Cooking

Traditionally food is cooked in a wiah which is a dug out mud oven. They can be inside the community hut or outside. These are used to roast or bake pig’s meat and jackfruits.

 

Once the wild pig is hunted, it is kept in the common area. A young boy of the tribe unties the pig and takes out the salai patti , heart and liver which is inside it. He cleans the pig  by burning off the hair and scaling the skin with a knife. The feet are removed and given to the dogs, while the ears are roasted and eaten by the hunter who made the kill and the boy who cleaned the pig. The body is separated from the head and the skull is preserved. The oven is filled with firewood and stones and set on fire. After it is heated up the wood and stones are removed and the oven is covered in layers of salai patti on which the pig meat is kept. The stones are then kept inside and it is left like this for 3-4 hours. The meat is then taken out and eaten.

 

The Jarawas also like to cook jackfruit seeds. Ripe fruits are roasted in the earthen ovens. The roasted fruits are sorted and separated from the burnt firewood and stones. The baked seeds are removed from inside the fruit. The pericarp and the seeds (echepo) are separated and the seeds are heaped on a salai patti. About 25-30kgs of seeds are collected by one family in a season. The seeds are then tightly bundled up in salai patti leaves and tied with cane thread. These bundles are kept below the mud in the creeks next to the shoreline. These are filled by seawater even during low tide. The salt water soaks the seeds and preserves them. After a fixed period of time the bundles are taken out and the seeds are cleaned in fresh water and dried. They are then eaten while travelling between settlements.

 

Fish, crab, larvae and ripe banana are roasted and eaten. All the cooked food is shared equally between the family members. Leftover food is taken by the males for the hunting the next day.