Whether it is avarai uttakka - local beans cooked with potato, tomato, onions, garlic and tempered with mustard seeds, or sandagai - roasted tomato sauteed with small onion, garlic and coconut ground to a fine paste - the "masala made carefully after dry-roasting 17 spices and not bought off the shops" is the key, Indira says.
Dry weather has prevailed since the weekend at Pilton, so the parched ground is like concrete in places - pretty tricky to hammer tent pegs in, I'd wager!