Bhutache Wade

Eh?! What in the wide wild world is that?

Bhut   = Ghost
-ache = a suffix to indicate "Ghost's"
Wade = Does mean several different food items and I haven't yet been able to figure out which one is implied here.

Then, what exactly is Bhutache Wade? 

As far as my knowledge goes, it means nothing more than the smell emitted by a certain kind of trees during the late evenings and night. The smell, people of yesteryear said, resembles the aroma of freshly cooked wades. And as the smell hasn't come from some actual kitchen which has wades on platter, the wades they attributed to some culinary inclined ghost. It is an excellent smell though.

Now, what exactly is this rather long mention of some aroma doing in the space meant for my memories  and specifically my first memories? A lot actually. When my parents moved to Thane from Dadar (me being just two years old), our housing society's building was surrounded by the Murphy India Company on two sides. This was the same company which manufactured radio- sets and advertised them using the very popular "Murphy Baby" Calenders. Murphy had most probably acquired a lot of land from the Government of India at a throw-away price as most big companies did in those days. The almost four acre land was well maintained with nicely trimmed lawns and landscaped tree plantations around their two main buildings. But soon in 1989 or so the Murphy India Co's Thane plant suffered from a terminal disease of those days called as Union Strike. (I do support Workers' Unions and their right to strike, but I am totally against the concept of some political party ruling the Union and some selfish Union Leaders filling their coffers at the cost of the poor plain labour. Anyways, my views about strikes is not the central point here.) After the plant closed down the gates, the vast land was left without its caretaker, without its mali and soon it got thickly populated with all types of trees (My parents and I have noted almost forty different types of birds there since the land turned itself wild). And amongst these wild trees were some that presented to us, almost every winter evening the appetising smells of Bhutache Wade. 
The Murphy Compound has given way now to a very fine group of residential buildings. The birds have probably relocated. The trees burnt fires in the construction workers' kitchens five years ago I suppose. May be because I was very young then, the smell left so profound an impact on me that to this day when I go out for trips, treks or picnics to even a moderately forested land and the slightest whiff of the aforementioned smell makes itself felt, I live my childhood all over again.