My experiments with cooking

I am a foodie to the core . But many years back though on an occasional basis i started venturing into the kitchen . It started with the nescafe shake which was made famous with the advertisements in TV long back with a shaker given free with nescafe . And though theres nothing to go wrong with a cold coffee the final taste depends on how well you shake and the proportions . The more passionately you shake it the tastier it became . And i realised later that the difference between the average cook and the best cook is "passion " .

I never envied rabbits for eating the carrots . Afterall carrot is not a great vegetable but i think the milkmaid free recipe book started me when i was in school to borrow moms grater and started grating the carrots and adding ghee and milk and of course milkmaid to make my first proper dish ghajar ka halwa .. As they say if people eat it without complaining you get passmark . It was passed .

Years passed and i spent only 1 percent of the time in kitchen and that time was used mainly to eat from moms preparations while they were being made . Then i had a eureka moment . I still think i made that recipe myself . (to the best of my knowledge ) . I named it too called prawns nariyalwaala .. (prawns with masala cooked in coconut milk )  . Prawns recipe was followed by crab curry and i made sure that i cleaned it myself .

While these high end non veg dishes was going on i one day made the "simple " vegeterian dish called sambar . In cooking if one p stands for passion the other p is proportion .  I learned it the hard way by making the "simple " sambar . First time i added so much water that finally the entire dish was thrown as it was like a vegetable soup and few people pour soup on rice .  Later i realised the proportions after asking around ( guys are bad at asking not only directions )  and from then on my sambar became edible .

Again without going to aviyal ( i still dont know it ) graduated to the great biriyani . But this time no experiments i learnt it from the veterans . From my father and mother separately because both had their distinct style of cooking .  To sum up ... i am still experimenting and all are welcome to try it (at their on risk )

Mammootty and the rat snake --- my teachers

Many of my teachers had nicknames . Both when i was in college and when i was in school . None were put by me and i never called them nicknames . As i grew older i realised that just because some of my friends gave some of my teachers nicknames didnt mean they were disrespectful to them .Nicknames like petnames could be due to love also . Anyways coming to some of my teachers .

Rat snake (or chera ) was obviously our biology teacher . I dont know why he wasnt called a cobra or any other name . But when i think of him i remember one day when he asked all of us to draw the picture of a rabbit . Whats there in a picture drawing ?  It was fun . The fun part was however hard we tried the pictures drawn by us (even by the bookworms :) )  resembled other animals than a rabbit . Some resembled a rat . I stared at the picture i drew and i think it remotely resembled a rabbit .  What we were not prepared for was our biology teacher checking each of my friends pictures and many of the poor souls getting a muscle squeeze punishment if it resembled any other animal . And when he reached me he stared twice once at me and then at the picture . It was a just pass as i didnt get the punishment . But it was a narrow escape . Was he called rat snake because he was looking for rats in the picture . I dont know . Anyway he was called chera (malayalam for rat snake ).

Then there was mammootty (not the film star ) and frankly we were jealous of him :)  . Because in our mixed college while we guys were trying all our tricks to impress the girls the girls were getting impressed not by us but our chemistry teacher . He looked like mammootty the film star and he taught well . I used to like his class and i loved organic chemistry . Mammooty had a good class presence too as even the naughtiest of boys behaved well in his class .

Then there was" small" teacher a lady teacher whose name rhymed with small and also was of small built and also she was new to the teaching field . She was my friend . But in the class the poor teacher was the target of as many paper rockets than were put on by the space centre in trivandrum . She was nice but could not control the class .

Then there was "anki " the name of the dress worn by missionaries . Unfortunately our spoken english teacher was nicknamed anki .  He was a nice teacher but again he was particular that the english was spoken just like the britishers did . And the world famous malayali students (including me ) used to mangleesh never rose up to his expectations . And the punishment was a muscle squeeze .  If you wonder what this muscle squeeze was it was a pinching without injury by compressing the muscle in the back of the arm . In those days when our teachers punished us corporally we didnt go to court suing them or even hating them . They were committed and the love -hate relationship came out in the form of nicknames ..,.

I am in teaching field for last 13 years and dont know whether i am called which animal or villain character . But most of my students give me respect and is friends with me . As long as that is the case i dont care whatever i am called .. As they say whats in a name ... is Mammootty listening :)

nostalgia ---baths

                                  Nothing is as refreshing as a hot water bath . Today also did it as usual (proves that i take a bath everyday :) )  . But today was nostalgic about my baths of my childhood ..

                                                             Just like varieties of food (oh God when will i stop this food comparison ) each bath was unique in itself . First there was the simple bath where for hours you start playing with the large metal bucket as big as yourself (these traditional vessels were 6 times the size of our present day plastic buckets ) . Hot water if you wanted was made by using firewood under these huge metal vessels . And the merriment increased when the cousins (all kids of nearby ages ) had a group bath with playing with the water and mock fighting .

Then there were baths which were in the open . If you think we were exhibitionists you are partially right . It was on the side of the family well and the touch of cold water from the well was more refreshing than any pipe water . And the exhibitionism was purely unintentional as the open air bath was just that ... open air ... and we were children :)

Then there was the bath in the pond . It was more exciting as some swimming was involved alongside the fishes and the occasional tortoise . But personally though i was not afraid even of snakes there was one unknown creature we were all afraid of .. "crocodiles " .. No , our pond was never infested with crocodiles . But it was a fear instilled by our mother and aunts to prevent the kids (really a naughty bunch ) from going near the pond unsupervised . And the swim was only when the pond was less full as when it was full it was 3 person depth and scary .

Coming to crocodiles i was lucky enough to swim in the place where sankaracharya had his leg bitten by a real crocodile . That was kalady . When not in rainy season we used to go there to have a swim in the river periyar . Its a beautiful river and has inspired countless malayalam songs too .

And last but not the least the beautiful kovalam beach and swimming in the sea . Every weekend when i was a bigger kid and in early teens used to go there and had a swim . Taste of the salt and an occasional tumbling with the waves makes this bath unique as you need another bath at home to clear the sand which sticks to your body after . But in the excitement who cares ...

And the bath in the sea with my girlfriend :)  ( sorry thats seriously a joke ... only phantom did it with diana ) ...I was a child remember  ...

Three inaugrations and some little thoughts

                                                                      Todays newspaper had a photo of a leading dress showroom in kochi getting inaugrated . It was the latest in a series of large showrooms of them which is led by a successful kerala businesswoman . I just looked to see which big politician or filmstar was inaugrating the huge showroom worth crores in investment . And i was surprised to find that it was she herself and an elderly family member who was lighting the lamp and inaugrating it .

                                                                   Having always admired this lady entrepreneur for her people skills (its not easy to manage a large workforce in the great Gods won country )  as well as her brand building skills this inaugration without inviting a big shot was a lesson in itself .

This is in sharp contrast with the inaugration i attended six months back of a  bottling plant in kochi area . Two politicians were invited for the inaugration and one of them from the beginning to the end was having mobile phone attached to his ear (no exaggeration ) . The bigger politician was repeatedly exhorting the workers about workers rights . People familiar with the work climate of kerala knows that most major industries have shutdown here because of "hyperawareness " of workers rights at the expense of work . and this guy during inaugration invited by the management was trying to leverage his political clout by pointing out repeatedly to workers rights . As an audience i was left thinking how this private firm should have at least invited a filmstar who at least would not have caused them harm by the speech . And as predicted within six months there were three strikes in the factory and hopefully it will get shutdown soon .

Another leading shop one of its biggest kind in south india opened a large showroom in kochi . This time since all our kerala filmstars were not enough so they downloaded a megastar from bollywood paying almost a crore for his visit . The inaugration was a gala event one of the best inaugrations in the state like the big fat indian wedding .  A few months passed by , the bollywood star became richer by a crore , the people had nice memories of the event but what happened to the main thing . The huge showroom which spent a significant chunk of their potential turnover on this over the top expenditure . Within just a few months the huge showroom became bankrupt and now the absent lights and the huge building gives a grim reminder of extravagant expenses causing downfall which was to a large extent preventable .

                                                              A good beginning need not have a politician or a filmstar . Let them do their jobs be it in politics or films . Spend that extra money on your business .Comments welcome as always and share it if you like ..

my goli soda days

                I am getting old :)  Dont give me advice or make fun of me . I am still 17 years young :)

What i meant is i am thinking backwards often especially about the good old days in food .Not that i dont like any of the food these days but some of the items i do miss nostalgically .

One of them is the goli soda . The soda which was in a green bottle and which you had a marble in it which you squeezed with your finger to open it . Not that current sodas are filled with anything else at least that had "pure carbon dioxide " and the sherbets with lime had a special taste when made with it . And that gave you good company in good as well as bad days ..In good days i used to have it from the corner tea shop and on bad days ( i mean the stomach upset days ) this soda with lime and salt with ginger calmed my angry stomach .

And then there were the green and red parrys muttais(toffees ) . Maybe the hard caramel it was hard work to crush it with your teeth and savour the taste unlike the readymade toffees which melt in your mouth . Of course the poppins which was its friend is still available but these green and red parrys muttais disappeared long back .

There was a short period when i was studying in a good private school but 10 minutes in lunch hour i was literally begging . In those days we didnt get pocket money and we were not allowed to buy the fruits which were salted and sold near the school for a few paise . So many of us used to go and literally beg her for a piece of fruit and they used to give us a piece more out of pestering . Nowadays also we get those fruits like mangoes but fruits like lanthapazham etc i hardly see these days . And the taste of a fruit got after intense begging/pestering is different . Even more sweet was the ice mittai not the company made but delivered in bicycles with boiled semiya topping . Thought to be "unhygeinic " they were totally banned by our uncle who studied in same school years back . But occasionally i tasted this heavenly ice stick keeping an eye faraway whether my uncle was around .

Naranga mittai , gas mittai etc in the big bottles of  the ubiquitous teashops made our day . But still when my aunt from america long ago asked what i wanted from there i was about to tell " Coca Cola " because that was not available in india then . Now we have Coca Cola but i miss all those which i got in my childhood . Not with a sense of loss as we have lots of tasty things these days but i want at least the green parrys mittai . Is it greed ?  Tell me what you think :)