Month: December 2014

“One more plate” and then

“One more plate”and then

“One more plate”…

Repeat twenty times and you have a picture of the one-sided conversation that happened every single evening between the panipuri wallah and his best customer – my brother Arvind!  Come rain or shine or exams or even dog bites and consequently painful injections in the tummy – nothing deterred him from visiting the golgappa wallah at the corner. At five paisa a puri, most people would be happy with five or six or maybe a dozen but not my brother. If he fell below twenty on any day, the panipuriwallah would be very concerned  -“Arvind miya, sab theek tho hai?” (All okay?) All would definitely be okay except probably for the state of his finances! But then, who can blame the vendor? After all, he must have been busy building a nest egg to send his daughter or son off to Amreeka and needed a cash cow of a customer! He was only taking care of his market!

Have been thinking of this five pips a puri business and how much it costs today. The itinerant street vendor at the beach today charges about 25 bucks a plate – that’s five puris (not that I’ve ever dared to eat there!). Five rupees a puri? Exactly a 100 times! Inflation of a hundred thousand percent!!! Bet the pani puri guy’s offspring is actually hiding under an alias – like Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg or Cheryl Sandberg or sumpin’!

My cousin Devi and I ventured to go with Arvind once to try out this thing he was so fond of. Not realising that the thing inside was “pani”, we picked up the rather attractive looking things and carefully – bit into them – with the inevitable consequences. It being some festival day, our new dresses were quite ruined by the brownish green water that ran down our chins all over the new paavadais!

It took me a long while to try paani puris again but then, once i learnt how to eat them – popping them whole into the mouth and managing, without even trying- to give an impression of a frog that has swallowed a snake (quite against nature, i assure you!), slowly finding the space to masticate and then swallow in a burst of coughing  as you turn bright red and then choosing to repeat the whole process while the vendor gleefully looks on as he builds his progeny’s future in the land of milk and honey – sigh… if only they didn’t taste soooo… good!

And here they are, designed to make you choke with pleasure…

PANI PURI

• Puris – ready made – 1 packet – contains about 40 or so. (of course, if have masochistic genes or have forgotten that you live in the 21st century, you might choose to make them yourself !)

STUFFING

• Aloo – potatoes – boiled, peeled and sliced – 2 large
• Green gram sprouts – steamed for 3 minutes only and cooled – 1 cup
• Onion  – chopped  – 1 small
• Roasted cumin powder – 1 tsp
• Chaat masala – 1 tsp
• Salt 
• Minced green chili  – 1

Mix all of this together and set aside.

MITHI PANI (sweet sauce)

•  1/2 cup tamarind – soak in hot water for ten minutes and extract juice. Repeat. Set aside extract
• Dates -seedless – 1/2 cup 
• Jaggery – 1/2 cup

Pressure cook all together for one whistle along with 2-3 cups of water. Mash well or blitz in the mixer for  a few seconds till smooth.

• 1/2 tsp jeera – cumin powder
• 1/2 tsp dhania powder
• 1/2 tsp saunf (aniseed) powder – optional
• 1 tsp  red chili powder
• 1/2 tsp dry ginger powder – saunth
• Salt
• Pink Himalayan salt – kala namak – 1/4 tsp

Mix all the powders into the tamarind-date juice and set aside

TEEKHA PANI (hot sauce)

• Mint leaves – 1 cup
• Coriander leaves – one cup
• Green chilies – 1 or 2
• Ginger – 1/2 ” piece
• Kala namak – 1/2 tsp
• Juice of two lemons
• Salt
• Roasted cumin powder – 1 tsp

Grind everything togther and dilute with 3 cups water. Set aside.

TO ASSEMBLE:

Wash hands first! Like the vendor in our colony, we want you to stay “sab theek hai!” and unlike him, we know that washing hands is crucial to this! 

Make a hole at the top of the puri with your thumb. Insert a little of the potato-sprout mixture. add a tbsp of each of the sauces and imitate a frog eating a snake. The trick is to let the eyes bulge out so that the liquid doesn’t ooze out of the sides of the mouth! 

Repeat till your mom has earned a thousand bucks!

The easiest way to serve these is to fill up glasses with half and half of each glass with the sauces and place one at each plate. Then make the puris with fillings and pass them around. That way, everyone pours their own pani into their own sauce and reduce teh chances of spilling it on the neighbour! 

One other way is to serve it as shots. 

The very best is to serve it is to spike the pani with vodka and serve it as shots in puris! Then after one plate of puris, who cares if the paavadai is ruined?!

 (Pic courtesy: Internet)

 

 

“Snehalatha… Neeroo… Sudharani… Kanaka… Zehra… Aruna…” and the list goes on as the team captains pick their teams for a game of throwball… and finally, for no other reason except that one of them is stuck with me and probably likes me :)… more likely because they have no choice… Anuradha… last one to be picked for the team… can’t throw, can’t catch and can’t even be relied on to get the ball acroos the net! Thankfully, I’m not in a sports-mad school and it being an academic sort of place, I can get away with being THE nerd! I suspect I’d have had a tougher time in a school today or in a different country where nerds are marginalised.

One of the nicest things about growing up in the India of a few decades ago was the total acceptance of where people came from and variances in dress, behaviour, even food! There were kids whose parents wouldn’t let them come to movies because “cinemas” were a corrupting influence on young minds! Kids who brought aavakai rice only for lunch everyday (i did envy those!). Kids who were not allowed to eat in other kids’ houses for some reason we couldn’t fathom. Kids who couldn’t come on school picnics because parents couldn’t afford the buck or half a buck that it cost. There was none of the cruelty of exclusion that we read about today – that you are either “in” or a pariah! Peer pressure was unheard of and i think did not exist at any level. No living up to the Joneses, no birthday parties to be outdone, no foreign holidays to be bragged about though what i did long for was a village holiday that all my friends seemed to take for granted – we were the poor, deprived completely city-fied kids who didn’t even have a village to go back to!

Which is probably how I got away with being so bad at games that NO ONE wanted me on their teams! Sigh… till I discovered a talent for word games and all varieties of card games which did NOT involve any kind of bat or ball or getting up and running! That habit unfortunately led to an lifelong struggle with the weighing scales as I discovered later in life!

I also got to be quite a decent hand at table tennis in my teens and so managed to breeze past those tough years till we get to boasting to our children about how we studied under the lamp post (going by the stories, that was everyone in my parents’ generation). Boy, those lamp posts must have been pretty crowded! Bet some enterprising soul could have sold tickets to the dress circle (immediately under), balcony (next circle) and the “junta class” third circle where you got to squint at your books! How we were so good at all games – and no, with a sports-mad husband, a swimmer for an older kid and an athlete for a younger kid, wisdom lay in staying out of the sweepstakes!

Food was just as egalitarian – what grew in the backyard, what was sent to some lucky sods from their “native” villages (i later found out that these selfsame lucky sods thought WE were the lucky sods because we bought everything in shops – it had to be better, no?!) , leftovers from lunch plus additions for dinner. Leftovers are great provided they are in the form of vegetables! Till today, not having my veggies makes me feel seriously deprived and one my favourites of all time is the very ‘umble, very everyday…

 

VANKAAYA KOORA/ BRINJAL/ EGGPLANT/KATHRIKAI/BADNEKAI/BAINGAN CURRY

 

I can’t live without my “koora podi” – curry powder – not the British stuff but the South Indian one made with a few variations in most Andhra and Kannadiga households. So let’s do that first and then the curry itself

 

KOORA PODI

 

• Urad dal – 1 cup
• Chana dal – 1 cup
• Thuvar dal – 1 cup
• Asafoetida – 1 pinky nail sized lump (gorantha)
• Red chilies – 2 cups or 1/2 cup red chili powder
• Dhaniya – coriander seeds – 1 tbsp

 

Dry roast, cool and grind togther all the ingredients. If using chili powder, don’t roast, just drop it on top of the other hot, roasted ingredients and let the whole thing cool before grinding. This podi can be stored for weeks without refrigeration and is a great taste booster to everyday okra, green plantain, potato, carrot, beetroot – any other curry.

 

KOORA

 

• Brinjal – 1/2 kg – wash, remove stalks and cut into 1″ chunks. Drop them into water to which a little turmeric has been added.
• Koora podi – 3 tbsp
• Onion – chopped – 1 – optional
• Green chili – minced – 1 or 2
• Ginger – 1/2 ” piece – grated
• Sesame oil – 1 tbsp
• Salt
• Curry leaves
• Mustard seeds – 1/2 tsp
• Urad dal – 1/2 tsp
• Jeera – cumin seeds – 1/2 tsp

 

Heat the oil in  a saucepan. Add the mustard seeds. When they begin to pop, add the urad dal, jeera and curry leaves. Add minced chili, ginger and onion and fry till golden yellow. Drain and add the brinjal pieces. Add the salt. Stir everything together well. Cover and cook, stirring occasionally. When they are about half done, add the koora podi and cook, covered, till almost done. Remove lid and continue to roast for a few minutes till the vegetable becomes a little crisp again.

 

And I promise to make this if you pick me for your throwball team!

“Please Mummy. Please, Daddy. Please, please, pleeeeezzze. Please let me go. Everyone is going (lie no.1). My whole class is going (lie no. 2).”

Repeat ad nauseum over ten days and the toughest parental resistance (not so tough in my case though!) is bound to break down. 

The year is 1973 and just short of ten years old, I am pleading to be allowed to go on a school trip to Jammu and Kashmir. Kashmir – the very name evoked total awe and the spirit of adventure in a ten-year old’s soul. My very first school trip, parents were understandably nervous till a “BIG” girl – Nimmi – my neighbour and all of eleven years old, added her entreaties to mine – “I’ll take care of her, uncle. Please let her come.” And so resistance was overcome and the princely sum of two hundred and twenty rupees  was paid out for a fourteen day trip to Delhi, Jammu and Kashmir – travel, food, accommodation all included! Some guilt too – I was convinced I had paupered my parents! Imagine my surprise when before leaving, my mom gave me a purse with a whole hundred bucks in it for spending money – that much money existed???! 

And so started an adventure which has given me memories to laugh and cry about over four decades! Armed with a few frocks, one sweater to ward off the October cold of Kashmir and a few pants (made out of leftover green striped curtain material!!), we set off. The first incident happened the night we left Hyderabad when my then closest pal Snehalata’s (may her soul rest in peace) suitcase was stolen on the train. We ended up sharing the few clothes I had for the next two weeks – layering them (without ever having heard the term!) to stay warm. Neither of us made much of it but I remember when we reached back home after two weeks (full of head lice and half-starved!), her dad, who was a farmer from Nalgonda and a lovely man, blessed us both saying he wished that our friendship would last a lifetime. We lost touch some years later when she left for a different school and then migrated to New Zealand but she found me again on Facebook (God bless Mark Zuckerberg) a couple of years before she passed away of cancer last year and we spoke often – so yes, it did last a lifetime…

Back to happier times and the trip. It was my school’s first experience of organising a trip… with predictable consequences. Missed schedules, inadequate food and accommodation – none of these troubled us small fry very much (well, the inadequate food did, a bit!) because we could play and had fun any which way! The older girls – 13 and 14 years old – had a tougher time of it. The nun in charge used to give us five bucks every morning to pay for our food for the day! We found a vendor on the Jammu platform who would give us a hot meal of 3 rotis nad aalu saag for a buck – and so wherever we were during the day, I remember going back there for breakfast and dinner!

It didn’t occur to any of us that spending the money parents had given could be spent on food – that was meant for GIFTS and gifts it had to be! Saffron and some bright orange stones for my mom to be made into a necklace(!!), a Kashmiri kurta for my brother Arvind and one kilo of walnuts to be shared between my dad and Anand – these were my choices of gifts! Unfortunately, there was some snafu with our reservations on the way back from Delhi to Hyderabad and we slept on the platform for a night before managing to get into an unreserved compartment. Food was woefully inadequate so I ended up eating and sharing my walnuts with Sneha and carefully preserved TWO of these as gifts for my dad and Anand  – mea very culpa indeed 🙁 thereby proving the way to… is paved with noble intentions (very noble indeed)!

Maybe it’s that sojourn in Kashmir but aloos (potatoes) have always been a serious comfort food. 

Here’s an somewhat unusual and extremely simple potato curry.

POTATO PEPPER FRY

• Boiled, peeled baby potatoes (or potaotes cut into chunks) – 1/2 kg (I usually boil and peel them the day before i need them and store in an open container in the frig so they get crisper when roasted)
• Turmeric – 1/2 tsp
• Peppercorns – 1 tsp
• Jeera  – 1 tsp
• Curry leaves – 1/2 cup – crisped in the microwave for 2 minutes
• Oil or butter – 2 tbsp
• Asafoetida
• Salt

Pulse the peppercorns, jeera and curry leaves in the mixer for a second – till the peppercorns just break apart and don’t become a powder). Set aside. Or crack them in a mortar and pestle and crumble the curry leaves with your fingers.

Heat the oil in a large flat saucepan, add the potatoes, asafoetida and turmeric. Let potatoes roast till crisp and golden. Add the salt and the crushed pepper-jeera-curry leaf combo and roast for a few more minutes. 

Done!

And if you have money left over, buy gifts for the family!

 

“Scratch here”

“No, half a centimetre to the left.” 

“No, just below that.”

“Aah, right there!” 

“Harder, please, Mummy. Use your nails (non-existent in her case)!”

Mosquitos buzzing all around and having a banquet on my arms and legs which I can’t scratch right then and right where I want the scratching – because my hands are covered with green goop – henna, gorintaaku, mardaani, goranti, mehndi – call it what you will – it’s one of those things that gets women all over India and I suspect elsewhere in the world – excited, happy and festive! One of the great mysteries of childhood was how did mosquitos KNOW just when and where you couldn’t scratch and settle down for a meal RIGHT there! Also with a mother whose idea of scratching was a sort of gentle rub in the vicinity of the affected area whereas what I wanted was a scratch that would peel the skin right off, these sessions were rather agonising! On the other hand, gorintaaku – putting was rarely a one-household-only activity – more like a communal getting together of neighbours and little girls so there was company to be had in the agony of mosquito-ey itching too!

Leaves were gathered, washed and ground in the stone mortar and pestle (mixers hadn’t been invented yet!) and as that indescribable smell of henna filled the air, little kids sat around waiting for their turn – to have hands adorned with one large blob in the centre of the palm with many little circlular blobs around it and caps on the fingers – rather like a large dosa with little dosas around it. Post mosquito-no-scratching session, we were fed by hand – by the moms – and felt very “special” indeed! Generally it was dry food – dosas or stuff that was easy to feed.

You slept with it on your hands – on mats on the floor – the dry stuff being washed off only the next morning. Hands were compared for who’d have the deepest red colouration (I was one of those sad light orange cases!). 

Last night, at a sangeet-cum-mehndi session at a friend’s son’s wedding, many of these memories came back – except the mehndi was the intricate Arabian in origin style – no more blobs and caps but fancy designer stuff now – i do have a sneaking fondness for the lumps though! 

Breakfast needed to follow the same pattern too – but after two plates too many desserts ( Achilles heel and all that!), here’s a superbly healthy option of multigrain dosas…

OATS AND MILLETS DOSA

• Oats – 3/4 cup
• Jowar ka atta – 2 tbsp
• Besan – 3 tbsp
• Rice flour – 2 tbsp
• Soya flour – 2 tbsp
• Yogurt – 1 cup
• Red chili powder – 1/2 tsp or
• Minced green chili – 1 or 2
• Pepper corns – 1/2 tsp
• Jeera – cumin – seeds – 1/2 tsp
• Curry leaves – chopped fine or crisped in the microwave and crumbled – 2 sprigs
• Asafoetida – 1 large pinch
• Salt
• Water
• Sesame oil – 1 few tsp

Mix all the ingredients together and whip well adding enough water to make a thin, runny batter. Heat a non-stick dosa pan and pour one ladleful in circles – starting from the outside and working your way in – like a rava dosa – the thinner the better. Pour about 1/2 tsp of oil around the edges. Wait till the bottom browns, flip over and wait till it brown on the other side. I served it with ginger pickle and leftover pepper potato curry ( coming in another post!)

And if you ever want to put henna for your daughters, please learn to scratch – PROPERLY!

I think i’m going to cheat a bit today! 109 days of honesty and cooking deserves one let off day, right? Plus i’ve just had a glorious head massage and am sleepy as hell!

Winter, such as we have of it, has come to Madras and when I walk on the beach in the mornings, I see people – young, old, men, women, even children – bundled up and with a variety of head gear to protect their ears! Or is it that we are afraid that the wind might just whistle in one ear and out the other – i wonder??! “Romba jill-aa irukku, illiyaa?” (it’s very cold, isn’t it?) starts almost every conversation you overhear. And all the ear-protected heads nod in vigorous agreement. This – in a city where the minimum temperature last night was 24C! But yes, rombave jillaa irukku! (It is very cold indeed!)

One of my greatest sources of amusement (secret of course) are the many things people use to protect their heads. There  are multicoloured scarves, shawls, monkey caps with “jill” noses peering out and an innovation from a couple of years ago, a truly hilarious contraption that covers both ears with furry rabbity things and meets at the back of the head with a metal thingy – these come in designer tortoiseshell, tiger stripes, leopard spots and other animal patterns – meant to make the wearer look uber “cool”! In its own way, the total disregard for fashion IS very ubercool and I end up gazing admiringly at the “veshti and kurta” clad thatha (grandfather) on the beach, striding along listening to the “Suprabhatam” (or as one friend prefers to dub it – “Super-bhatam”!) with his ears firmly secured against the cold in tiger stripe ear muffs! 

But wait, this is a food blog and even i am determined to cheat, the meme should be cheat about food, right?

The food life on the beach is interesting. There’s a guy pounding away at aloe vera in a large steel vessel and dishing out glasses of fresh aloe vera juice, the ubiquitous tender coconut water seller who’s there in all weathers and who, in winter, is patronised only by the younger ones and “North Indians” who don’t know that this is not “correct” winter food! Brrrr… 24 C is VERY JILL indeed! Loads of guys selling fresh vegetables and fruit; a laughter club creating – and causing – much unintended hilarity (okay, not strictly food but hey, laughter CAN work up an appetite you know!), and what is the subject of my discourse today – winter foods. Thegelu (also called gengulu) in Telugu, Panankazhangu in Tamil, tender palm shoots in English and i don’t know what they’re called in Hindi. 

Plucked only in the winter, the shoots have two outer woody layers that you roast on an open fire or sigri – ok, i do mine on the gasflame now! – and when the skin is very sooty, peeled off. Then you peel off the outer sooty layer and the inner fibrous layer and split it in two longitudinally to get at the white heart  – called the chandamama (moon!) which is again thrown away! The rest of the “thega” is broken into inch-long chunks and chewed thoroughly before the very fibrous part is spat out!

Seems like a lot of work but it actually isn’t and the the woody, fibrous pulp is worth the trouble. High in fibre, it’s winter’s super food – helps you move what otherwise might get jammed up in the cold weather! 

Also, because you need to do such a lot of chewing to get at the heart of the matter, you feel satiated much earlier than you would with say, a samosa – ergo it’s a super diet food – the thega, i mean, not the samosa!

When I first moved to Madras and was still struggling with Tamil, I had this insane pica for thegalu – was also expecting my first child at the time and tried my best to get hold of them. No one seemed to understand what I wanted, even when i drew pictures of it – with colours and all – till one of the vendors near the bus stop where i used to wait for the bus to go home from office and whom i’d asked for thegalu earlier – actually sourced it for me from some market! And told me what the Tamil name was for this was. She became in my eyes, an instant Miss Chennai -what a beautiful soul!

Go chew – on my cheat food for the day!