat, where khichdi remains popular, the lentil and rice dish is usually served with kadhi, a spiced yogurt dish that can be mixed with the khichdi. Khichdi is usually not prepared with fish in Gujarat, although fish is sometimes eaten with the khichdi in coastal villages where seafood is plentiful. According to Hobson-Jobson, while fish is eaten with kedgeree, the use of the term for "mess of re-cooked fish ... is inaccurate".[5]

The dish can be eaten hot or cold. Other fish can be used instead of haddock such as tuna or salmon,[6] though that is not traditional.

Other mixed rice dishes

See also

References

  1. ↑ Lobscouse and Spotted Dog; Which It's a Gastronomic Companion to the Aubrey/Maturin Novels, Anne Chotzinoff Grossman and Lisa Grossman Thomas, Norton, 1997, p. 12. ISBN 978-0-393-32094-7
  2. ↑ Smith, Delia. "Buttery Kedgeree". Delia Smith's Complete Cookery Course. Retrieved 2008-03-10.
  3. ↑ "Sustainable shore - October recipe - Year of Food and Drink 2015 - National Library of Scotland". nls.uk.
  4. ↑ Trotter, Christopher (2004). The Scottish Kitchen (first ed.). London: Aurum Press Ltd. p. 49. ISBN 1854109790.
  5. ↑ Yule, Sir Henry. "Hobson-Jobson entry on Kedgeree". Hobson-Jobson: A glossary of colloquial Anglo-Indian words and phrases, and of kindred terms, etymological, historical, geographical and discursive. New ed. edited by William Crooke, B.A. London: J. Murray, 1903
  6. ↑ "Recipe for kedgeree". Scottishrecipes.co.uk. 2007-06-06. Retrieved 2009-03-12.
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