பொன்னி

Ponni is the standard table rice across Tamil Nadu, and for most households the default. The grain is medium-length and cooks soft and slightly sticky - the texture that suits eating with sambar, rasam and kuzhambu by hand.

It's undramatic and that's the point. It behaves predictably, it doesn't compete with what's served on it, and everyone in the family already knows how to cook it. We stock it because a household buying Ponni weekly is a household we can introduce Thooyamalli or Mappillai Samba to.

Ours is naturally aged rather than sold fresh-milled, which gives a drier, better-separating grain.