Bangladesh is full traditions and festivals. And has so many cuisines according to it. Today I am talking about “Mezban” .
Mezban is a multi-dimensional traditional banquet in the greater Chittagong region of Bangladesh also famous worldwide for its nobility. The word mezban came from Persian word mezbani means hosting or arranging feast for people. Chittagong’s locals call it mejjan. The word mezban means hospitality or hosting.
Mezban are mainly organized on the occasion of someone’s death anniversary, death of someone, Akika after birth of a child, death of a religious person and etc. It is also organized on a special occasions or for auspicious occasions.
Historically mezban is the traditional festivals where a huge amount of peoples are invited to eat white rice, mezbani beef, chonar dal with beef fat, tabular bones, gourd. Mezban are usually eaten during the lunch time. Usually neighbors and relatives are invited for the mezban sometimes it opens for all. In the past, invitations for mezban was spread by beating drums and blowing tin cans in the market and people of all ages came to eat mezban. In urban areas, invitation cards are printed and distributed among all relatives and neighbors. Also the practice of mezban started in late 1960s, when National Professor Nurul Islam became the president of Chittagong Association, Dhaka for the term of 1968-1983.
The mezban beef prepared by the experienced and old chef. Normally people slay one or two or sometimes more cow. And sometimes they slay goat also but this is depending on the situations. Sometimes people organize fish mezban. The mezban program starts before the day of the program. The organizing team arrange a huge amount of table and chair for the guest and sequence them in some rows. All the ingredients of cooking are bought before the day and start to prepare for cooking. A sum of women help the cooking team by peeling and mashing onions, almond, cumin, ginger, garlic, pepper, chili, hot spices, fenugreek, mustard, fennel etc. And some helps to washing plates and glasses.
Mezbani beef are cooked in some huge pot and its so big that contains sometimes a ton of meat.
Clean all the meat and put them into the pots. Then add onion slices, onion paste, ginger-garlic paste, red-green chili paste, turmeric paste, fennel -fenugreek paste, cumin paste, green chili, almond paste, hot spices, bay leaves, mustard paste, coconut paste, coriander, oil and clarified butter etc and mix them together very well. Add some water for tenderness. And cook them in medium low heat for several hours. And the other dish chonar dal prepare other side after the preparation of mezbani meet. The chef cook the tabular bones and fat of meat together as the same processing of the meat but when the meat become started to soft the soaked chick-pea pulse and gourd are added with the meat and cook them in low heat for some hours. The chef start cooking from the mid night.
Mezban is one kind of get together with all relatives and neighbors. Its now popular to all. Almost every big cities has mezban restaurants.
Thanks all for reading this blog.
