BEST BAKED SURTI BISCOTTIS ………….
India has proudly produced a record 76.78 million tonnes of wheat in the year 2007-2008.In the wake of which we will not need to import wheat from foreign shores this year, unlike the past two. There was a time in the bygone era when our country always had a surplus of wheat. François Bernier, the famous French physician to Aurangzeb wrote in his book of travels in the 17th century that India had enough wheat to feed chapattis and naans to the entire nation as well as a surplus to make cheap sea biscuits to feed the English, Dutch and Portuguese sailors. In the 19th century, ‘Hindu biscuits’[they were made without using egg white as glace or animal shortening] an Indian version were prepared in desi tandoors and were a much cheaper option than the expensive imported tins of biscuits by Huntley and Palmers.

The earliest history available on baking in Tapi town is that of the Dutch factory bakery. The building that till recent times functioned as our General Post Office, situated opposite the Dutch gardens was originally a Dutch factory. During those times 5 Parsi gentlemen were appointed by the Dutch to knead bread dough for their bakery since Surat did not locally produce commercial bread then. Upon leaving India, the Dutch left their ovens to one Mr.Faramji Dotivala; who then provided bread loaves to the remaining Colonial community in town. After the English left, since bread was looked upon as Christian food, it had few takers and thus the stale bread often dried up .Since it was fermented with toddy, it did not catch fungus but lost all moisture and turned hard. This stale bread found its way to the poor who relished it and found it easily digestible as well. So the bread buns were made smaller and specially dried to be sold as biscuits. It is said that doctors often recommended these as convalescent food to patients.

Later a richer version of the same was introduced by adding ghee to the dried buns and thus the Irani [sadi] and Batasa [makhania] biscuits originated in Surat.Also, the Surti sweetmeat-‘dul ‘made with the plain flour,semolina, flavoured with nutmeg and cardamom was oven baked and the ‘nankhatai’ was invented. Surat’s oldest bakers are the Parsis with their pioneer-Dotivala followed by Saher,Mazda and Khurshed bakeries. Till date these are most popular and sell off freshly baked products between dawn to dusk.

Other bakeries came in much later selling prepacked snacks and fancy iced pastries along with local goods. The Rudarpura area has a Sheri named dahifalia which is now known as the’ bakery moholla’ since most homes here have a ‘bhatti’ running that produces various baked products for the outlets of The New India bakery. Aptly named since it began post Independence in town, its shops are all around from Zhampabazar to Adajan, Bhagal to Parle Point. Surprisingly, the entire Sheri uses the same name for separately owned outlets!

The puff biscuit -‘khari’or ‘padvali’ as it is called was so named because of the layers that it consists of. It is available in various versions of pepper, jam, fenugreek etc along with its most popular plain avatar.Ginger, sesame, cashew, jowar, cocoa, coconut, pepper along with various flavours and essences have all found their way within our baker’s dough and we have infinite local biscuits to choose from. The yeast used for baking is now a derivative of hops and potatoes since post Independence use of toddy has been banned due to its alcoholic nature.

Our local biscuits are hot sellers right from roadside teastalls to the aromatic bakery shops. Whether it’s Shrewsbury or wine cakes, cashew nut macaroons or vegetable puffs, vanilla twists or ravakopra mix, all are available to us Surtis.Even though most bakery products are similar; they differ in taste according to the wheat flour, fat and finish used in preparing them so ,Surti homes have their own favourite bakeries. Visitors to Surat often carry back Padvali, Batasa and Nankhatai neatly packed in cardboard boxes because the original Surti swad of the same is matched by none other in the nation.
So dear surti, before you call out for that second cuppa morning chai, make sure you call in for a fresh batch of warm, local biscuits from down the road. The best way to enjoy them is to dip and nip.After all desi biscuits should be relished in a desi way, what say?