Winner of Third Place in Gooseberry Pie’s First Writing Contest April 2024
by Sara Siddiqui Chansarkar
Two days after my wedding, my mother-in-law asks me to prepare amla murabba or gooseberry preserve for my husband, even though I like the fruit raw and tangy in its natural flavor.
She instructs me to poke five kilograms—about 100 solid gooseberries—with a needle, soak them overnight in a mixture of slaked lime and water to kill the acidity, drain, dry, place them in a porcelain jar as tall as my knees, as wide as my waist, and bury the berries under five kilograms of sugar.
I don’t understand the process, but comply when she asks me to strain the syrup oozing with gooseberry goodness into a pot daily, boil it, taste it, and pour it back into the jar over the softening fruit.
To my disappointment, the fruit’s flavor fades until, on the sixth day, I report no trace of tanginess in the syrup.
My mother-in-law gives me a look of approval and says, “My son likes them all sweet and tender.”
I cringe, dig my nails into my wrist, then wash off the edge of my sari encrusted with sugar, bite into one mellowed orb, happy to find some sourness clinging to the core.
Sara Siddiqui Chansarkar is an Indian American writer, the author of Morsels of Purple and Skin Over Milk, working on her first novel.
