Footsteps - Jotaro's Travels: January 2015

Friday, January 30, 2015

India 2015 Kolorful Kerala : Day 6 - Of Fishing Nets & Mosquitoes

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Footsteps - Jotaro's Travels

India 2015 Kolorful Kerala : Day 6 - Of Fishing Nets & Mosquitoes

Fort Kochi - 11th January 2015

From Alleppey we moved away from the rustic countryside and back to the city, but not the busy urban centre of Kochi yet. It's to the old & historical part, it's to Fort Kochi. Will the city be as interesting as the countryside?

This is page 5 of a 6-page blog, click on the respective titles below to go to other pages :
- Kolorful Kerala Day 1 & 2 - Of Spices, Tea Valleys & Cool Hills.
- Kolorful Kerala Day 3 - Of Tahrs & Kalaripayattu.
- Kolorful Kerala Day 4 - Of Elephants & Kathakali.
- Kolorful Kerala Day 5 - Of Kerala Backwaters Houseboats.
- Kolorful Kerala Day 7 - A Dahl Shopping Day.

We left Alleppey in the late morning and headed north along the peninsular formed by the backwaters lake to Fort Kochi, the scenery slowly changing from rustic to urban and then to metropolitan as we got closer to Fort Kochi.

In the morning the girls went to check out the church near Maria's Heritage & Spa and left us guys at home. Getting bored and not having cycled for almost a week (see, I am a avid cyclist) I played with the Indian-style platform swing imagining myself to be riding on a magic carpet!

A CYCLING STINT AT THE BACKWATERS

But why ride an imaginary magic carpet when I could be riding a real bike.
Heck! Desperate I took a walk out to the lane outside that runs next to the river, there were houses next to it. I saw a couple of boys riding an old beaten down bicyle.
How desperate was I? Well, my cycling itch made me desperate enough to approach them to see whether they could rent me the bicycle. "Sure, why not? But first we have to ask our father." was their reply and with that led me to a ramshackle house facing the river. I asked the father the same thing, and he just told me to take the bike; no need to rent it just return it when I have finished.
Such are the simple-mindedness of these folks, their honesty just shines through.

Light-heartedly I cycled off, my destination the church on the other side of the river.

My cycle ride, gave me an opportunity to take a closer look at life here:

A close-nit family of goats...

... beautiful water lily flowers and ...

... snipes lounging in the water.
(... read more of this cycling stint).

THE ROAD TO FORT KOCHI

10:30am - We said our goodbyes to Alleppey and headed north for Fort Kochi. The roads here were busy with traffic, nevertheless I was able to witness the colourful going ons along our journey up.

Colourful fruit stalls.

Colourful carpets and rugs.

Colourful pots and vases.

And... colourful people! I did mentioned that India is a colourful place.

Red banner flags fluttering in the wind above the street signalled that we are getting close to Fort Kochi.

FORT KOCHI

Into Fort Kochi- except for the main roads, most of the streets are narrow. Near the core of the heritage zone, remnants of Portuguese influence can be seen in buildings like the one above. Their gable end walls are distinctively Portuguese architecture.
It's much hotter here than in Alleppey. We dropped off at our hotel, the Chiramel Residency Homestay, it's a nice cosy place. But straight away I noticed something odd, the doors leading to the bedrooms upstairs were swing doors and we were told to keep them closed. See, this area here has lots of mosquitoes and this became more evident when we walked out for dinner in the evening. Fort Kochi is in a low-lying area and often the drains are full of water when there is a high tide, just right for the snappy mosquitoes to breed.

After a quick refreshing bath, we ARE ready to look more closely at Fort Kochi.
But first thing first.... our stomachs!
We popped over to Tower Street where there is a food court with many stalls selling seafood for which Kerala is famed. Our lunch was at the Kerala Cafe, the operator looked helpful and more importantly was honest.
Among the food we had was this grilled Pomfret wrapped in a banana leaf. It was nicely done, with a crispy skin and the meat was tender inside. Also the marinating was done in a way that it seasoned only the outer layer; the inner layer was pure fresh fish; we just butter the meat with the covering spice paste to our individual liking.

We did not miss this Jeera Rice too. Kev liked this simple spiced up rice, it's good as the spices just added a tinge of spiciness to the rice but does not overwhelmed it.
(... see more of this nice lunch).

Stomachs sated, it's time for us to view the historical sites of the city.
We started off with the St. Francis Church. Built in 1503 AD, this church with a distinct Portuguese design front gable roof is the oldest church in India.

To preserve the old tiles in the church, visitors are required to take off their shoes when entering.
I wonder whether this church is dedicated to St. Francis Xavier, a Jesuit who was very involved in evangelization in India, the East Indies and even Japan.

The Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama was buried inside this church for fourteen years before it was removed to Lisbon. But his tombstone can still be seen here.

Our second destination, the Mattancherry Palace. A very odd fact of this palace is that it was built by the Portuguese and was called the Dutch Palace but was the residence of an Indian sultan.
Apologies, no photography is allowed in the palace, so this shot at the entrance to the palace museum is the best I can give you. It's a pity though, there are very nice murals inside done in traditional Indian style. Pity!

So I had to be satisfied with artwork like the above which I saw on display at shops in the city. If you think this is a nice painting, the murals I saw in the palace were much more beautiful and so much older.
(If you like Indian Art, see my blog on Indian Art).

After that we visited the Jewish Synagogue. Fort Kochi was at the crossroads of the spice sea route from Europe to the East Indies spice islands; the Europeans, Indians, Chinese and even the Jews came here to trade, so there was a Jewish Community here and even a Jewish Cemetery.
Again, photography was not allowed in the synagogue; so I will just introduce up to this old Jewish lady who is one of the few descendants who are still staying here.

It was Save The Best For Last - the site which I found the most interesting were these giant fishing nets; the Chinese Fishing Nets at River Road! The sight of these huge nets hanging suspended over the sea is breath-taking.
But then I wondered to myself, Chinese nets in India? India, a historical focal point of trade routes was a melting point of culture, so why not something Chinese in India? These fishing net techniques are a throw-back to the days when Admiral Zheng He made his maritime voyages from China to Africa.

The nets are lowered into the seas for up to almost half an hour with the hope that the currents will wash fishes into the net But these days the catches here are paltry, the few fishes we saw netted were quickly hijacked by seagulls who swooped into the nets as soon as they are raised up. Perhaps the other nets seen at Willingdon Island are doing better.

In the evening we walked out for dinner. It was now that the mosquito problem became more evident; stop walking for a while and they will come zooming in, eager for blood.
This did not deter us from reaching our dinner eats place - the Oceanos Seafood Restaurant.
While the others went for some Indian fare (albeit not so spicy), I let my grumbling stomach have a rest and took something Continental - Spaghetti Pesto. It turned out to be a good choice, the olive oil coated the pasta well....AND the prawns were very FRESH!

Oh.. Yah... a closing note.
Most of the hotels we stayed in provided amongst their toiletries spiced-toothpaste. It's toothpaste ingrained with spices and slightly sweet. They have that aroma similar to those spicy mint provided by Indian restaurants after the meal.
Very nice touch there.... *said while blowing out fresh minty breath*.
Good night!

This is page 5 of a 6-page blog, click on the respective titles below to go to other pages :
- Kolorful Kerala Day 1 & 2 - Of Spices, Tea Valleys & Cool Hills.
- Kolorful Kerala Day 3 - Of Tahrs & Kalaripayattu.
- Kolorful Kerala Day 4 - Of Elephants & Kathakali.
- Kolorful Kerala Day 5 - Of Kerala Backwaters Houseboats.
- Kolorful Kerala Day 7 - A Dahl Shopping Day.

Related Blogs :

Banana Leaf Fish & Seafood @ Kerala Cafe
Fresh & spicy seafood at the heritage centre of Fort Koci, Kerala, India.

India 2015 - Kolorful Kerala : January 2015

A seven day tour of the Southern Indian state of Kerala - one of spice gardens, tea valleys, cool mountains, house-boats cruise and colonial Fort Cochin.

Kerala Houseboat Feast @ Alleppey Backwaters

Our houseboat cruise along the backwaters of Alleppey included a lunch fit for a king - Alleppey, Kerala, India.

YummY! - Banana Leaf Fish & Seafood @ Kerala Cafe Fort Kochi

You are at - Jotaro's Blog / FootSteps / YummY! / India 2015-Indian Food / Banana Leaf Fish & Seafood @ Kerala Cafe Fort Kochi

YummY!

Jotaro's Food Review

BANANA LEAF FISH & SEAFOOD @ KERALA CAFE FORT KOCHI

Fort Kochi, Kerala, India - January 2015

We were on a holiday in Kerala, India and on our sixth day's tour we stopped by for lunch at the food court in Fort Kochi. Centrally located at the heritage area of the city, this food court is easily accessible from the many tourist sites.

There are many food stalls here and we went in to Kerala Cafe as they seemed friendly and honest. It's important to go to a honest operator. Even as I was taking the above photo, a couple of motor-taxi guys thought I wanted to take photos of their taxis and requested money for doing so. As tourists we just have to be careful at times and look out for people who take advantage.

A friendly waiter came to take our orders; soon, with gusto, they were preparing our seafood and grilling the spice-seasoned pomfrets on a hot plate.

Although the title of this blog is "Banana Leaf Fish", the fish are only wrapped in banana leaves after cooking. This is unlike the grilled fish in Malaysia where they are grilled together with the leaves.
Our fish came, looking good and nicely wrapped in banana leaf; the green of the leaf contrasting well with the red spicy fishing that peeping through.

Wow! Our unwrapped pomfret looked even better than when it was being grilled. It looked very spicy red, I do hope that it's only moderately spicy chilli hot as we had requested for our food not to be too chilli hot.

Like most sea-food in Kerala, the fish was indeed fresh; its meat tender and yet firm.
The grilling was done well, the skin was crispy and coated well with wet spices. The fish was seasoned but not for too long as the flesh of the fish itself had only a tinge of spicy taste. Just add the spicy paste coating to the amount of one's personal liking.

The Chilli Crabs came in a thick curry. The crab shell had been pre-cracked so that the curry has coated some of the fresh crab meat too.
A nice dish just nicely sweet too.

The fried Calamari/Squid was good too. My only complain about the food here is that the curry seems to be of the same style, perhaps they should offer some variety in their curry cooking or at least in the chilli paste they used. OR perhaps we did not order well. *smiles*

Some vegetables, in the form of Dahl, to balance off our meal. This one was not as thick as the many others that we had in Kerala.

To go with all the good curries we had some fried rice; this was fairly good only.,

The better rice we had was this Jeera Rice; its a simple rice flavoured with some spices and curry leaves. Goes very well with the curries.

To cool off and balance the "heatiness" of the spicy food, we had some lassi and pineapple juice. It was a very good meal at a place easily accessible from most of the central tourist spots of Fort Kochin.