Sharat · Hemanta

Early and Late Autumn

Appears in
Bengali Cooking: Seasons & Festivals
Bengali Cooking

By Chitrita Banerji

Published 1997

  • About
An old Bengali proverb says that if the kash has started flowering, you know the rains are over and the autumn has begun. More than spring, it is this season, compounded of early autumn or Sharat and late autumn or Hemanta, that is a time of unalloyed hope. One more monsoon has been lived through. One more harvest awaits the grower of rice. In the countryside the white, broom-like kash flowers grow beside the ponds and rivers mirroring blue skies with fleecy white clouds.

The lush humidity of monsoon is slowly replaced with a gradual evaporation of moisture and the overwhelming, almost dank greenness of the landscape is transformed into a mixture of green, gold and brown. The ata, a fruit available specifically during this short and delightful season, symbolises the qualities of the Bengali autumn in appearance and flavour. Its hard, knobbly, green and black exterior is a surprising contrast to the fragrant creaminess of its flesh wherein nestle glossy black seeds. So tasty is the flesh that Bengalis do not mind the bother of having to spit out seeds after every mouthful. Like potatoes and tomatoes, the ata is of foreign origin, having been brought to India by Europeans. A native of Central and South America, the ata is called chirimoya in Spanish and, either imported or grown in Florida, is sometimes stocked in American supermarkets under the name of cheremoyo.