Balti (food)
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A Balti (Balti: བལི་, Urdu: بالٹی) is a British-style type of curry served in a thin, pressed steel wok-like "balti bowl".[1] It is served in many restaurants in the United Kingdom. The precise origins of the Balti style of cooking are uncertain; some believe it to have been invented in Birmingham, while others believe it originated in the Pakistani region of Baltistan in Kashmir from where it was brought by South Asian immigrants to Britain.
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[edit] Origin and Etymology
Balti cuisine became known throughout the UK during the 1990s, after initial growth in Birmingham since the 1980s. One school of thought states that name 'Balti' for food may reflect the fact that an ethnic group living in that area of north Pakistan are called Balti. Alternatively, 'Balti' food is named after the pot in which it is cooked. That origin of the word is to do with the Urdu and Hindi word balty - "Balty, s. Hin. balti, which means "bucket." This is the Port. balde."[2] As mentioned in the late nineteenth century in Hobson-Jobson, the term 'balti' refers to the steel or iron pot in which the food is cooked or served, taken from the word 'balti', which is derived from the Portuguese word 'balde', meaning bucket/pail, which was taken to India by the Portuguese on their seafaring enterprises in late fifteenth century. Therefore, originally, the word 'Balti' refers to a bucket, then evolving to its meaning as a cooking pot.
According to Pat Chapman, the origins of the word can be traced back to the area of Baltistan, in northern Pakistan, where the people cook in a cast iron wok similar to the Chinese way of cooking (Baltistan shares a border with China). In his Curry Club Balti Curry Cookbook, Chapman states: "The balti pan is a round-bottomed, wok-like heavy cast-iron dish with two handles." He also states "The origins of Balti cooking are wide ranging and owe as much to China (with a slight resemblance to the spicy cooking of Szechuan) and Tibet as well as to the ancestry of the Mirpuris, the tastes of the Moghul emperors, the aromatic spices of Kashmir, and the 'winter foods' of lands high in the mountains."
The word was the subject of analysis on the BBC TV series Balderdash and Piffle. A menu from 1982 was cited as the first written reference, with The Curry Club's Curry Magazine Edition 29, winter 1984 answering a reader query about the definition of Balti. Written evidence seems to be scant prior to 1982, and the Oxford English Dictionary and The Curry Club welcome any contributions which will verify the first mention of Balti in Britain.
[edit] Balti houses
Balti restaurants are often known in Birmingham as 'balti houses' ('house' here meaning not private residences, but, rather, 'establishment,' as in 'customs house' or 'public house'). Some balti houses have a sheet of glass on the table top with menus secured underneath.[3] Balti houses often offer very large "Karack" naan bread pieces, meant to be shared by the whole table.[4]
Balti houses originally clustered along and behind the main road between Sparkhill and Moseley, to the south of Birmingham city centre. This area (comprising the Ladypool Road, Stoney Lane and Stratford Road) is still sometimes referred to as the 'Balti Triangle' and contains a high concentration of Balti restaurants, as well as some of the oldest to be found in the city. On 28 July 2005, a tornado caused extensive damage to buildings in the Triangle,[5] forcing many restaurants to close. A clean-up operation ensured most had re-opened by the beginning of 2006.
Balti restaurants have now spread beyond the triangle, and are also based in the south of Birmingham along the Pershore Rd. Lye near Stourbridge to the west of Birmingham has become known as the 'Balti Mile' with up to a dozen restaurants clustered along the High Street.
The food and its style of presentation proved very popular during the 1980s and grew in the 1990s; Balti restaurants gradually opened up throughout the West Midlands and then a large part of Britain. The expanded curry market in Britain is now said to be worth some £4 billion annually; but some still claim that it is impossible to get a 'proper' Balti outside the urban West Midlands.
Outside Britain, there are a small number of Balti houses in Ireland and many other English-speaking countries, particularly Canada and Australia.
Since the late 1990s, British supermarkets have stocked a growing range of pre-packed Balti meals and the Balti restaurant sector has since faced increasing competition from the retail sector and from changes in customer tastes, along with other traditional Indian restaurants.[6][7]
[edit] Bibliography
- Curry Club Balti Curry Cookbook, Piatkus, London — ISBN 0749912146 & ISBN 0749913428 (1993)
- Modern Balti Curries, above title republished by John Blake Publishing, London (2006)
- Pat Chapman’s Balti Bible, Hodder & Stoughton, London — ISBN 0340728582 & ISBN 0340728590 (1998)
- 2009 Cobra Good Curry Guide, John Blake Publishing, London — ISBN 1-84454-311-0
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Richard McComb, Birmingham Post, 20 February 2009
- ^ Hobson-Jobson: Being A Glossary of Anglo-Indian Colloquial Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, by Col. Henry Yule and the late Arthur C. Burnell. London: John Murray, 1886, at page 40.
- ^ birmingham.gov.uk : A Brief History of the Pakistani Community
- ^ Birmingham, the latest hot destination for foodies
- ^ birmingham.gov.uk : Birmingham tornado
- ^ Has the great British curry house finally had its chips?
- ^ Indian restaurants seek government help as recession bites
