India is the gourmet’s delight. Her culinary art developed
in the temple kitchen, where expert chefs prepare a diverse
spectrum of foods, associated with Gods and noted for their
nutritive value. Taste some of them and you’ll never
be quite the same again.
Palani
Panchamirtam is the oldest form of jam or fruit mix and
preserves very well, even for months. And the saying is
that ‘the olden it is, it tastes better’. The
secret lies as much in the art of preparing it as in the
quality of the fruit that is used as the basic ingredient.
It is the small sized viruppachchi plantains which account
for it, the reason being that they have very little water
content. Incidentally, Viruppachchi is the name of a village
(in the Palani Hills) where this particular variety of plantain
is grown and marketed.
Crushed
plantains apart, Panchamirtam consists of kandasari sugar
from Kangeyam area, dates, kismis, sugar candy (kalkandu),
cardamom and ghee in proper proportions: plantains 100 numbers;
kandasani sugar 10 kgs.; dates 1 kg.; Sugar candy 500 giris.;
kismis 500 giris.; ghee 250 giris.; cardamom 25 giris. The
plantain is crushed fully. Sugar is then mixed with it.
Seedless dates, sugar candy and kismis are added in the
third stage. The last items to go into the preparation are
cardamom and ghee.
Panchamirtam,
collected after abhishekam, is not only a delicious and
nourishing food; but also has astonishing properties which
keep it in conditions suitable for consumption over a long
period, without refrigeration. You are advised to buy all
your requirements from the Devasthanam and to transfer the
contents to your own containers for proper preservation.
Interested persons may visit the Panchamirtam making kitchen
in the Devasthanam’s choultry. The Devasthanam has
now made arrangements to manufacture Panchamirtam by using
electric utensils.
