The Quintessential Roadside Eatery

Mrigank (Mick) Das

Of course, I am proud to be part of DMS '83  and BJB '85 but From grade 4 to a bit of grade 9, we lived in Burla and I attended St. Joseph's convent school in Sambalpur. Burla is a picturesque town, and what it lacks in size it makes up in scenic resplendence.  A recent trip by Chinu and Ajoy brought back some memories of the lovely town and the Hirakud dam, and the water from the dam feeds into a huge canal, almost a river that flows through Burla.  There is a medical college and an engineering college and I believe '83 has alumni from both.  I remember it being a beautiful idyllic place, with lots of greenery, a Burla club where I loved to play ping-pong and baddy and tons of soccer fields.  

Every morning my dad used to drop me off at a bus stop 'chakka' just before the bend to the sprawling and beautiful Medical campus where future doctors go for their training.  At that spot all the convent students from Burla would board a bus that took us on the fairly long trip to St Joseph's which was built on a beautiful hillside.  There are many beautiful memories, but there was a dhaba called Berry's in between Burla and Sambalpur, on the freeway just a mile or so before a right turn took you into the bigger city.  It was really a truck stop, not a swank place masquerading as a dhaba.  The charpoys were real, the owner was a clean-shaven Punjabi bloke, slightly overweight with a very friendly smile, inviting voice and warm demeanor and always was hands-on in the food preparation.  The dish du jour was an authentic punju chicken curry with a sizeable piece of thigh with leg… the chicken was marinated and pan fried before it went headlong into the rest of the heavenly gravy - thick, garnished with aplomb, slightly orangish and visually enticing gravy topped off by two hard boiled eggs split down the middle and gently smeared by the broth, with their yellow ovals playing with the senses of the clientele - accompanied by the best clay-oven baked tandoori roti and naan smeared in ghee, and the traditional steel plate of punju salad; colorful smorgasboard of cucumbers, radishes, carrots, onions, tomatoes and the occasional lemon or two.

Vividh Bharati or something similar played those great 70s and early eighty tunes in the background,  distinct enough if you wanted to savor, subtle enough if you wanted to ignore and converse - the times were innocent and sparkled in their own way that affluence cannot provide - it is a strange paradox of life.  The whole meal was a gastronomic tour de force that was to be experienced by the patron from the prelude to the climax.  The aroma wafted out the open kitchen and entrance and kissed the folks already ensconced by the charpoys and titillated the people just disembarking from their cars and two-wheelers. Those days global warming and deforestation hadn't afflicted our beautiful native land… so the breeze of the open fields by the freeway acted as nature's air-conditioner.  

I remember many nights with my dad eating there, and sometimes with other friends especially a great friend and senior named Debaloy Dey(who has directed two Bollywood movies…maybe more sometime later on that).  I don't know if Mr. Berry is still alive,  but he was a really good man and showed me there are different ways of serving society.. I pray for his well-being wherever he is for he provided many people with a nostalgic magnum opus time after time, not to mention always throwing in a cheerful greeting and a generous serving of friendly banter.