With more than four million users on Instagram, Mira Kapoor is a social media star who never ceases to give us couple goals, outfit goals, make-up goals, and more. However, we love her the most for her unabashed love for food and all things desi and local, when it comes to that. Mira is a self-confessed foodie, she like her husband, actor Shahid Kapoor, is also a vegetarian. And her diet comprises so much more than paneer and mushroom. She loves her veggies and keeps her fare versatile and seasonal.
On Saturday, the 28-year-old relished a full bowl of Undhiyu with a cup of tea. Quite the combination, right? For the uninitiated, Undhiyu is a mixed-veg delicacy from Gujarat. The word Undhiyu means ‘upside down’ in Gujarati. In the rural parts of the state, a range of local, winter vegetables - like surti papdi, carrots, baby eggplants, purple kand, green peas, sweet and regular potatoes, seedless kakdi, fenugreek muthias, and unripe Rajagiri bananas - are traditionally stacked inside a matka (Indian clay pot), with a rich masala made with groundnut oil, green garlic, coconut, coriander, and chillies.
These matkas are buried in a larger underground furnace, and covered with a pile of dried leaves. The veggies are allowed to cook slowly. The masalas intersperse and make the veggies moist and soft, and the dish comes together as a whole. Undhiyu is a labour of love, but a labour worth it. Now of course, you can use modern cookware to cook the same, most of the ‘winter vegetables’ are also available all year round.
Most people pair their Undhiyu with Rotla, but Mira was seen having the same with her cup of tea. She wrote in her caption, “Undhiyu for life. I’m pretty sure I was Gujarati in my last life”. Actor Alia Bhatt also commented on the picture, saying, “I want that cuppa tea”, to which Mira responded, “@aliabhatt mummy, it’s time for you to cross the sea link”, inviting the Gangubai Kathiawadi star over to her place.
