The Onam Sadhya

'Onam' is an ancient festival in Kerala that celebrates the rice harvest. I'm lucky to live in Singapore where we can eat different foods for each meal, and Indian cuisine is very much part of our weekly diet. At home, we always cook dhaal, sambar and chutney to store in the fridge to satiate late night hunger pangs. I certainly welcome the festival as a chance to uhh eat the gorgeous foods it serves up at its feasts.

The Onasadhya is special. Many Kerala restaurants offer these Onam feasts over two days leading up to Thiruvonam, the last day of the festival. This year, Thiruvonam fell on 4 September, and restaurants offer the onasadhya on 3 and 4 September. Onam feasts are traditionally vegetarian; we also get a seriously wider array of vegetarian selections compared to the usual items. Most Kerala restaurants offer the region's brown rice or matta rice. I won't be able to cook all these delicious items. The next best thing- get out to a decent restaurant to eat them all. Off we went to Curry Magic and Spice Junction to get a fix.

The sadhya at Curry Magic.

Many Onam feasts are organized buffet style for maximum efficiency and least impact to manpower allocation. Curry Magic and Spice Junction organized it this way too. We've known Curry Magic since its beginnings as a little stall in Toa Payoh North and all the way to its current home in Jalan Riang. Food has been consistent and many friends have had the restaurant's food catered for various events.

At both restaurants, there were plenty of jaggery-coated banana chips (upperi) and two kinds of payasam to sweeten the tongue. I'm not big on pickles generally, but Curry Magic's inji curry is something I could always get behind. Today, the thoran was so good. The kootu curry was done stir-fried with yam stems, green gram, ground coconut. Many choices of pachadi and kichadi. I really liked the beetroot pachadi.

Spice Junction at Race Course Road has been recently recommended to the man and I, and we've been hopping in ever since for our weekly dose of spices since I'm rather fond of Kerala dishes. Spice Junction's olan (ash gourd and black-eyed beans cooked in coconut milk) was delicious! Since this lunch was done right after a LES MILLS GRIT™ Strength class, I had no guilt at all. Merrily ate two servings and polished off three bananas.

I ate SO MUCH over this period. I literally waited THE WHOLE YEAR to eat myself silly with fabulous Indian vegetarian food in one weekend. 🙌🏼 😁

The sadhya at Spice Junction.