The warm Madras spirit is often a wisp of vapour escaping from a glass of hot tea at a local tea-kadai (tea shop). And if you swear by coffee, that brew is on offer too. Tea shops aren’t just about the caffeine or nicotine fix that most people seek them out for. Be it during humid summers or when a cyclone barrels down from the Bay of Bengal, tea shops are also about the accompaniments. In that aspect, Chennai has a special offering. It may not be branded or feature in advertisements, but the good old butter biscuit is unique to Chennai and it also serves as a link when this coastal metropolis was known as Madras. Obviously, this humble cookie is now available across Tamil Nadu, but there is no mistaking its enduring charm, one bite at a time.
Coveted jars
There may be packaged chips, soft drinks, ethnic sweets and savouries like Thenkuzhal, murukku and masalavadais and yet, in a tea shop, those long jars having butter biscuits are much coveted. The usual invocation from a caffeine sipper would start with a ‘master’ or ‘chetta’ (that’s if the one manning the boiling kettle is from Kerala) and then these words would be uttered, “Oru [one] tea, rendu [two] butter biscuit.”
The usual ritual is a sip of the beverage followed by a bite of the biscuit. At times, it is dunked into the glass, too, before being popped into the mouth. The taste will drag in childhood memories, an old friend’s life lessons and usually time stands still. A hint of sweetness, an edge of the butter’s salt, all cocooned within a round cookie and at times the baker may have been a touch late to remove the biscuits from the oven and then it acquires a toasty flavour too. Even during these rare flawed days with smoky undertones, the butter biscuit is to die for.
Not a simple cookie
Since we are all awash with Madras nostalgia, the accusation would be about being carried away by a simple cookie. Yes, chai shops across India have their own delicacies like the pazhampori in Kerala or the Karachi fruit biscuit in Hyderabad. All of them are stars in their own right but ask anyone who has hung out at a tea shop in Chennai, and there will be a nod of the head and a wistful look at those butter biscuits.
Often, people who settle in other cities beyond Tamil Nadu tend to buy these cookies during their home-runs. It is a bid to smuggle tasty nostalgia beyond the borders. Even today when other jars have cookies laced with grated coconut or diced cashews, the butter biscuit with its earthy notes is like a comfort pillow that you always adore. Just like Chennai with its quintessential Madras bonhomie that has stood the test of time, the butter biscuit remains eternal, waiting for some kinship with tea and a lost-in-thought customer. This butter does surely melt your heart.
