Man with magical tapioca wand

TIRUVANANTHAPURAM : Give him five minutes. Choose your tapioca. And he will craft out a ‘kappa puttu’, a dish solely made from tapioca. Or to whet your appetite, he will give you a soup crafted from tapioca. The ubiquitous kappa has undergone a magical twist under Rafeeq H M. Rafeeq is someone whom most city dwellers might be familiar with, at least through their taste buds. He arranged two elaborate feasts in the city recently, fashioning out magnificent dishes from commonplace fruits. The Chakka Sadya and the Banana Sadya which were held in the backdrop of the Chakka Mahotsavam (jackfruit festival) and Banana festival are to his credits. And this time he has given a fresh spin to tapioca.

A grandiose array of dishes to tantalise your palate have been arranged at the first National Tapioca Fest underway at the Sooryakanthi ground, Kanakakkunnu in Thiruvananthapuram. Replete with a grand sadya, biriyani, snacks, soup, jam, the culinary lineup has more than 200 dishes fashioned from tapioca. 

“You cannot find any food item that is laced with chemicals here. We are trying to promote the crops and fruits that are often overlooked by people and encourage them to include more of such traditional dishes into their diet,” says Rafeeq a native of Idichakkaplamoodu in Parassala. “We are losing out on most of our regional cuisine. This is an attempt to reintroduce them,” he added. “That we can craft these many varieties of dishes from tapioca or jackfruit is likely to prove an inspiration for others to return to our traditional fruits and crops,” he added before rushing off to give pointers to one of the cooks.

The costliest dish here is the kappa dum biriyani which has a full chicken in it. It comes at Rs 400 a plate. Ten kinds of kappa biriyanis are available which are spiced up by mutton, chicken, quail, beef and so forth. “All the dishes you see here are made solely of tapioca. We haven’t added anything else,” says Suchitra M, who is helping Rafeeq. 

The starting price of biriyani is Rs 150. A tapioca sadya encompassing 101 dishes wherein the pickle, side dishes, sambar, aviyal, erissery, pulissery, fish curry and chicken curry are all made from tapioca awaits the visitors. No sadya is complete without a dessert and you have a payasam crafted from the tuber as well. A grand array of snacks made from tapioca also are on offer. Cutlets, noodles, vadas and fritters, form the elaborate list of 101 snacks that have been made from tapioca.