Toblerone

Growing up, Toblerone was one of the highlights of our lives. Back in a time when chocolate itself was a rare treat, a bar of Toblerone was right up there, at the pinnacle of all our wishes and desires.

A bar would make its appearance every once in a while at home, mostly as a result of my father's official trips. We would watch with bated breath, waiting for the gold and yellow triangular pyramid to slide out of his suitcase. My sister and I stored it with great care, eating only one little triangle at a time, sometimes breaking each triangle into two to make it last longer. And when only one piece was left at the end,  we would offer it to everybody at home, and gape in wonder and pleasure when our parents said, "We don't want it. You can eat it," and shake our heads over how anybody could even refuse Toblerone. And then we would break it into two equal pieces (we would have weighed it to ensure fairness if we had measuring scales) and then we would savour it till the last chocolatey crumb.

So, when I saw this, I chuckled, imagining how Child-Shruthi would have reacted at the sight.

The sad part is this. As it is with so many things in life, now Toblerone is within my reach, but I don't have any particular craving for it. The irony!

Day 12 - Overeating

What do you think of a day where you get to eat breakfast at your favourite idli-vada joint (Brahmin's Coffee Bar), and dinner at your prefered Dosa place (CTR?)

Yeah, I had such a day yesterday.  And all I can do is heave a sigh of contentment.

Actually the last few weeks have been like that - overeating.  The days of watchful and healthy eating flew out of the window, and I've been eating everything in sight.

This was my dessert plate at a buffet lunch at a restaurant a few weeks ago:

And no, I'm not proud of it.  (Though I did enjoy it!)

But my system is tired of this.  I'm now craving my favourite breakfast of oats.

Time to get back on track!

Day 23 - Imli Chutney

Strange, huh?  A food post, all of a sudden?  Just wanted to share with you this chutney that makes everything interesting.

If you google for Imli chutney, you'll get lots of recipes, and so I won't bother

There is the Khajur-Imli chutney, made with dates and tamarind.  And then there is the hunisehannina gojju, made with lots of ginger, and south-indian style seasoning, that goes well with huggi/pongal.

But mine is a 5-minute version, and I make a little bottle of it every two weeks, and I always have a stock in the fridge.  It makes everything interesting.

Sprouts?  Add a little groundnuts, and a spoon of imli chutney, and you have a tasty snack.  Curds - add a spoonful, and see how great it tastes.  Eggs?  I tried giving Puttachi eggs in various forms, and though she ate it all dutifully, she fell off her chair in wonder when I boiled an egg, sliced it, and poured a spoonful of imli chutney over it.   Now it is a staple at our place.

It is also a formula for instant chaat.  Boil some chickpeas or something, add imli chutney, and even if there is nothing else to go with it, it can easily be called chaat.

How I make it - forgive me, I have no patience for recipes and proportions, but what I do is:

Heat tamarind paste and jaggery syrup together with a little water. Add salt, kala namak, chilli powder, ginger powder, roasted cumin powder, and then boil it well.  For thickness, you could add a thickening agent like cornflour or rice flour or something, but I don't bother with that also.  Once it boils well, cool it down and bottle it.  Store in the refrigerator.

And yes, I have all the above ingredients always available in the said forms, and that's why it is a five-minute process for me.  

Warning:  Too much of anything is not good, obviously, so if you are dealing with kids, you'll need to make rules about what you can eat it with, and how much.

In defence: Junk Food

As a mother, I have to frequently defend the choices that my husband and I make with Puttachi, to well-meaning well-wishers who think that we are going about certain things wrong. 

Junk food tops the list.

Why don't you give Puttachi Junk food? Poor thing!

I do give her junk food.  We love our junk, so why would we deny her those little pleasures?  The only thing is that I have very strict rules about when, what, and how much she can eat.
- No junk food before mealtimes, or on an empty stomach.
- No junk food after six in the evening
- Each serving is very small.  Just enough to satisfy the urge, and not to fill the stomach.  No more than two biscuits, no more than one piece of chocolate, no more than 2 tbsp of mixture - do you get the drift?

Why do you do this? Poor thing!

Junk food has no nutritional value.  It is eaten for enjoyment.  And so too much of this food in the tummy means that much less of nutritious food.  I'd rather she eats full balanced meals than fill her stomach with sugar and carbs.

Does she listen to you?

She does.  In fact, she now takes decisions herself.  Recently, when she was offered a third biscuit in the same sitting, she said, "I think I have had enough junk for now." 

How do you make it work?

From the very beginning, we've ensured that she doesn't even have the concept of eating so much at one go.  And more importantly, we follow those rules ourselves.  She frequently sees me decline a sweet because it is mealtime.  When she observes us following these rules, she realizes that this is something that is followed for a reason.

In fact, once, we were unexpectedly stuck somewhere and I didn't have any food on me, and Puttachi had become very cranky with hunger.  I had a Munch in my bag, and I gave it to her to eat.  She said, "Amma, the whole thing?  Are you sure?  Did you see how much you gave me?  The whole thing?  Is it okay?"

You're going to have a tough time later.  She's going to rebel and eat lots of junk food.  You have to give her whatever she wants now.

If you have a picture of her begging for junk food while I stand with my feet apart, hands on my hips (and horns on my head) and shouting, "No," you are wrong.  I never deny her junk food when she asks for it.  In fact, she even asks for it this way, "Amma, can I have a chocolate after I eat a banana?"
 
If she asks for something at an inappropriate time, I tell her why I cannot give it to her at that time, and she immediately modifies her request to - can I have that after food?

So it is not a question of my denying her something she craves for.  So I don't think this will cause her to rebel. 

But I know that many things are not in our control.  So if later in life, she actually does take to binging on junk food, we'll deal with it later.  Why get it started right now?

When we offer her junk food, she looks at you for permission.  We don't like that.  Aren't we responsible enough to know what is good for her and what is not?

If she wants to ask me for permission, it means that you are giving junk to her at at an ambiguous time - it has been a while since she's eaten, and there is still some time to go for the next meal - so she cannot take her own decision.  So she looks at me for help on taking the decision.  I cannot do anything about that.  In fact, I think you must appreciate her sense of responsibility on this, instead of labeling me Hitler.  I have in fact, never told her that she must ask me for permission if somebody she KNOWS gives her something to eat.

Some people even give her something and ask her not tell us.  That is a very dangerous trend, so please don't do it.

I think even the fact that I had to write this post speak volumes about the junk food culture that is so prevalent now.  People think nothing at all about eating anything and everything at any time of the day.  In previous eras, there was no junk food available commercially.  When somebody wanted to eat some nice yummy fried stuff, they had to make it at home!  And that is the biggest stumbling block!  And even if they did get around to making it, it was naturally way better than the stuff we get outside for the simple reason that they knew what went into it!

Gosh the things in junk food now - colour, flavouring - studies keep coming in about how this or that flavouring has proven to have ill-effects on children, yet the food flood keeps pouring out of the factories, and there are a million people standing with their mouths wide open to take it all in......

It scares me, it does.

From darkness to light

My earliest memory of eating mangoes is that of a bunch of us kids in our underwear, standing in our grandparents' backyard, eating slices of mangoes, while the juice ran down our chins and arms.

Fast forward to my teens.  I had braces on my teeth.  It wasn't, to put it mildly, easy to clean the mango fibres stuck in my braces, and so mangoes had started irritating me. Besides, there was one time when I ate a mango with the elastic bands (of the braces) on, and the off-white bands got stained yellow, and became bloated.  I was so repulsed by the sight of them that I swore off mangoes forever.

My terrible vow became a matter of great consternation for my family, especially for my mother.  She couldn't get even a piece of mango down her throat when I was around, because she felt guilty for eating such a delicious fruit "without giving it to me."  Mothers!

Fast forward to my first year of marriage.  My Father-in-law enjoyed buying the best fruits, cutting them neatly, and putting the pieces into bowls for everyone in the family.  I liked that. Who wouldn't, being handed delicious fruits - ready to eat - on a platter?

Then the mango season arrived, and my Father-in-law bought the first few mangoes home, cut them up and handed all of us bowls of mangoes.

"Ah no," I was about to say.  "I don't like mangoes."

But then something happened.  I looked at the bowl.  I looked at the mango.  I don't know what it was - was it that I was hungry?  Was it that my body was craving sugar at that time?  Was it that my subconscious finally got rid of the yuck-factor of the bloated yellow elastic bands from my memory?

I don't know.  And frankly, I don't care.  For I picked up a piece and put it into my mouth.  Squish - went the fruit.  Squirt - went the juice.  And I chewed and I closed my eyes while I went to heaven.

It was like I was tasting a mango for the first time.  I ate another piece, and then another, and before I knew it, my bowl was empty.

I sat there, with just one thought running through my head - "Excuse me, what just happened here?"

"Oh, I can see you like mangoes," said my mother-in-law, smiling.

I came out of my trance, looked at her, and took a deep breath.

"Yes," I said.  "I love mangoes."

(Written for the Tulika Summer Blogathon)

Thank you, food bloggers!

I love variety in food.  And since I am the cook at home, it falls upon me to provide my taste buds the varied tastes it craves. 

I am always looking for different ways to cook every vegetable.  And there are only so many recipe books one can buy.  So I turn to that saviour of all info-seekers - the internet.

It is unbelievable how many food bloggers are out there.  How many of them take the time and effort to chronicle their efforts in the kitchen and put them out there for everybody to see! 

Whenever I find myself tired of eating a vegetable in all the ways I can cook it, I just run a google search with " recipes"  and then I sit back and survey the endless recipes that turn up.  Sometimes I enter searches with the name of the vegetable in all languages I know.

It takes me an average of five minutes to zero in on a recipe that is:
- quite different from anything I've made.
- simple
- quick

Sometimes, I make drastic changes in the recipe - for example, I add lentils to a curry recipe to make it suit nutritional requirements, sometimes I add some other vegetable that I feel might go well with that one.

So far, the result has been at worst, palatable, and at best, delicious.  For every five dishes I make this way, one turns out to be a hit, and enters our regular menu.

Sometimes, if I have a hunch that a vegetable can be cooked in a certain way, I give a specific google search. For example, something made me think that dosas made from raw bananas might taste good, so I gave a "Baalekayi dose" search, found many recipes, chose one, and that turned out to be yum.

I really admire the patience food bloggers have.  I am a person whose sole aim is to dash into the kitchen, drum up a healthy, tasty meal in the least possible time, and then dash out, and get on with life.  So I cannot understand how someone can have the patience to make a dish, and instead of running out of the kitchen after that, transfer the dish into attractive bowls, take photos, upload the photos, write down those recipes with the correct measurements...phew!

I know the effort it takes because I have seen my mom work on her food blog with so much interest. 

Every time I like a recipe, I think of going back to the blog and leaving a comment on the site, thanking the blogger.  But I never do get around to doing that.  So here's thanking all you food bloggers out there for sharing your recipes with the rest of the world.  Thanks for making eating more interesting for me.

The UK Files - A concert to remember and a taste to forget

I enjoy Western Classical music - I don't understand the nuances, but I like it anyway. But I'd never been to a live concert. My cousin V takes lessons in both Western Violin and Western Saxophone (not to mention Carnatic Violin) and is good at all of them. He wakes up at 5 30 am to practice music, and when at his house, it was a wonderful daily alarm for me - the strains of an instrument from downstairs. Err.. not that I woke up each time to those sounds - half the time it would play in my dreams :O

Anyway, V was a part of a concert, presented by his school along with a girls' school. It was in a church in the city. My uncle was out of town, and my aunt and I left Puttachi with S who had arrived just that day, and went to the concert.

The church is beautiful, old and big. Listening to classical music on an audio system is nice, but listening to it live, with the great acoustics that the size and structure of the church enabled - this was an experience to be savoured. I loved it. There was a choir, which rings in my mind to this day. And it reminded me of the dozens of choirs I have been a part of. I always enjoyed them - the preparation, the rehearsals, the way, with practice, all the voices slowly come together in harmony, and the final presentation, and everything in between - I was so insanely jealous of that group during the concert! I would so love to take part in any choir/orchestra/group music again!!

During the break, there were refreshments. We had eaten dinner before going, but we were already hungry, and so we accepted some refreshments - some juice/wine and some snacks. I took a plate, filled it with a little chips, and something that looked like Kurkure, and brought it for both my aunt and me to eat. The chips got over in a second while we chatted and ate, but the stick-like savouries remained, until both of us realized that we had unconsciously rejected it - we didn't like it.

After we got home, my aunt asked V - "What on earth WAS it?" He listened to the description and said, "Oh, Marmite." Apparently, people either love it or hate it, and he was in the former camp. "Thank heavens we don't have Marmite in India," I said, only to watch a programme on BBC the VERY next day, about how they were trying to introduce Marmite in India - marketing it as a health-food. They even added it to pulao, and people actually seemed to like it. Shudder. Is it here yet? Any idea, people? If not, remember, you heard about it from me first.

About the concert - it has whetted my appetite, and I would so love to listen to more live Western Classical concerts - like for example, at the, ahem.... Sydney Opera House and the Royal Albert Hall....? :)

A wonderful breakfast

I've been meaning to blog about this for a while now. When in my aunt's house in England, we had cereals and fruits and nuts every morning. I enjoyed that breakfast. After S joined us, he was totally taken with the idea of such a healthy breakfast. When we got back, we discussed it, and decided to try out that breakfast for a couple of weeks.

We did try, and we're hooked. I cook oats in milk, and add chopped fresh fruits, nuts and dry fruits. I also add a fistful of ragi araluhittu/hurihittu (popped and powdered ragi.) For a bit of crunch, we add a little Kellogg's oatbites. It's working wonderfully for us in many ways, at many levels.

Every morning, at about 9 or 10, I had a tendency to feel terribly tired and drained out. It was worse when I ate bread and uppittu. (My mother and my grandmother also have the same problem, and we're still not clear why it happens). After we started this breakfast, it hasn't happened even once. I do feel hungry again at about 10 or 11 (but I feel hungry around that time even after an Indian breakfast), but I've never once felt drained out. Peevee, my sister, the nutrition expert, says that it is because of complex carbohydrates in the oats - it releases energy bit by bit.

Besides, the compulsory dose of fruits and fibre has done wonders for Puttachi's digestion. Initially, Puttachi wasn't very receptive to it, and I felt guilty about giving her something she probably didn't like. But one Saturday, when I set a plate of something else before her, she frowned and said, "Why haven't you made oats? I want oatmeal." "Don't fuss, eat whatever is on your plate," I said, but inwardly, I was doing somersaults! It's been eight months and she is also enjoying this breakfast as much as S and I do. As for me, who is so crazy about good food, I was quite sure I'd get bored with this after a while, but each morning, I approach my bowl with great enthusiasm, and that is saying a lot about it!

To an extent, this breakfast means lesser time and effort. But it does take time chopping fruits and breaking nuts down into small pieces for Puttachi, and cooking the oats just right so that it doesn't get gooey - it does have it's own effort. But the biggest plus is that I needn't wonder every night what to make for breakfast next morning.

But I make make Indian breakfast in the weekends - one, for my tastebuds, and two, because I don't want to forget how to make all that, and three, if I feel tired, I can very well chuck everything and take a break mid-morning.

If, for any reason, a hearty Indian breakfast is not working for you, I urge you to try this.

Evening Snacks in Mumbai

When I was working in Mumbai, I lived as a PG. PG Aunty gave us breakfast and dinner, and packed lunch for us to take to office. That accounted for three square meals a day.

But what about hungry evenings? I always get hungry in the evenings. Even now. Mumbai was no different.

If I spent the evening working in office, I would either order a sandwich from the coffee guy in the pantry, made to exact specifications (only one layer of butter, no onion, no toasting - only roasting, etc.), or if I had the time, I would go out to one of the two canteens in the SEZ in which my office was, and have a high-calorie snack. My favourite was the Sabudana Vada, which only used to be available on the usual fasting days of the typical Maharashtrian.

But when I left office early, I would come back to a near empty PG. Sometimes I would buy a packet of Maggi, cook it up and have it with tea. Or sometimes I would buy a 100 g pack of Amul Shrikhand and eat it all up at one go, unabashedly scooping it up with my hands and licking my fingers.

But most often, I had Dabeli. There was this little stall outside this awesome shop that sold the most head-whirringly fascinating foodstuff, called - Parry's (??) near where I lived. I would get down from the office bus, walk straight to the Dabeli man, and order a Dabeli. It was a small snack - peanuts and pomegranate seeds and masala sandwiched between two half-pieces of pav. It was just the right size - enough to quieten my hunger pangs, but not large enough to fill my stomach so much that I couldn't eat PG aunty's usually delicious dinner. I had Dabeli nearly every evening. I have never eaten Dabeli ever since I left Mumbai, though I have heard of it being sold around here. I once decided to make it myself, and even got Dabeli masala from my aunt in Pune, but I never got around to it.

I have a suspicion that I don't want to eat it again for fear that it will not reach the high standard that my brain remembers. But everytime I hear about Dabelis, my salivary glands start working overtime, I remember the smell, taste and look of the Dabeli, and the simple pleasure of my biting into the delicious snack, standing outside the shop overlooking the Gurudwara.

If my hunger was too large to be fed by a small Dabeli, I would have a Frankie further down the road. But Frankies dug too deep a hole in my pocket without giving me the requisite satisfaction in my stomach or my mind - so this was rare.

But what did provide immense Shanti to both stomach and mind was the peerless Lassi that was available in the Punjabi dairy shops on the same road. This Lassi came in a tall glass, and was thick, sweet and rich. The lassi man usually asked for your permission before he topped the lassi with a dollop of Malai. Thick cream. So thick that you could cut it with a knife. And so delicious that tears of joy would sting my eyes.

And this glass of heaven was available for just 12 rupees - or was it 15? Just one glass and it quenched my thirst, satisfied my hunger and energized me immediately. If you caught me at that point and asked me for anything, I would do it for you without hesitation.

Some things, I tell you - they make life more beautiful than it already is.

Kids' Food Recipes!

Here are a few recipes suitable for children - healthy and tasty, that work or have worked with Puttachi.

Oatmeal: Takes just two minutes to make - and you have a healthy, wholesome, tasty meal!
What you need:
A handful of Quaker oats
Milk
Sugar/honey/jaggery

How I make it:
1) Put the oats into a microwaveable bowl
2) Pour enough milk on it to just cover the oats.
3) Microwave for 2 minutes.
4) Take out the bowl, add milk to dilute the oatmeal, which would have become very thick. Adding cold milk brings down the temperature, ensuring that you can feed it to your child immediately.
5) Add sugar or honey or jaggery to taste.

Puttachi loves oatmeal. It tastes far better when sweetened with jaggery.

Wheat Dosa:
A handful of whole wheat flour
Milk
Salt
Optional: A tablespoon of rice flour for crispness, chilli powder, jeera, onions, other finely chopped vegetables - whatever, depending on your child's age and taste.

1) Add the flour into a bowl.
2) Add milk and stir so that no lumps are formed. Add enough milk to bring it to a dosa batter consistency.
3) Add salt to taste, and other ingredients of your choice, and mix well.
4) Spread it out like a dosa on a tava. A suggestion - make many tiny 2 inch circumference diameter dosas instead of one big one. Somehow, it tastes better!
5) Use ghee instead of oil for the dosa. Great flavour!
6) Serve as it is, or with anything - sugar, shrikhand, honey, ketchup, chutney, etc.

Btw, this is a great instant snack for adults too. Very tasty.

A kind of Soup:
1 carrot
1 tomato
1 onion
A handful of peas
7-8 string beans
A piece of beetroot/chow chow/any other vegetable lying around in your refrigerator
1 clove of garlic
1 potato OR two slices of whole wheat bread
3-4 1 inch cubes of paneer
A piece of cheese or a dollop of cheese spread
Milk
Salt to taste.

1) Cook all the vegetables together with salt.
2) Blend it all in a mixer with the paneer, bread (if you are using potato, cook it along with the other veggies) and milk.
3)Add a dollop of cheese spread or a cube of cheese, mix well and serve hot.

Puttachi just gobbles this up - it is an entire meal of its own - easy to make, great taste, healthy and filling.

Khichdi 1:
1:1 rice and split greengram (hesaru bELe). The split greengram has to be dry roasted until light brown before use.
Ghee
Jeerige (cumin seeds)
Vegetables - carrot, beans, peas, chow chow, etc., chopped
1 onion
Cloves of garlic - according to taste.
Ghee

1) Heat ghee in a small cooker, and add the jeera to it.
2) Add chopped garlic and chopped onion, fry in ghee until fragrant.
3) Add all chopped vegetables, and the 1:1 rice-dal mixture, and cook it all together until done.


Khichdi 2 (Huggi).
1:1 rice - split greengram (roasted)
Ghee
A few pepper corns (menasu)
A few cloves (lavanga)
A piece of cinnamon (dalchini)

1) Heat ghee, fry lightly pepper, cloves and cinnamon.
2) Add rice and dal and cook until done.
3) Be sure to remove the pepper, cloves and cinnamon before serving to the child.

Both the above khichdis, if cooked such that it is sticky, can be eaten by the child herself. If it is liquidy, she will need a spoon, or you might have to feed her.

Mini snacks:

Boiled potatoes mixed with cheese
Boiled peas on a plate
Pomegranate seeds

The peas and pomegranates are great for keeping the child occupied for a while :D

I will put up more kids' recipes as I discover them. I would also welcome such recipes from you! :)

All the best!

Sweetness

On Sunday night, we had been to a Gujarati and Rajasthani Special Dinner Buffet at a restaurant. Needless to say, I ate till I was fit to burst and enjoyed every mouthful.

What strikes me as unbelievable, even to myself, is that being such an avid food lover, and a person who is always looking to taste new things, I had never had a complete Gujarati meal, ever. Dhokla, yes, Gujarati snacks, oh yes of course. But a Gujarati meal? Never. So this was something new to me, and I loved the taste, especially the sweetness in all the dishes.

I have heard people say disapprovingly about Gujarati food - "Oh, but everything is sweet!" Well, everything is not sweet, as in completely sugary, but the dishes do have a distinctly sweet element in them. I can understand if people do not like it, but I, personally, quite enjoyed it.

Actually I have heard people complain about sweetness in food quite a bit. A Delhi friend of mine, working in Pune for a while, complained to me that the chicken preparations in Pune are sweet. I have heard people shake their heads disapprovingly about Bengali food and say that they add sugar to everything. I don't know about the chicken of Pune, but I have eaten Bengali food a number of times in my friend's place, and I have enjoyed it every time.

But what surprised me, was when someone, a few years ago, complained to me that Karnataka food is sweet.
"Sweet?" I said, "I don't think so."
"But you add jaggery to everything!"
"Ah, of course, but that is just a tinge of sweetness!"
"But it is sweet!"

Ah well, I guess what is normal for me is sweet for this person! And then I observed the food that my mom makes. Yes, that slight element of sweetness - is it there, is it not there... that mild. But it makes so much difference! I remember once when my mom was away and I made the huLi, and I tasted it to find that it was not satisfactory. When my mom came back, I said, "Amma, I have forgotten something! Not the tamarind, the salt is okay, the khaara is okay, but something is missing!" Mom tasted a bit of it and said, "Bella!" (Jaggery). I quickly added a teeny tiny piece of jaggery to the huLi, mixed it and tasted it, and lo, it was perfect! The sweetness is so mild that you cannot really make out its presence, but it does make a difference.

A good friend of mine, let us call her K, was my hostelmate when I was doing my post-grad in Tamilnadu. She married a man who worked in Bangalore, and came to live here. In one of her conversations, she told me, "Shruthi, you people add jaggery to everything!"
This conversation was old now, for me.
"Yeah", I said wearily, "just a little."
"But it is definitely sweet. I don't like it, really. There is no point going out to restaurants in Bangalore, I'd rather cook at home!"
In the same situation, I know people who would have said, "Baaaah! How can you eat such food?" But K is a decent and sensible sort, so she said, "Shruthi, how could you manage eating the food in Tamilnadu?"
"I had no choice! You can cook at home, but I couldn't do that, I had to eat in the mess!" I said.
Then I decided to be more gracious. "Oh, perhaps adjusting to no sweetness in your food is easier than adjusting to sweetness in your food, who knows?" I said.

Well, something that I don't even notice in my food, is such a deterrent for someone else!

BUT. Stating that "Kannadigas add something sweet to everything" will be a false statement. Even though S~ and I are both Kannadigas, and from comparatively similar families, our food is quite different. My mom-in-law doesn't add jaggery to any dish. It took me a very long time to pinpoint what the difference was. As always, we tend to find most comforting what we are basically used to, and so I still prefer that imperceptible tinge of sweetness in my food.

Food habits - fascinating, aren't they?

Ragi Mudde

On a discussion on a post on her blog, I saw that Shyam thought that Ragi mudde had to be swallowed. I don't blame her, I used to think so too.

Ok, wait, wait.... what is Ragi mudde? If you were around when our H.D.Deve Gowda was the PM, you wouldn't ask me this question. He is the one who made Ragi Mudde so famous.

(Joke doing the rounds at that time -
Q. Aaj Pradhan Mantri kis mudde par baat karenge?
A. Ragi mudde par. )

Anyway, let me tell you what Ragi Mudde (pronouced Moo-they) is. Ragi is Finger Millet , and Mudde means Lump in Kannada, so essentially, Ragi Mudde means Ragi Balls.

Traditionally, it has been the staple diet of the working class in Karnataka (at least). My mother tells me that when she was young, it was considered below your dignity if you admitted to making Ragi Mudde at home. Rice was the food of the upper class of society.

But now, with nutrition taking a front seat, Ragi has got its due. It is back in fashion. I think some of the thanks should go to Deve Gowda too.
I have seen more roadside restaurants serve Ragi mudde, than they did before.

Ragi Mudde is made by adding ragi flour to hot water, and stirring continuously such that no lumps are formed. The resulting thick matter is shaped into spheres, and served with a side dish.

Ragi also forms the first food of many babies in Karnataka. Ragi is sprouted, dried, ground, and then sieved with a very fine cloth. It is then made into a kind of porridge, adding the flour to boiling water or milk, and stirring continuously until cooked. Ragi malt is also made similarly. It makes a delicious drink when mixed with milk.

Another common Ragi food we ate as kids was Ragi Aralahittu/Hurihittu. Whole ragi is roasted on a hot surface, such that the grains pop, like popcorn, and these popped grains are ground and it is simply mixed with hot or cold milk and consumed. It was a typical evening snack for us, after we got back from school. I haven't had it in years and years, though.

Ragi Rotti is another tasty dish, a cousin of the more popular Akki Rotti(Made with rice flour). Ragi floor is mixed with water, and salt, spices and vegetables are added. The resulting batter is pressed into a roti, and roasted on a tava. Dosas also are made out of Ragi, with other ingredients. Ragi is also finding its way into fried snacks and bakery items, as in Ragi chakli, Ragi Biscuits, in the attempt to cash in on the health trend.

In fact, I myself add a handful of ragi flour to the wheat flour when making Chapatis. The chapatis turn out slightly crisper/harder, but the taste and health benefits make up for that.

Back to ragi mudde. When I was a child, my mom probably told me that ragi was the prefered food of the working class because it was nutritious, filling, blah, blah, and it could be consumed very quickly as it could be swallowed, and did not need chewing. Now I took this very seriously, and my flea-sized brain thought that ragi should NOT be chewed.

I would make each morsel as small as possible, put it far behind on my tongue like I was swallowing a pill, and then I would summon as much saliva as possible to lubricate the back of my throat, and swallow painfully, with some of the ragi sticking in my throat. I plain hated it, and declared war on it.

After many efforts to make me eat ragi, my mom decided to get to the bottom of the issue.

Mom: Why don't you like Ragi Mudde, Shruthi?
Me: I hate swallowing it!
Mom: Who asked you to swallow it?
Me: You did!
Mom: Shruthi, I said it COULD be swallowed, not SHOULD be swallowed!
Me: Then can I chew it?
Mom: Ayyo, please do!

Since then, I have been chewing ragi mudde and I really like it. Especially when eaten with Gojju (A vegetable dish made with tamarind and jaggery). Actually, it tastes pretty good with almost everything - huLi, saru, curds.

But there is a way to eat it.

Place the steaming Ragi mudde on your plate.
Make a hole on top, with your finger. Quickly, else your finger will burn!
Put a dollop of ghee into the hole.
Watch the ghee melt from the heat of the mudde.
Now, mix the ragi and ghee quickly.
Eat with side dish.
Enjoy.

And try not to think of Deve Gowda while you are at it.

Condensed Milk

Every Saturday, I read Vikram Doctor's excellent column in The Economic Times - "Garam Masala", and decide to blog about it that night. The muhurtha, as they say, had never arrived, until now.

Vikram Doctor, in my opinion, is a terrific food-writer. One, he loves his food. Two, he knows his food. Three, he has the knack of writing about it in a wonderful way. You are left mentally licking your fingers at the end of it.

Each time I read the column, I decide to alert my foodie readers about it, but then, as I said, I forget.

But this time, it didn't slip my mind - because this time, he wrote about condensed milk. Yes, that luscious, sweet, rich, sinful, viscous liquid that sends you straight to heaven with each delicious spoonful.

Vikram Doctor says it best -

As thousands of children have discovered over the years, condensed milk straight from the can is one of the most blissfully yummy things you can eat.

and

Both Nestle and Amul sell their condensed milk as an ingredient for home-made desserts, with recipes often provided helpfully on the can wrapper. I have never really been able to bring myself to make most of these, since good as they sound, they never sound quite as good as the plain product itself.

Heh!

Needless to say, S~ went out immediately after reading the article, and bought both Nestle's Milkmaid and Amul's MithaiMate. It had been so long, and man, am I enjoying it!

Do read the article. And yes, if you like your food, don't miss Vikram Doctor's column each week. You will not be disappointed.

Cerelac

I love Cerelac. I was fed Cerelac as a kid, and I am sure I dipped my spoon into my sis PeeVee's bowl when she was being fed Cerelac, but my happiest Cerelac days came much later.

Whem my cousin K1 reached the Cerelac-eating age, I would hang around during his feed-times, half for the joy of seeing the adorable fellow eat, and half in the expectation that he would leave some in the bowl, so that I could lay claim over that. And sure enough, he wouldn't eat all of it (thank you, K1), and I would lick the bowl clean.

When his brother K2 was born, I was a little older, and much cleverer. My aunt V and mom had roped me in to "help" feed K2, perhaps to keep me busy. I would receive instructions to prepare Cerelac for him. I would go to the kitchen, prepare Cerelac under somebody's guidance, and then take the bowl to my aunt for her to feed the little K2. Once they were sure I could do it on my own, they allowed me to do it without supervision a few times. Here's where I worked my plan. If they had asked me to prepare two spoons of Cerelac, I would prepare 3 spoons. The logic being, obviously, that K2 would waste more, and I would get more to eat.

I am not sure if my aunt V worried about why K2 had started eating less (she wouldn't, she is hardly the worrying kind), but if she did worry, and changed his feed in any way, I apologize for the lacuna, if any, in K2's nutritional input. But considering that he is now a strapping six-foot plus sportsman, I think it hardly mattered!

Anyway, after that, there was quite a gap before the next kid was born in the family, and I grew Cerelac-hungry. Once, when I was well into my teens, I poured out my tale of Cerelac craving to my sis P, and was quite surprised to see that she loved Cerelac too! We mentioned it to our parents, and they, sweet people that they are, gave us some money and asked us to go and buy Cerelac for ourselves. Ohmigosh! A full tin of Cerelac just for us! Both of us ran back home, mixed some Cerelac with milk, dug into it, found it bland, added sugar, and ah, bliss! That cured my Cerelac cravings - for the present. But a couple of years later, another cousin V was born, and sure enough, I ate his Cerelac too.

Now, just think, I have my own baby and I have full control over what I can do with her food - so I couldn't wait until I could start her on Cerelac. But the Doc advised me to start her on processed Ragi. I was shocked. What about Cerelac? Yeah, yeah, I know, Ragi is much more nutritious, and home-made stuff is always better, and the Little One is slurping up her Ragi, cooing and flailing her limbs in pleasure. But what about Cerelac?

Well, whatever it is, I am waiting for an opportunity to bring Cerelac home... errr.. for myself.

The making of a foodie

I am a person who thinks that food is one of the best things in life. Of course, you already know that. But just this morning, I got wondering about what makes a foodie, well, a foodie.

In my case, it involved having a mother who is not only a great cook, but also the kind who is not afraid to experiment. While growing up, we were never bombarded with the same dishes time and again. She always thought of a way to make food different and interesting. She never stuck to the rules of "Ok, this vegetable can traditionally be made into two types of dishes, so I will make one of those". She is the kind who improvises, who mixes and matches, and out of experience and an innate instinct, is able to turn out a dish probably never made before, but delicious all the same. So naturally, I always had something exciting to look forward to at mealtimes.

It also involved having a father who is not fussy, doesn't demand that such and such an item just has to be present in each meal, and who is never averse to mom's experimenting. He in fact, made the right appreciative gestures during meals and my mom was accordingly encouraged. Besides, being brought up in the north, he was accustomed to North Indian dishes, and my mom learnt them all very quickly after marriage, and so North Indian cuisine was a regular part of our food, along with the usual South Indian. Also, my parents' short stint in Germany probably got them started on continental food too - and after that there was no stopping them.

But of course, in spite of two food-oriented parents (politely expressed?), it isn't necessary that the children turn out to be foodies. My little sis P, for example, though she enjoys her food, is not much of a foodie. Not like me, who dreams of food all the time, and wakes up in the middle of the night craving some obscure dish.

One more thing. My advice to all you single people out there. When choosing your partner, do go in for someone with similar food tastes (if you care enough about food, that is!) I have seen some ill-matched couples, one of them itching to try out exotic cuisine, the other sticking religiously to Anna-Saaru. It is quite a painful sight.

I am very fortunate in that S is as good a foodie as I am, perhaps a level or two higher. Now my aim is to make sure that the Little One is appropriately introduced to the joys of fine dining. I know, I know, long time to go, but what's wrong in planning?

So are you a foodie, and what do you think made you one?

Have some more!

Warning: A rambling foodie post. Don't read it on an empty stomach and then sue me! :)

A lot of people mentioned "force-feeding" in the comments on my previous post. This is carried out very frequently in the name of "Upachaara". Upachaara in Kannada, means hospitable treatment. Probable equivalent is "Mehmaan ki Khaatirdaari". Making sure that the guest is comfortable and eats his fill and makes himself at home without any "Sankocha" (Hesitation arising from shyness).

[Since there are no English equivalents for Upachaara, Sankocha, etc., I will use these words in the rest of this post.]

The mark of a good host has traditionally been how nice he is to the guests - in other words, how well he does Upachaara. And what is the highlight of this Upachaara? Force-feeding.

I am sure that you have all been subject to this force-feeding at some point or the other. Some people do have a lot of Sankocha, and it is for these people that Upachaara might be necessary.

But nowadays I have seen that hardly anybody is really shy when invited to dinner. People eat their fill, and comfortably. [Or am I speaking for myself?]. I, for one, do not need any kind of Upachaara. If they have asked me to dinner, they had better have enough food for me - for I will eat as much as I want to. And conversely, if I am playing host, I assume that my guests are eating enough. Sometimes this can backfire. My guests might have a lot of Sankocha, and I end up saying, "Will you have another Chapati? No? Ok!" And then the guest might think, "Oh no, what a bad host, she has no idea how to do Upachaara!", and he goes home hungry.

So, my rule of thumb is, if a person does Upachaara, then he needs Upachaara.

I am sure you all have horror stories of being force-fed until you were ready to puke. My first such experience was at a classmate's house, where he had invited us for a birthday lunch. The food was delicious, but there were so many courses that I lost count. And it was the worst kind of situation - where all the food was not placed on the table, but was brought out course after course. So I ended up eating 8 puris with chhole, three large helpings of pulao with raita, and two large helpings of curd-rice, in addition to the side-dishes and papads and sweets and curries. And no, I did not ask for so much food, I was force-fed it. Rather, the food was heaped on my plate when I was not looking, and I just had to finish it, as we are taught not to waste food. After I staggered away from the dining table and went to the living room, they brought out huge containers of thick, sweet delicious vermicelli payasa. I nearly fainted. I ate the payasa over two hours.

I learnt my lesson. When invited to lunch, I shamelessly ask the host, please tell me what you have made, and whether there is dessert, so that I can plan my meal. Doesn't work in formal settings, but in such cases I eat very little of everything, and keep my plate closely guarded so that nobody heaps unwanted food on my unsuspecting plate.

Ok, why did I start talking about Upachaara here? The same Upachaara which I dread when I go to people's houses, comes as such a lovely surprise in restaurants. Seriously, have you heard of a waiter doing Upachaara?

My friend M and her husband B were in India last month. S and I went out for dinner with them and their four-month old baby. They wished to eat some good South Indian food - and they zeroed in on North-karnataka cuisine. The Kamat restaurants in Bangalore dish up some really good cuisine of this kind, and so we went to Kamat Minerva at Minerva Circle.

The restaurant is named "Upachaar"(yes!), and we went to the North-Karnataka section, where the specialty is the "Jolada Rotti" meal [Rotis made of Jowar].

The waiters were very attentive, they went out of their way to make it comfortable for us, and they laid out a separate chair for the baby's car seat. Ok so far so good, all restaurants do this.

Then they served us these delicious, light, soft, Jolada rottis on a banana leaf, with some really yummy side-dishes. They kept watch over our leaves, and came right up with hot rottis just as we put the last bite of the previous rotti into our mouths. They were right there, unobtrusive, but ever watchful. I lost count of the number of rottis I ate. I ate and ate, and ate. When my friend M felt that she had enough, she refused the next rotti the waiter offered. He stood there in horror. "Madam, how can you say no? You get ordinary food everywhere. This kind of food is special - you have to come all the way here if you want to eat this food. Take one more, do take one more". "How can I say no if you put it that way", asked M, and ate another. I took the hint and went on eating.

Finally I realized that I just had to stop, and told the waiter so. He tried to persuade me, but I was firm. He disappeared and came back with hot steaming rice. "No! NO rice please" I said. He stood by me with a pained expression. "Our drumstick sambar is very popular, very famous. You just have to taste it. You cannot leave without tasting it, Madam! Just a little, you won't regret it, madam!"

I relented. True to his word, he served a little rice, and before I could protest, he drained a whole spoonful of hot, fragrant ghee on the rice, and then served the drumstick sambar. I have to give it to him, it was indeed from another world. I wished I could eat more, and I would have, given that the waiter was standing by me with a pleased and expectant expression, rice piled high on his serving spoon, but I just had to say no. I wouldn't have been able to stand up, had I eaten any more.

Funny. The same Upachaara that would have been frustrating and exasperating in a domestic setting was such a welcome change in a restaurant. A very homely and comfy feeling. The restaurant hardly has much to lose by that Upachaara - but look what it gained. Publicity! :)

[Btw, Upachaara is not equal to force-feeding. Force-feeding is one of the major aspects of Upachaara, that's all]

What is your comfort food?

My comfort food is Saaru-Anna. Saaru is a kind of Rasam, but it is thicker - it has dal(pulses). Where Rasam is best drunk, Saaru is best mixed with rice (and.. err.. ghee) and eaten. But yes, Saaru can be drunk too, when you allow the thick dal part to settle down, and you carefully ladle out the watery part into a cup - best had hot.

There are varieties of Saaru too, with less dal, with only tomatoes, with only pepper, etc., but my favourite is the standard version - the one with dal and tomatoes, and a garnishing of asafoetida and mustard in ghee. And of course, topped with coriander and curry leaves.

Give it to me with soft, steaming hot rice (Anna), and sigh.. life is good.

But. But, when asked to name my favourite dishes, Saaru-Anna hardly ever figures in the list. But if I go for a week without eating Saaru, I start craving for it - and I feel like I have had a good meal only when I eat a plate full of hot Saaru-Anna.

Saaru-Anna was what I would request for while visiting relatives from the hostel, and my mom always made Saaru-Anna for the first meal when I came back home for the holidays. If I am recovering from an illness and don't feel like eating anything, it is usually only Saaru-Anna that is palatable.

I am a foodie, as I have said a number of times on this blog, and I love to taste new dishes. I enjoy the gastronomical delights of the place I am visiting, when I go on vacations or holidays. But when I come back, it is only Saaru-Anna that soothes my taste-buds (and also mind, body and soul).

I don't even need to eat this everyday - I can go for days on end without it. But when I do finally get to eat it, I feel at home. Its like that old pair of pyjamas - that gives you peace of mind.

I see this Saaru-Anna phenomenon all around me. My entire family, friends, most people I know who are accustomed to Kannadiga cuisine behave just like I do when it comes to Saaru-Anna.

So what is your comfort food? [Please mention the kind of cuisine you are originally accustomed to, along with your reply. Just a personal survey. Thanks :)]

The Meal on a Banana Leaf

..Or as we call it in Kannada, BaaLe Ele OoTa, has to be one of the best things in life. Any celebration in South India is incomplete without a sumptuous lunch served on a Banana Leaf. In fact, I admit shamelessly that there are a number of functions to which I go more for the lunch than for the event itself.

The importance of the food in such events, especially weddings, cannot be understated. Food is what the guest supposedly remembers even after he has forgotten the name of the bride and the groom, and how he is acquainted with them.

In fact, the caterer for my wedding had been decided three years before the groom was. Well, what I mean is that my mom and I had been to a friend's wedding, and the food was so wonderful, that my mom took the caterer's card, and when it was time for my wedding, it was this one that we contacted. And the food was fantastic!

A wedding feast is an event in itself. You are usually hungry and tired after talking to so many relatives/friends, whom you get to meet only at weddings. After all the smiling and talking, all you want to do is eat. So when you hear that lunch is ready, you run to the dining hall (unless you are unlucky enough to be closely associated with the couple getting married, in which case you get to eat only in the third pankti(batch) or so).

You sit at the table (it was cross-legged, on the floor, in the days when people were in good shape), in front of a fresh green banana leaf. You sprinkle some water on the leaf and clean it with your hands. Then you watch the food being served - in the preset order, in the preset positions on the leaf.

You wait desperately for the rice and ghee to be served, because only then are you supposed to start eating. Once it is served, you look around you to ensure that the older generation has started eating, and then you delve into the food.

You start off with the Payasa (Kheer), and then licking your lips, you eat the Thovve(simple, thick dal), which tastes fantastic despite how simple it is. Probably just your brain getting the pleasant signal that food is on its way. By that time, they arrive with the huLi (thick sambar with loads of vegetables), and you gobble it up in no time. Before the next item arrives, you have time to eat the mixed rice (Puliyogare, Bhaath or Chitranna), and sample the two different kinds of Kosambari(Mixed, garnished salad). You even taste the Gojju (A thick spicy preparation with a tamarind and jaggery base), and the Mosaru Bajji(Raita).

Just as you stretch out your hand towards the different kinds of Palya (Gravyless, vegetable curries), they arrive with more rice. Close on the heels of the rice comes the Saaru (A kind of Rasam), and you eat it with relish, mixing the Palya, and the HappaLa(Papad) with it.

Once you have savoured that, you sit back and crane your neck to see what the Bhakshya (sweet/s) is. Hurried exclamations to the person sitting next to you, expressing joy(usually) or disgust(extremely rarely) at the choice of sweets. Then you polish off the sweets with relish, and even as you eat them, along comes some kind of a fried savoury, like a Pakoda/Bonda, and you lose no time in eating that too.

In the middle of all this, some of the items make an appearance once again, and you have the choice to eat your favourite stuff all over again, if your stomach permits. Finally the Rice comes along again, followed by curds, which you mix and eat with salt and a little of the pickle.

Then you get up and wash your hands and leave the dining hall. A packet with a coconut and betel leaves is thrust into your hands. You look around for the nearest scapegoat on whom you can dump the coconut, and then do likewise.

Then you go back to the main wedding hall, where you can easily distinguish the guests who haven't eaten yet from those who have. The latter have this smug, satisfied look on their faces. And of course, a coconut in their hands.

An Ice Cream to Remember.

An inspiration. The seed of an idea. Built upon. Tried out with trepidation. Result - Astoundingly delicious.

If you like nuts, and if you like ice-cream, and if you like ice-cream with nuts, here is a very simple, but delicious recipe for you.

Discovered and prepared by none other than S himself.

What you need:

X Scoops of Vanilla Icecream. [X depends entirely on you.]
Tip: Amul icecream is a good choice ! It's tasty, light, and doesn't leave a greasy residue in your mouth.
Nuts of your choice. The more nuts, the better. [Excluding the chefs, of course.]
Tip: Badam and Pista is a great combination. But any kind will do.
Ghee - Just one teaspoon.

How to make it:

1) Break the nuts into sizeable chunks. So that you can easily get your teeth into them.
1a) Prevent predators from putting them in their mouths.
2) Lightly roast the nuts in the ghee, in a shallow pan, just until a maddeningly pleasant aroma rises up.
2a) The aroma will attract more predators. Keep a keen eye on the nuts.
3) Pour the roasted nuts into the icecream, and mix well.
4) Put the resultant gooey mass back into the freezer. Wait for about 15 minutes. Long enough to get the icecream to solidify again, and short enough to ensure that the nuts don't go soggy.
4a) Try hard not to keep opening freezer to see if icecream is ready.
5) Remove frozen icecream from freezer, and serve in glass bowls.[Appearances matter].
6) Gorge.

Very simple, yes. But absolutely scrumptious!!

What distinguishes it from ordinary ice-cream-sprinkled-with-nuts is that the nuts somehow release their flavour into the icecream during the 15-minute freeze. Also, The nuts are large and crunchy, and find their way into your mouth with each divine spoonful. You will find yourself licking the bowl after you finish.

Try it out! And if you like it, please do come back and let me know! And also, please pray that S gets more such brainwaves!

A short affair with Hyderabadi cuisine

Ok let me be frank. The object of this whole write up on Hyderabad was just to write about the food. Everyone knows I am a food freak, but still to keep up appearances, I wrote about the actual Hyderabad trip first. Anyway having got that off my back, let me plunge into the details :)

This trip was a gastronomical delight. I will not say anything further. Just check this out.

Breakfast at Minerva Coffee House, Somajiguda Circle : I had something called MLA Pesarattu. Pesarattu is a dosa which is made of Green gram(Moong dal). It is very nutritious and tasty. This MLA pesarattu is a variation. The pesarattu is folded like a Masala dosa, and instead of the potato curry in the middle, there is Uppittu! (Upma). It is a strange combination, but it is deadly! And along with it, the spicy chutneys and chutney-powder.. mmmmm ..... And in this place, the standard coconut chutney and sambar were so good, that after I finished the pesarattu, I took a spoon and ate the chutney and sambar just like that, which I never do! I topped this off with fantastic coffee.

Irani chai: Very different. Liked it? I think so :)

The wedding spread: There was chaat, Italian, Chinese, Thai, North Indian, South Indian, icecreams and Paan. Everything was very tasty, but the chaat deserves a mention. There was pani puri, bhelpuri, alu tikki with channa, and ... here it comes... Tava Sweet. Now this was totally new to me!

This guy has this hot sizzling tava. He puts a little of petha, rasagollas, badam barfi, sweet vermicelli, khova(mewa), then some more miscellaneous sweets, then adds some nuts, and then heats it all with rabdi/badam milk. Then he serves it sizzling hot in a cup. I went totally nuts over it. I lost count of how much I ate. Like one of the guys was saying, next time after Diwali, take all the leftover sweets, mash them up, heat them on the tava, pour some badam milk and eat. :)

Hotel Paradise, Secunderabad:
Lunch the next day. Biryani at Paradise Persis, Secunderabad. Now before you ask, I am a vegetarian, and I KNOW that the specialty is non-veg biryani, and since I do NOT eat non-veg, please do not say "Oh you don't know what you are missing!" :)Anyway I ate this really yummy Alu Biryani and Egg Biryani. It was so different... the "biryani" I am familiar with is all spice and oil and it totally coats your tongue and leaves you panting. But this was so good... delicately flavoured... a treat to the palate. I found only recipes of meat biryanis on the web... can anybody please guide me to a good veg biryani recipe?

Now comes the piece de resistance -Khubani ka Meetha . This is a sweet dish made of stewed apricots - a Hyderabadi special. If my tummy was not bursting with biryani, I would have finished off all the Khubani ka meetha in the restaurant. Each spoonful took me to paradise (pun not intended). I can still taste it.... The luscious pulp of the fruit, the exotic fragrance... sigh!

Also worth a mention is Venkateshwara coffee house in Lakdikapul, near the hotel where we stayed. It makes some delicious breakfast. And the most wonderful Badam Milk ever.

One of the guys was going on and on about all the other places we did not visit and all the other stuff we did not taste. I have only one thing to say to Hyderabad - I'll be Back.