Search Facebook for beef shutki, or dried beef, and countless photographs, videos and advertisements appear. Some sell dried beef online, others beef pickle, and others post videos showing how to cook dried meat as bhuna, bharta or a hot curry.

What was once mainly part of a village method of preserving food is gradually finding a place in online businesses, food vlogs and urban menus.

The method was born of necessity. Many families made dried beef as a way of preserving the meat from the Eid-ul-Azha sacrifice, because refrigerators were not found in every house, rich or poor. Rubbed with salt, turmeric and spices and dried in the sun, the meat kept for a long time and could be cooked later.

In the north of Bangladesh, in the coastal belt and in some rural areas, meat has been dried alongside fish for generations, and in places the practice survives. Nor is it confined to Bangladesh: sun-dried or artificially dried meat is valued across Asia, Africa and the Americas.

With the refrigerator the need disappeared — after the meat of the Eid sacrifice is cooked and distributed, nobody has to think about preserving it. Yet some people's appetite for it has not faded, and they still make dried beef for their own table.

The rush to sell it online shows demand returning, and social media and online trade are giving the food a fresh popularity. Many now present it as a traditional dish.

There is a memory in it too. Md Kawsar Ahmed, a government officer now posted at Benapole in Jashore who was born and raised in Jamalpur district, told BBC Bangla that as a child he saw dried beef being made in every house in his village at Eid-ul-Azha, because there were no refrigerators. To make it, the meat is generally cut into thin or small pieces.

Source: BBC Bangla