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City Food – Gur ka Sherbet, Pahari Imli

City Food - Gur ka Sherbet, Pahari Imli

The autumn of the sherbet.

[Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi]

Its days are numbered. It is evoking the doomed spirit of one of those very many Walled City landmarks that are fated to soon disappear. Except that each time it vanishes, it resurfaces after a brief interlude. Always.

This street-side stall serves a refreshment rarely served elsewhere in Old Delhi’s labyrinthine alleys. A thandi drink rustled out of jaggery, the stall’s gur ka sherbet is a summertime speciality. A visit to the stall at this time of the year is thrilling because of the following factors:

a) Although gur itself is often consumed in winter, gur ka sherbet is a thirst quencher for the sweltering month of May and June, and this being October, the stall is preparing for its annual winter hibernation. It is to suspend its sherbet operations by this month’s end. And when a thing is ready for its farewell, it grows precious and more interesting.

b) In the furiously modernising Walled City, the unique longtime stall is successfully managing to survive unaltered, when many other institutions have shut down, or have been obliged to drastically adapt their character to withstand the new times.

The stall is located in the cramped Chitli Qabar Bazar, sandwiched between a stationery store and a jewellery store, across the street from a garment shop named Sorry Girls, It stands at the east-facing mouth of Pahari Imli, the hilly neighbourhood that is home to stall owner Aqeel Ahmad.

The sparsely furnished establishment comprises of a large brass cauldron, two ladles and a dozen glasses. The drink in the cauldron lies beneath a plastic sheet to protect it from dust and flies. Aqeel Ahmad occasionally lifts the plastic and stirs the pale golden liquid with the ladle. He sets up the stall every morning at eight o’clock and prepares the drink on the spot. The ingredients include water, ice and jaggery, which he sources from a Farrash Khana wholesaler.

The quiet-tempered man now points out the long seeds floating in the drink. He calls these tukmeera, praising the seeds for keeping the stomach cool. “I’ll stop making the sherbet in two weeks… I’ll bring it back in March after the cold season.”

The steadfast stall was founded 75 years ago by Aqeel Ahmad’s late father Zaheer Ahmed. “His legacy helps me carry on,” he says. His only son shall keep the inheritance going, the sherbet man remarks confidently.

In November, the stall will be stocked with diapers and woollen pajamas. “That’s what I sell after the sherbet season gets over.” A side-wall is already covered with diaper boxes.

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