The Millet-Fish festival in Kochi is generating awareness on the rich nutritional values of millets, helping the public to explore its culinary combinations with seafood varieties.

The festival is organised by the Ernakulam Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK) of the ICAR-Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI).

Experts say that millets offer a bright future in Kerala as it could be perfect harmony when mixing the grains with seafood. Fusion flavours of millet-seafood combo such as kodo millet with prawn and millet porridge with fish chutneys are highly prospective as a wholesome and nutritional diet, especially in Kerala, said A Gopalakrishnan, Director, CMFRI.

The fest largely focuses on promoting healthy eating habits towards a healthy future generation, he said.

C. Tara Satyavathi, Director of ICAR-Indian Institute of Millets Research, Hyderabad, said the demand for millet-based diets is increasing following the efforts of the Central government to promote the products.

The millet products have good business prospects as they are highly in demand in overseas markets. As they are gluten-free, millets are a sought-after food variety across the globe. Many start-ups, entrepreneurs and multi-national companies are increasingly coming up with many millet products, she said, adding that combining these with fish would bring an added advantage to the promotion and popularisation of millets.

The festival has a delightful array of millet-fish dishes such as kodo millet-shrimp biryani, little millet-seafood sadya, octopus fry, seaweed halwa, pearl millet smoothie, millet sweets, etc drawing food enthusiasts from all walks of life. The sumptuous sadya included a mix of little millet with shrimp, squid, clam, and three types of fish, creating a rare delight for food lovers.

A buyer-seller meet being held at the fest showcases millet products, offering an opportunity for consumers, traders and distributors to foster business deals. This provided business opportunity for farmer producer companies, self-help groups, start-ups helping them forge direct connections with consumers and distributors.

A cookery show held at the event enabled the public to know how they could utilise various millets in their daily dietary plans. Culinary experts demonstrated the healthy ways of cooking millets without compromising on taste.

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