{{Short description|Fish and rice-based dish}} {{distinguish|text=the Indian village of Khijri or Kedgeree}} {{Infobox prepared food | name = Kedgeree | image = Kedgeree.jpg | image_size = 250 | caption = | alternate_name = | country = India and Scotland | region = | creator = | course = | type = | served = | main_ingredient = Rice, smoked haddock, eggs, parsley, butter or cream | variations = | calories = | other = }}
'''Kedgeree''' (or occasionally {{not a typo|'''kitcherie''', '''kitchari''', '''kidgeree''', '''kedgaree''', '''kitchiri''', '''khichuri''', or '''kaedjere'''}}) is a dish consisting of cooked, flaked fish (traditionally smoked haddock), boiled rice, parsley, hard-boiled eggs, curry powder, lemon juice, salt, butter or cream, and occasionally sultanas.
The dish can be eaten hot or cold. Other fish can be used instead of haddock such as tuna or salmon,<ref name="scotrec">{{cite web|url=https://scottishrecipes.co.uk/recipes/Scottish-Kedgeree-Recipe-Using-Smoked-Haddock |title=Recipe for kedgeree |website=Traditional Scottish Recipes |date=2007-06-06 |access-date=2009-03-12}}</ref> though these are not traditional. In Scotland, kippers are often substituted for the smoked haddock.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2010/feb/11/allegra-mcevedy-kipper-kedgeree|title=Allegra McEvedy's kipper kedgeree recipe|first=Allegra|last=McEvedy|date=February 11, 2010|newspaper=The Guardian}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/kipper-kedgeree/|title=Kipper kedgeree|website=Delicious Magazine}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/kipperkedgeree_87265|title=Kipper kedgeree recipe from Saturday Kitchen Best Bites|website=BBC Food|date=2007|last=Martin|first=James}}</ref>
In India, khichari is any of a large variety of legume-and-rice dishes. These dishes are made with a spice mixture designed for each recipe and either dry-toasted or fried in oil before inclusion. This dish was heavily adapted by the British, resulting in a dish almost unrecognisably different from the original khichari.
==History== Kedgeree is thought to have originated with the Indian rice-and-bean or rice-and-lentil dish khichuṛī, traced back to 1340 or earlier.<ref name="Spotted Dog 1997, p. 12">''Lobscouse and Spotted Dog; Which It's a Gastronomic Companion to the Aubrey/Maturin Novels'', Anne Chotzinoff Grossman and Lisa Grossman Thomas, Norton, 1997, p. 12. {{ISBN|978-0-393-32094-7}}</ref> ''Hobson-Jobson'' cites ibn Battuta ({{circa|1340}}) mentioning a dish of munj (mung beans) boiled with rice called kishrī and cites a recipe for khichdi from the ''Ain-i-Akbari'' ({{circa|1590|lk=no}}). In Gujarat, where khichdi remains popular, the lentil and rice dish is usually served with kadhi, a spiced yogurt dish that can be mixed with the khichdi. Khichdi is usually not prepared with fish in Gujarat, although fish is sometimes eaten with khichdi in coastal villages where seafood is plentiful. According to ''Hobson-Jobson'', while fish is eaten with kedgeree, the use of the term for "mess of re-cooked fish ... is inaccurate".<ref>{{cite web|url=https://dsal.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?c.1:1:302.hobson |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120715234629/http://dsal.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?c.1:1:302.hobson |url-status=dead |archive-date=2012-07-15 |title=Hobson-Jobson entry on Kedgeree |work=Hobson-Jobson: A glossary of colloquial Anglo-Indian words and phrases, and of kindred terms, etymological, historical, geographical and discursive |last=Yule |first=Sir Henry }} New ed. edited by William Crooke, B.A. London: J. Murray, 1903</ref> The Mughal emperor Aurangzeb (d.1707) was fond of the Alamgiri Khichdi, a variety featuring fish and boiled eggs.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Shankar |first=Kartikeya |date=2021-07-17 |title=Tale of the humble ‘Khichdi’ |url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life-style/food-news/the-tale-of-humble-khichdi/articleshow/75610905.cms |access-date=2026-02-23 |work=The Times of India |issn=0971-8257}}</ref>
It is widely believed that the dish was brought to the United Kingdom by returning British colonials who had enjoyed it in India and introduced it to the UK as a breakfast dish in Victorian times, part of the new introduced cuisine.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=David |first=Deirdre |date=1999 |title=Review of ''Imperial Chintz: Domesticity and Empire'' |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25058479 |journal=Victorian Literature and Culture |volume=27 |issue=2 |pages=571 |issn=1060-1503}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Beetham |first=Margaret |date=2008 |title=Good Taste and Sweet Ordering: Dining with Mrs Beeton |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40347196 |journal=Victorian Literature and Culture |volume=36 |issue=2 |pages=401 |issn=1060-1503 |via=JSTOR}}</ref> The dish was listed as early as 1790 in the recipe book of Stephana Malcolm of Burnfoot, Dumfriesshire.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nls.uk/year-of-food-and-drink/october|title=Recipe of the month from the Library's collections: Kedgeree|website=National Library of Scotland|access-date=2015-11-01|archive-date=2016-03-04|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304093413/http://www.nls.uk/year-of-food-and-drink/october|url-status=dead|date=October 2015}}</ref> The National Trust for Scotland's book ''The Scottish Kitchen'' by Christopher Trotter notes the Malcolm recipe and other old examples, expressing the belief that the dish was devised by Scottish regiments hankering for the tastes of India.<ref name="Scottish Kitchen">{{cite book |last1=Trotter |first1=Christopher |title=The Scottish Kitchen |year=2004 |publisher=Aurum Press |location=London |isbn=1-85410-979-0 |page=49 |edition=1st}}</ref>
By the 19th century, kedgeree had become a sophisticated breakfast or brunch dish in England, appearing, for example, in a Saki short story, "A Bread and Butter Miss."<ref name="Munro1998">{{cite book |last1=Munro |first1=H. H. |title=The Complete Saki |year=1998 |publisher=Penguin |isbn=978-0-14-118078-6 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aU_sxUxGtE0C&pg=PA433|page=433 |chapter=A Bread and Butter Miss}}</ref> By the late 19th century, it was served as a breakfast dish for children in upper-class Victorian households.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Vigne |first=Thea |date=1975 |title=Parents and Children 1890-1918; Distance and Dependence |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40178476 |journal=Oral History |volume=3 |issue=2 |pages=6 |issn=0143-0955 |via=JSTOR}}</ref> By 1930s and 1940s in Britain, kedgeree was a popular and affordable breakfast among the working classes and in institutional settings because it could incorporate leftovers; rather than fresh fish, smoked or tinned fish was often used.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=MacIver |first=O. Alsager |date=1939 |title=What Shall We Have for Dinner? |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/43759561 |journal=Social Work (1939-1970) |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=40 |issn=2398-3973 |via=JSTOR}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |date=1942 |title=Some Points On Communal Feeding |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/20322162 |journal=The British Medical Journal |volume=1 |issue=4228 |pages=83 |issn=0007-1447 |via=JSTOR}}</ref> Kedgeree followed a similar trend in the United States, where it was first popularized as a breakfast dish in Victorian times and would later be served at the White House during Franklin Delano Roosevelt's presidency (1933–1945).<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Henderson |first=Sylvia M. |date=2001-11-01 |title=Kedgeree |url=https://online.ucpress.edu/gastronomica/article/1/4/91/44403/Kedgeree |journal=Gastronomica |language=en |volume=1 |issue=4 |pages=91–92 |doi=10.1525/gfc.2001.1.4.91 |issn=1529-3262 |via=JSTOR|url-access=subscription }}</ref>
==See also== * Fish curry * Koshary, a related Egyptian dish * List of seafood dishes * List of rice dishes
== References == {{reflist}}
== External links == {{Wiktionary|kedgeree}} * {{Cookbook-inline}}
{{Rice dishes}} {{Scottish cuisine}}
Category:Fish dishes Category:Indian cuisine in the United Kingdom Category:Indian rice dishes Category:Victorian cuisine Category:Anglo-Indian cuisine Category:Curry dishes Category:British fish dishes