<i>Shidal</i> - A traditional fermented Fishery product of North east India

Abstract

A survey was carried out in two states of Northeastern India namely Assam and Tripura to study the indigenous technology of <i>Shidal </i>(a pasty and solid, semi fermented fishery product) preparation, indigenous fish oil extraction method and <i>shidal</i> recipe preparation techniques and data were collected from the experts belonging to ethnic tribes, ethnic Bengali and Muslims communities. The skeletal method of <i>shidal</i> preparation had minor differences between the localities. The village fishers followed a method where semi-dried local varieties of <i>Puntius</i> spp. were utilized, whereas the commercial producers utilized the fully dried <i>Puntius</i> spp mostly imported from other Indian states, as the raw material. Moistened fish are tightly packed into an oil processed earthen pot and sealed almost airtight. Fish are allowed to get fermented anaerobically by some resident bacteria for about 6 months. Mainly the fish protein and lipid are broken down to some peptides, amino acids, fatty acids, indole, sketole, etc. producing a strong characteristic odour of <i>shidal</i>.