As temperatures climb and energy payments soar, most of us attain for the closest chilly drink or crank up the AC. However Indian households as soon as had a less complicated, smarter resolution: conventional summer season meals designed to chill the physique from the within out.
Rooted in Ayurveda and regional knowledge, these dishes weren’t nearly style—they helped folks keep hydrated, enhance digestion, and beat the summer season warmth, all whereas utilizing elements present in on a regular basis kitchens.
Listed below are a few of India’s most beloved cooling meals that deserve a re-evaluation this summer season:
1. Curd rice: A southern consolation
- What it’s: This dish combines cooled rice with curd and is frivolously seasoned with mustard seeds, curry leaves, and inexperienced chillies.
- The place it’s well-liked: It goes by totally different names throughout the nation—thayir sadam in Tamil Nadu, mosaranna in Karnataka, and dahi chawal in North India.
- Why it helps: It’s filled with probiotics, helps intestine well being, and helps decrease physique temperature.
- Good to know: It’s straightforward to digest, refreshing to eat, and reasonably priced, making it good for on a regular basis summer season meals.
2. Chaas: The quintessential summer season drink
- What it’s: It is a conventional buttermilk drink made by mixing curd with water and including spices like cumin, ginger, mint, and salt.
- The place it’s well-liked: It’s consumed extensively, from neer mor within the South to mattha in Maharashtra.
- Why it helps: It cools the physique, aids digestion, and replenishes misplaced fluids.
- Tip: Add crushed mint or roasted jeera to make it much more cooling.
3. Aam Panna: The tangy thirst quencher
- What it’s: This refreshing summer season drink is made out of boiled uncooked mango pulp, jaggery or sugar, cumin, and black salt.
- Why it helps: Its vitamin C and antioxidant content material make it nice for hydration and stopping heatstroke.
- Style profile: The candy, bitter, and barely spicy flavour makes it a favorite in lots of households.
4. Coconut water: Nature’s electrolyte
- What it’s: That is the clear liquid discovered inside inexperienced coconuts.
- The place it’s well-liked: It’s a go-to drink in coastal areas however is now extensively obtainable throughout India.
- Why it helps: It replenishes electrolytes like potassium and magnesium, and helps digestion and pores and skin well being.
- Bonus: It’s naturally low in energy and sugar.
5. Jaljeera: A spicy cooler with a kick
- What it’s: It is a tangy and spicy drink made with roasted cumin, mint, black salt, tamarind, and lemon juice.
- When to drink it: It really works effectively as an appetiser or as a refreshing drink after a scorching day.
- Why it helps: The elements stimulate digestion and supply cooling aid.
6. Sattu Sharbat: The protein-packed refresher
- What it’s: It is a drink made by mixing roasted gram flour (sattu) with chilly water, lemon juice, and salt or jaggery.
- The place it’s from: It originates in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
- Why it helps: Its excessive protein and fibre content material helps stop heatstroke, energises the physique, and cools from inside.
- Professional tip: Splendid to drink mid-morning or post-lunch to beat the warmth.
7. Panta Bhat: The fermented rice delight
- What it’s: This dish entails soaking leftover rice in water in a single day and consuming it the subsequent morning with mustard oil, salt, and uncooked onion or inexperienced chilli.
- The place it’s well-liked: It’s a standard summer season meal in Assam, Bengal, Odisha, and components of Bihar.
- Why it helps: It’s wealthy in probiotics because of pure fermentation, straightforward on the abdomen, and really hydrating.
8. Mint: The natural coolant
- Tips on how to use it: You may add mint to lemon water, chaas, salads, or grind it into chutneys.
- Why it helps: The menthol in mint creates a cooling sensation and helps digestion.
- The place it really works finest: As a garnish or facet, mint can immediately clean up any summer season dish.
Why these meals deserve a comeback
These elements and recipes aren’t costly. They don’t require fancy home equipment. And so they’ve labored for generations, lengthy earlier than store-bought electrolyte drinks and freezer aisles took over.
Bringing them again into our diets is just not solely a scrumptious selection, however a sustainable one. These meals are rooted in native produce, low in waste, and wealthy in knowledge. They assist us keep cool the pure approach—and hold us linked to traditions that understood seasonal residing far earlier than it turned a buzzword.
So this summer season, earlier than you attain for that fizzy drink or power booster, attempt a glass of chaas. Or a bowl of curd rice. Your physique — and your grandmother — would approve.
Edited by Khushi Arora