Echil/pathu

[Dr. Dhanam]

Share:

Facebook X (Twitter) LinkedIn WhatsApp Email Share Link

How to explain to non-brahmins especially people belonging to the West?
i live in Scotland.

 

[P.J.]

Pathu


In simple terms any cooked items likely to get spoiled without refrigeration is called Pathu; for example Rice, Sambar, Rasam

Butter milk is not Pathu as it is not likely to get spoiled even if kept without refrigeration.

In those days, when refrigeration of left over food was unheard of so all items marked out as pathu tended to spoil fast and this was a precautionary measure to prevent mixing of food.

Chappathi, is not Pathu as it is not likely to get spoiled fast.

Echil

The concept of 'uchchishtam' (in Sanskrit), 'entho' (in Bengal), 'aitha' (in Orissa), 'jutha' (in North India), 'ushta' (in Maharashtra), 'echchil' (in Tamil Nadu), 'echil' (in Kerala), 'enjalu' (in Karnataka), or 'engili' (in Andhra Pradesh) is a common belief in India. It can refer to the food item or the utensils or serving dishes, that has come in contact with someone's mouth, or saliva or the plate while eating - something that directly or indirectly came in contact with your saliva.

It can also refer to leftover food. It is considered extremely rude and unhygienic to offer someone food contaminated with saliva. It is, however, not uncommon in India for spouses, or extremely close friends or family, to offer each other such contaminated food and is not considered disrespectful under such circumstances. In certain cases, as in the first lunch by the newly-weds, sharing food from each other's plates may be thought of as an indication of intimacy


Hope this helps

Etiquette of Indian dining - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[sangom]

The concept of "Pathu" varies, IMO. Highly orthodox people of old used to term any food - with the exception of milk, and water - as Pathu. So, Chapathi was Pathu for them just as Dosa is; but fried items were not classified as Pathu if there was no prior cooking. Therefore, Poori had no Pathu, but Potato Bonda was Pathu.

Since I grew up in a conservative household, I thought I may add this info also. In short, any food cooked in water is Pathu, I think.

 

[prasad1]

The concept of "pathu" as explained by PJji was useful in the days before refrigeration. It has lost its meaning in the modern days.
Etchi has relevance because of Hygiene consideration.

 

[tbs]

hi

these echil /pathu is differ among brahmins....more tanjore brahmins follows these very rigorsly...

not many palakkad/thirunelveli brahmins....generally food grains cooked in water called pathu...

echil is generally leftover balance of eating food....now a days very rare brahmins followed it...

 

[sangom]

The concept of "pathu" as explained by PJji was useful in the days before refrigeration. It has lost its meaning in the modern days.
Etchi has relevance because of Hygiene consideration.

I know more than a few Tabra family who do not keep any "Pathu" food items in fridge. There is also a rich household who have a separate fridge for pathu items solely - all, even today!

 

[P.J.]

' Pathu' is very seldom observed by Working couples; they do not wish to waste food and at the same time avoid cooking cooking every item daily.

If elders are with them, it is possible to cook food every day.

For those working couples living in Foreign countries, with kids ,it is easier for them to cook items required for a few days and keep it in freezer.
Due to chill climate, food is also not getting spoiled.



Pathu is just to avoid mixing Non Pathu items like Butter milk with Sambar/ Rasam so that it is not spoiled.

 

[P.J.]

Pathu was discussed in this Forum earlier

http://www.tamilbrahmins.com/rituals-ceremonies-pujas/2922-concept-paththu-kitchen-2.html

Hygiene is perhaps the other name for Pathu. Hence vessels play an important role in preparation like using aluminum vessels help for a longer non-contaminated food items while those prepared with bronze becomes stale quite easily. Hence the practise of preparing items in bronze vessels and shifting it to aluminum vessels without touching the food contents is practised by many.

Salt added preparations attract greater chances of internal fungus/germs collection. They become stale much early. As an interesting point the purest form for cooking vessels are kal chetty/chetty panai (pottery). As a paradox a dish considered as Pathu item in one place may be cosidered as non Pathu in some other region. Obviously generation to generation people would have thought differently and established this bifurcation of Pathu and non-Pathu, maybe due to the climatic conditions of the region. That is why I decided upon trying to deeply understand the implication and follow Pathu/Non-Pathu strictly from hygienic point of view. Each one or each household is on its own in this.

answer by one member dhumakethu

 

[renuka]

The concept of "pathu" as explained by PJji was useful in the days before refrigeration. It has lost its meaning in the modern days.
Etchi has relevance because of Hygiene consideration.

Dear Prasad ji,

The best explanation!

Its true..in days where refrigeration was not present besides water everything else was subjected to putrefaction.

Coming to saliva contact..anyone with the right sense of hygiene would know how many types of bacteria/viruses are transmitted via saliva.

I have noted that Bangladeshis Muslims dont mind eating food as a group..daily I see a group of workers sit together and all eat from one big plate.

But I have never seen the Hindu workers from Tamil Nadu do this at all.

Muslims usually feel this fosters brotherhood feeling.I guess the bacteria in the saliva also end up being related!

 

[prasad1]

A younger TB friend here in USA still follows something akin to "pathu", and it is hilarious.
We were eating dinner in their house sitting at a dining table. It was a typical TB food, some of the items were on the table and other food was on the counter. He had a small petri dish of water by his plate. Every time he will touch that water before reaching for the next item, no body else was using this practice. I could not suppress my curiosity, and asked for the explanation. He gave me this explanation, that "it is Pathu". I wanted his explanation, he really struggled to give a meaningful explanation. LOL

 

[renuka]

A younger TB friend here in USA still follows something akin to "pathu", and it is hilarious.
We were eating dinner in their house sitting at a dining table. It was a typical TB food, some of the items were on the table and other food was on the counter. He had a small petri dish of water by his plate. Every time he will touch that water before reaching for the next item, no body else was using this practice. I could not suppress my curiosity, and asked for the explanation. He gave me this explanation, that "it is Pathu". I wanted his explanation, he really struggled to give a meaningful explanation. LOL

The next time when you meet him...tell him this is called OCD!LOL

 

[auh]

The next time when you meet him...tell him this is called OCD!LOL

So the next time a doctor washes his hand after treating a patient, we can perhaps shed light on his behavioural pattern... citing OCD ! LOL

 

[auh]

I think Shri Sangom is right in saying that the concept of patthu varies. In my family, rice, paruppu (dhal), rasam, kootu and sambhar (with dhal) are considered patthu. Gojju, mendiya kozhambu, poriyals etc are not considered patthu. Rasam without steamed dhal (molagu, gottu, vepampoo etc) are not patthu. Payasam is patthu since rice is used.

I couldnt make out any logic in this.

 

[prasad1]

So the next time a doctor washes his hand after treating a patient, we can perhaps shed light on his behavioural pattern... citing OCD ! LOL

Washing hand for cleanliness, and touching water in petri dish with finger tips are not same.
I am pretty sure a doctor can explain the need to wash hands before a procedure. Can you explain this charade of of touching water foe "pathu"?

 

[auh]

Washing hand for cleanliness, and touching water in petri dish with finger tips are not same.
I am pretty sure a doctor can explain the need to wash hands before a procedure. Can you explain this charade of of touching water foe "pathu"?

I think you are being hasty in your understanding that you missed the illogical comparison here. This link says that OCD is a DISORDER. NIMH · Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, OCD

Now do you mean to say that people follow patthu because of some DISORDER?

 

[Vaagmi]

Washing hand for cleanliness, and touching water in petri dish with finger tips are not same.
I am pretty sure a doctor can explain the need to wash hands before a procedure. Can you explain this charade of of touching water foe "pathu"?

I asked the cuckoo sitting on the tree outside my house. It said this:

The friend was only touching pure water kept in a petridish. He was not touching any gutter water. Having accepted the concept of paththu,he would like to wash his hands every time he touches the paththu but being lazy he touched the water in the petri dish. He would have died early by a few years if he had not done that "charade" for the reason that 1. his BP would have shot up because he has gone against something which has gone deep into his value system. 2. His stomach which should have received more blood supply while eating would have been denied its quota and so digestion would have suffered. He might have got even ulcers because of the discomfort he had been feeling while eating.3. He would not have enjoyed the food because of the enhanced anxiety level in having not done something which he usually does before eating. 4. His wife who would have toiled in the kitchen to make that dish tasty would have become crest fallen because the "friend" in his anxiety would have forgotten to appreciate her for her efforts. She also would have died a few years younger because of disappointment in married life.

Sometimes such charades are indulged in to avoid a lot of such complications.

The cuckoo flew away laughing.

 

[prasad1]

I think you are being hasty in your understanding that you missed the illogical comparison here. This link says that OCD is a DISORDER. NIMH · Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, OCD

Now do you mean to say that people follow patthu because of some DISORDER?

Disorder! I do not know, not being a psychiatrist I am not going into diagnosis.
Sitting on a table and chair and eating food from refrigerator where you have all sorts of food is mixing "pathu" food with non-pathu food. Keeping a petri dish for show when no one else at the table is using your practice, is less than meaningful. In my house Meat dish does not come (that is my reason), that is for one and all. So similarly you have a reasonable explanation and want to follow it, I can understand it. Do not follow a custom you know nothing about, but you follow it for show or guilt, then it is a mockery of the practice.

If you go back and read my earlier post you will see that "pathu" may have had its origin in hygiene, before the refrigerator.

 

[prasad1]

Sometimes such charades are indulged in to avoid a lot of such complications.

If you indulge in charades, and others can see through it and laugh at it. It is avoiding complication for who? When the wife and children of the same person make fun of such "practice" it is time to give it up.

 

[auh]

Disorder! I do not know, not being a psychiatrist I am not going into diagnosis.
Sitting on a table and chair and eating food from refrigerator where you have all sorts of food is mixing "pathu" food with non-pathu food. Keeping a petri dish for show when no one else at the table is using your practice, is less than meaningful. In my house Meat dish does not come (that is my reason), that is for one and all. So similarly you have a reasonable explanation and want to follow it, I can understand it. Do not follow a custom you know nothing about, but you follow it for show or guilt, then it is a mockery of the practice.

If you go back and read my earlier post you will see that "pathu" may have had its origin in hygiene, before the refrigerator.

Psychiatrist? In post #14 you had interjected with your differentiation of a habit necessitated by cleanliness with that of a habit mandated by tradition/custom. You had simply failed to follow my questioning of the rationale in arriving at such a decision as in post #11. OCD has nothing to do with the genuineness or lack thereof of any belief.

Whether patthu is a charade or otherwise, is not what I questioned, and when you offer para after para of explanation without understanding the query in my post, I cannot but sympathize.

And I don't understand where

Sitting on a table and chair and eating food from refrigerator where you have all sorts of food is mixing "pathu" food with non-pathu food. Keeping a petri dish for show when no one else at the table is using your practice, is less than meaningful.

this is relevant. In case you do not know (which is most probably the case) please request for more information so that you understand something about the practice, before you shoot from the hips. Generally brahmins who follow patthu/echil do not mix all food, refrigerator or not. Whence cometh the questionof meat, I wonder !

Your belief in brahman is as good, or as bad as, any other belief, in patthu or echil or any other...

Regards,

 

[sarang]

Our family doctor always dipped his hands in a basin with dettolised water and dry them after each patient.

Modern doctors do not follow this as they no longer believe in echil-pathu. And justified perhaps many do not touch the patient and scan only patho-scan-xray reports.

So the next time a doctor washes his hand after treating a patient, we can perhaps shed light on his behavioural pattern... citing OCD ! LOL

 

[Vaagmi]

If you indulge in charades, and others can see through it and laugh at it. It is avoiding complication for who? When the wife and children of the same person make fun of such "practice" it is time to give it up.

The "friend" 's so called charade was for his self. It was not a comic show he was conducting for the invitees to the dinner. The finger dipping in petri dish was for his self. His friends have no business to comment about it just as they have no business to comment about why he had a second helping with the sambar or why he drank water four times during the course of the dinner unlike his friends who drank it only once. If others laughed they have no etiquette.

 

[Vaagmi]

Auh,

Your post #19:

In case you do not know (which is most probably the case) please request for more information so that you understand something about the practice, before you shoot from the hips. Generally brahmins who follow patthu/echil do not mix all food, refrigerator or not.

You said it. LOL.

 

[renuka]

So the next time a doctor washes his hand after treating a patient, we can perhaps shed light on his behavioural pattern... citing OCD ! LOL

What you see in an OPD,
Is not what you call OCD,
Washing hands PRN or QID,
Saves lives and work of the CDC.



OPD===Out Patient Department

OCD==Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

PRN== Latin for as and when needed (pro re nata)


QID= latin for 4 times a day(quarter in die)

CDC===Center for Disease Control

 

[renuka]

Our family doctor always dipped his hands in a basin with dettolised water and dry them after each patient.

Modern doctors do not follow this as they no longer believe in echil-pathu. And justified perhaps many do not touch the patient and scan only patho-scan-xray reports.

???? I wonder which doctor you see these days that do not wash hands after each patient.

Most of us do not even wear rings or bangles at work becos it can spread bacteria from patient to patient.

Most of us wash our hands with antiseptic liquid handwash after each patient and if water is not available we use alcohol based hand sanitizer which is a compulsory ruling for doctors to have out here.

When a patient with conjunctivitis comes in to the clinic ..after the patient leaves we even disinfect the door handles which that patient touched so that the next patient who touches the door handle does not get the bacteria.

 

[auh]

What you see in an OPD,
Is not what you call OCD,
Washing hands PRN or QID,
Saves lives and work of the CDC.



OPD===Out Patient Department

OCD==Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

PRN== Latin for as and when needed (pro re nata)


QID= latin for 4 times a day(quarter in die)

CDC===Center for Disease Control

Mixing words, making them chime,
Marries not, a message in rhyme.
Before ye parry, harken in time,
Blind not the message within, sublime.