Kachumber Salad

An Indian staple, the Kachumber Salad is a raw side dish, common in Indian plates across much of the country. The salad requires no oil or dressing and is essentially an assortment of veggies and spices. To make it, one needs onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, mint leaves, coriander leaves, lemon juice, chopped green chillies, red chilli powder, roasted cumin powder, black salt, rock salt or salt, and lemon wedges and/or mint leaves sprigs for garnish.

Cucumbers, one of the essential ingredients of the dish, come with several health benefits. They’re low in calories, and high in water, vitamins, and minerals. Their antioxidants reduce the risk of chronic disease, and their high water content hydrates the body and helps meet one’s daily water intake needs. All this also aids in weight loss. They may also lower blood sugar and prevent constipation. They’re also easily accessible food and light on the stomach.

The cucumber is native to India, growing between the northern part of the Bay of Bengal and the Himalayas. From there, it was carried west. The Romans are said to have used artificial methods to grow cucumbers because Emperor Tiberius was a fan of the vegetable, seemingly eating it every day. Cucumbers were known to have been grown in England in the 1300s but long war meant the knowledge of growing them was lost, only growing again 250 years later. Columbus then introduced it to the Americas. There are also reports of the Canadian Indians growing them in 1535, and the Indians of Florida growing them in 1539. The colonists were soon growing cucumbers as one of the normal vegetables.

With a long history and travelling all over the world, the light, refreshing cucumber is consumed in several different ways in India, with the Kachumber Salad being among the oldest recipes using the vegetable to come out of the subcontinent.