Jana Fortier

Brief Bio

Hi all! I teach in the Department of Anthropology and in the School of Global Policy and Strategy at the University of California, San Diego

...on the topics of Foraging Studies, Himalayan Studies, Sustainability, Climate Change, Heritage, and Food Studies. My research centers around issues of resilience and sustainability, with respect to communities facing threats to their language and heritage, such as from climate change. My doctoral research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison concerned agricultural labor relations in Nepal while post-doctoral research focused on the adaptations of the Raute forest foragers to dwindling access to natural resources, such as wild yams and bushmeat in Nepal and India. This work resulted in the book, ‘Kings of the Forest: The cultural resilience of Himalayan hunter-gatherers’ (U. of Hawai’i Press). And my most recent book, ‘A Comparative Dictionary of Raute and Rawat’ (Harvard Univ. Press) documents the endangered languages of these Sino-Tibetan speaking peoples. This research has been funded by the Fulbright Foundation; Wenner-Gren Foundation; the National Endowment for the Arts; and the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Welcome!

... to our Food & Culture Class Resource Website!

Growing up in Minnesota, my first experience with spices was using cardamom and cinnamon for fried foods. My Great-Grandma Jensina used to sprinkle these delicious spices on lefse and other Scandanavian treats. Here is one recipe for lefse and krumkaka that reminds me of frying lefse at home

For example, here's a youtube demonstration of making Krumkaka

After going to Nepal for graduate research, I grew to love the dal-bhat lentils and rice meals of my hosts, the Karki family. Mrs. Karki taught me how to make foods such as roti bread and achaar pickles while my friend Kamala Gharti taught me how to weed the fields and make raksi alcohol. Since then, I've continued working with families in other parts of the Himalayas and learned to enjoy a wider variety of dishes. During my last visit, the Navdanya farm workers in Uttarakhand, India taught me about the importance of saving and drying high quality seeds.

Drying millet and flower seeds from the Navdanya Farm in Uttarakhand, India. Photo: J Fortier

My Interests

Since I've been working as an anthropologist and an ethnographer for a long time, I've developed a fair number of professional interests. Some of these include Heritage studies, Food Studies, Ecology, Ethnoscience, Himalayan languages & cultures, Cultural Materialism, Human Foraging studies, Herbalism & Natural Health

Image of Raute children playing 'slide' on a large boulder near their camp in Accham District, Nepal. The boulder also has some medieval Nepali writing on it which is hard to read (".... thaakhu..."?). Photo credit: J. Fortier

A Yummy Breakfast: Millet Pongal

Pongal is a porridge common to southern India. There are many variations, such as sweet porridges, buttery porridges, spicy porridges, rice porridges, etc. Pongal is also one of the foods offered as prasad to the gods at rituals. It is often served with chutney, such as coconut, mint, or other chutneys.

INGREDIENTS for 2 servings

1/4 cup moong dal / pesara pappu / Vigna radiata

1/4 cup hulled millets (foxtail or any other millet)

2 tbsp rice brown or white (optional)

2 cups water

2 to 4 pepper corn (or substitute 1/2 tsp ground pepper)

3 to 4 cashews, fried (optional)

1/4 tsp cumin

1 green chili, sliced

1 sprig curry leaves (or substitute 2-3 young citrus leaves)

3/4 tsp ginger grated

1 pinch hing (or substitute 1/4 tsp onion powder)

1 pinch turmeric

2 tsp ghee or oil (or substitute 2 tsp butter)

salt as needed

HOW TO MAKE THE RECIPE

Wash millets, moong dal, (optional rice if using) in a lot of water till they run clear.

Soak them for about 2 hours. Cook in 1.5-2 cups of water on simmer until chewy and water is gone. Otherwise, cook in a pressure cooker for about 20 minutes. Add warm water to adjust the consistency. If desired mash it.

Heat a small pan with ghee or oil; Fry cashews if desired and set aside.

Add ginger, green chili and fry till you get a nice aroma.

Add cumin, pepper, and curry leaves, fry till the leaves turn crisp, add hing or onion powder.

Pour the cooked porridge into the seasoning and mix. Garnish with cashews.

Serve hot with chutney, or with

NUTRITION

For 25 people @ 2oz small serving each, requires recipe as follows:

INGREDIENTS for 2 servings

3/4 cup moong dal / pesara pappu

3/4 cup hulled millets (foxtail or any other millet)

6 tbsp rice brown or white, (optional, if using use half cup more water)

6 cups water

9 pepper corn

12 cashews

3/4 tsp cumin

3 green chili sliced

3 sprig curry leaves

3 tsp ginger grated

3 pinch hing

3 pinch turmeric

2 TBSP ghee or oil

salt as needed

Notes on Millets

Small millets These are generally small round seeds of about 2 millimeters. They often cook as quickly as rice Eleusine coracana/finger millet; Paspalum scrobiculatum/kodo millet; Panicum miliaceum/Proso millet; Setaria italica/Foxtail millet; Echinochloa colona/Barnyard millet; Panicum sumatrense/Little millet; Coix lachryma-jobi/Job's tears.

Major/Large millets - Sorghum bicolor/Sorghum; Pennisetum typhoides or P. glaucum/Pearl millet

Nutrition

Refined carbohydrates, such as white rice and white flour, are the mainstay of the modern Asian Indian diet, and may contribute to the rising incidence of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease in this population. Prior to the 1950s, whole grains such as amaranth, barley, brown rice, millet, and sorghum were more commonly used in Asian Indian cooking. - Dixit et al. 2011 " Incorporation of whole, ancient grains into a modern Asian Indian diet to reduce the burden of chronic disease"

Image Source: Muthamilarasan, M. and Prasad, M., 2021. Small millets for enduring food security amidst pandemics. Trends in Plant Science, 26(1), pp.33-40.

South Asian Millets

Millets are critical to the diet of millions of people, but they're competing with crops like wheat, corn, and rice for valuable arable acreage. Compared to introduced crops, the millets all require less water, pesticides, and fertilizers. Most of them require less time to harvest than introduced crops too. This makes them a great choice for sustainable and regenerative agriculture. On the other hand, they may require more labor time and may have smaller yields than introduced crops. Rural farmers are faced with many decisions, and although these 'ancient grains' have comparatively higher in nutrients such as protein and potassium, the crop planting decisions may be based on which crops are most commercially successful. So... be sure to buy and eat your millets!

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