Pushti - nourishment
Annapurna Devi Mandir in Varanasi, decorated in a ritual known as "Dhanya Shringar" where the vigraha is adorned with grains 🌾
According to the legends, Lord Shiva and Parvati had an argument where Shiva argued that prakriti (substance or material world) is not as important as purusha (beyond material, pure consciousness). Parvati disagreed, and to prove her point, she left her abode in the Himalaya to far away. A catastrophic droughtstruck the world and inhabitants in Varanasi were facing starvation. Lord Shiva realised his mistake and prayed that Parvati comes back. When Parvati saw the people starving, She descended as Maa Annapurna. She established a kitchen, provided grains and cooked and fed the starving people. Shiva comes with his bhiksha patra and acknowledges how vital prakriti is and how the purusha is impossible without it. This is why in this temple, Lord Shiva is holding a patra in front of Maa Annapurna who is holding a bowl of rice. This mandir serves free meals daily to thousands of tirthayatris and locals.
Annapurna temple during the Annakoot festival when chhappan bhog (56 offerings), which include various rice and lentil gruels, vegetable dishes, fresh fruits and sweets, are offered as naivedya, and then given as prasad to the all the Bhaktas.
The image below depicts Annapurna Temple in Kathmandu, Nepal.
Here, Maa Annapurna is ananthropomorphic, She is worshipped in the form of this sacred silver kalash filled with rice.
But but... if
त्र्य॑म्बकं यजामहे सु॒गन्धिं॑ पुष्टि॒वर्ध॑नम् । उ॒र्वा॒रु॒कमि॑व॒ बन्ध॑नान्मृ॒त्योर्मु॑क्षीय॒ मामृता॑त् ॥
tryambakam yajamahe sugandhim pushtivardhanam. urvarukamiva bandhananmrityormokshiya mamritat
I worship thee, the three-eyed one, the fragrant nourisher. Liberate me from death like the ripe cucumber gets liberated from its bondage, and grant me immortality.
wherein Rudra (Shiva) is Pushtivardhanam - the nourisher, then why did He have to pray to Maa Annapurna for food? Because Shiva is the spiritual nourisher, He provides spiritual growth, and moksha (liberation), whereas Annapurna provides us biological sustenance and energy required to keep our physical body alive. Shiva cannot nourish your soul if your physical body is perishing. A Hindu cannot carry out Dharma when his/her own body is starving to death. This story is an ultimate example of how the material world is no less than the spiritual realm.
I'm feeling a little emotional again, remembering how my parents were at the brink of starvation when they were just children, in the refugee camps. One of my dad's core memories was of his father beating him up to pulp when he complained about his hunger, this was during the famine, following the 1971 genocide. My mom still remembers the UNICEF milk powders. I will never forgive Pakistan.