In a household preparing for Chhath Puja, a grandmother places a wooden mould in a younger pair of hands. A little whole-wheat dough, sweetened with jaggery, must be pressed firmly enough to reveal the carved pattern, but gently enough to keep its shape. The elder does not reach for a measuring scale or taste the mixture. She knows the texture by touch. It is a scene familiar across generations of Chhath-observing families, where culinary knowledge is passed down through observation and practice. Beyond the kitchen, preparations are already underway for a four-day journey of faith, discipline and collective devotion that will culminate at the water’s edge.
Chhath honours Surya, the Sun, and Chhathi Maiya, a maternal divine presence deeply revered among families in Bihar, Jharkhand and eastern Uttar Pradesh. Also known as Surya Shashthi, its principal observance falls in the bright fortnight of Kartik, while Chaiti Chhath is observed in spring. In 2026, the four-day festival runs from 13 to 16 November, beginning with Nahay Khay on Friday, followed by Kharna on Saturday, Sandhya Arghya on Sunday, 15 November, and Usha Arghya on Monday morning. Devotees honour both the setting and rising sun, acknowledging their dependence upon the natural world.
The festival’s origins cannot be traced confidently to one event or century. Sun worship has deep roots in Indian religious history, and popular traditions associate Chhath with Karna and Draupadi in the Mahabharata and with Rama and Sita in accounts connected with the Ramayana. These stories convey the significance attached to devotion, duty and the sustaining power of sunlight, rather than establishing a single historical beginning. Over time, Chhath has become a celebration of nature, endurance and the bonds that bring households and communities together.
For a devotee undertaking the vrat, Chhathi Maiya is not an abstract figure. She is approached as a protective mother in whose care people place their hopes for children’s health, the wellbeing of elders and the peace of the household. The prayers may include gratitude for a recovery, the fulfilment of an earlier vow or simply the chance to gather safely for another year. These widely shared hopes help explain why a demanding fast can carry such intimate meaning, and why the family around the fasting person also considers itself part of the undertaking.
The work begins well before the family leaves for the ghat. Grain is cleaned, washed and spread out to dry. Cooking spaces and utensils are prepared carefully, bamboo trays are inspected, and everyone has a responsibility. An elder may oversee the recipes, a younger relative wash the fruit, and others arrange transport or help with the heavy baskets. The person observing the fast is called a vratin, or parvaitin. Although women are especially visible in Chhath celebrations, men also undertake the observance. The household’s shared labour gives personal devotion a collective form.
On the first day, Nahay Khay, a ritual bath is followed by a carefully prepared meal. Kaddu bhaat joins plain arwa chawal, or unparboiled rice, with a simple gourd preparation. Depending on family custom, pumpkin or bottle gourd is cooked until tender with ghee, cumin and turmeric. Chana dal, split Bengal gram soaked and simmered until soft, is a customary accompaniment. Some households combine it with pieces of bottle gourd in lauki-chana dal. Onion and garlic are generally avoided in these observance meals, and the choice of salt or other seasonings follows inherited household rules. What appears modest on the plate is prepared with exceptional care.
The second day, Kharna or Lohanda, brings the comforting fragrance of rasiyav, also called rasiya or gur ki kheer. Rice is cooked slowly in milk, then sweetened with jaggery, often added after the mixture has cooled slightly to prevent curdling. The result has a deeper colour and earthier sweetness than ordinary sugar-based kheer. It is accompanied by Kharna roti, a thick, salt-free wheat flatbread prepared on a griddle and sometimes finished with ghee. In some homes, a simple ghee-fried puri takes its place. After a daytime fast, the vratin offers the meal in prayer, eats the prasad and shares it with the family. Thereafter begins the approximately 36-hour nirjala fast, without food or water until the final morning rites.
While the fasting devotee withdraws from eating, the work of preparing offerings intensifies around the home. Thekua, the festival’s best-known prasad, is made by combining whole wheat flour, ghee and dissolved jaggery, often with fennel, cardamom or coconut. Portions of the firm dough are impressed with patterns using carved wooden moulds and fried slowly until deeply golden. Too much liquid can blur the design, while too little makes the dough crumble. This firmness ensures that the impressions remain visible after frying and that the finished offering holds its shape during the journey to the ghat.
Nearby, kasar is made by mixing roasted rice flour with jaggery, sometimes with ghee or fennel, and pressing it into rounded portions. Other households shape arwa rice laddus, using coarser rice flour or a different jaggery consistency. These variations should not be mistaken for wholly separate ceremonial requirements. Their importance lies in the way rice, a foundational crop of the region, becomes an offering through particular household techniques. These offerings hold their texture during the journey to the ghat and can be shared after worship.
In the wider family kitchen, further sweets may be prepared for relatives and visitors. Pirukiya, a crescent-shaped fried pastry, holds a filling of sweetened khoya, coconut or semolina. Khaja is made from folded layers of dough fried into delicate, crisp sheets and lightly glazed with syrup. Khurma consists of small fried dough pieces coated in sugar, while malpua is prepared from a milk-and-flour batter fried until golden and sometimes dipped in syrup. In Mithila, versions of sweet pittha wrap jaggery or coconut inside a soft rice-flour covering before steaming. These foods belong to the region’s wider festive table, not to a universally prescribed Chhath offering basket.
The family now turns from the stove to the soop, the flat bamboo tray in which offerings are arranged. Its contents tell the story promised by the festival’s connection to sun and soil. Sugarcane comes from fields harvested after the rains. Singhara, or water chestnut, grows in ponds and wetlands, while suthni, an edible tuber, is brought from farms and local markets. Bananas, coconuts, sweet potatoes and large daabh lemons may join them, with radish, turmeric or ginger plants included according to custom. The basket reflects not only devotion but also the agricultural season and the livelihoods of those who grow and gather its produce. Even the basket has a history before it enters the home. Bamboo is cut, split, smoothed and woven by craftspeople whose work becomes especially sought after around Chhath. Farmers, market vendors, transporters and basket makers all contribute to what eventually appears as a simple offering. None of this makes the ritual less meaningful. It reveals how much ordinary work stands behind an apparently effortless act of worship.
As the last fruits are settled into the soop and the daura baskets are lifted, a traditional Bhojpuri song seems to follow the family towards the water. “Kaanch hi baans ke bahangiya, bahangi lachakat jaaye,” meaning “The carrying pole made of fresh bamboo sways as it moves along.” The song captures a familiar Chhath sight, with family members carrying the offerings while the vratin makes the journey to the ghat. The familiar melody accompanies the family towards the water, where thousands of similar journeys come together in a shared expression of faith.
At Sandhya Arghya, families gather by rivers, ponds, lakes or designated urban ghats. The vratin stands in the water to offer arghya to the setting sun, commonly pouring water or milk from a vessel. Some households also observe Kosi, arranging lamps and offerings beneath a canopy made with sugarcane stalks. The food remains an offering, not a feast for the fasting person.
As the sun descends towards the horizon, the ghats fill with the sounds of traditional prayers and songs. Standing in the water, devotees raise their offerings towards the fading light, participating in a ritual that has connected generations to the rhythms of nature.
The geography of this journey has expanded far beyond Chhath’s traditional heartland. A household in Bihar may have a familiar route to a riverside ghat and ready access to preferred varieties of produce. A family with roots in Bihar celebrating in Delhi may rely on specially organised ghats and markets serving migrant communities, while families in Mumbai join large gatherings at places such as Juhu Beach. The location, distances and arrangements change, but the traditional offerings, methods of preparation and sequence of worship remain recognisable. These are differences in how traditions are sustained, not claims that each city has invented a separate Chhath cuisine.
Before dawn on Monday, families return for Usha Arghya, the offering to the rising sun. After the prayers, the fast concludes with parana, when the devotee takes water and prasad, sometimes with ginger and jaggery depending on household tradition. The offerings prepared so carefully and carried to the ghat are now distributed among relatives, neighbours and visitors. What began as an individual act of devotion becomes an expression of community, as the fruits of several days of preparation are shared beyond the household.
Only now does the wider household meal come fully into view. In some Bihari kitchens, hara chana sabzi combines fresh green chickpeas with tomatoes and cumin, while baingan-badi ki sabzi softens sun-dried lentil dumplings alongside aubergine. Kohra sarson ki sabzi gives pumpkin a pungent mustard seasoning, and lal saag is made by cooking red amaranth leaves until tender. These are examples of regional home cooking that may accompany the days around Chhath, rather than prescribed ritual foods. Their place differs according to family custom and the needs of those returning to ordinary meals after the fast.
Other households enjoy dal pittha, rice-flour dumplings enclosing a spiced lentil filling and steamed or simmered until cooked. In Jharkhand, dhuska, made from a ground rice-and-lentil batter and fried until golden, belongs to the wider regional repertoire. Such preparations matter because Chhath is sustained by people whose culinary inheritance extends beyond any one festival.
Beverages follow the same rhythm. During the nirjala fast, the devotee consumes no water, milk or juice. The liquid used at the ghat is for arghya. After the final prayers, water comes first, followed in some homes by milk or a lightly sweetened sharbat. Non-fasting relatives may drink sugarcane juice or seasonal fruit drinks. These refreshments are part of family hospitality rather than mandatory ceremonial beverages, and their timing respects the discipline of the fast. When the family returns home, the baskets are lighter, the prayers have concluded and the kitchen begins to return to its ordinary rhythm. The wooden mould is cleaned and put away, ready for another year.
When Chhath comes again, perhaps the younger family member will prepare the dough independently, with the grandmother watching from beside the stove. In that quiet exchange lies the future of Chhath’s culinary heritage, sustained not merely by celebrating the festival each year, but by ensuring that its knowledge, practices and meanings continue to pass from one generation to the next.
The writer is Secretary, Cuisine India Society; Views presented are personal.