Hand of taste.

The only thing which linger in my mind after Diwali is the Ladoos .It happened all of a sudden, the planning and organizing a Diwali fest in our school, the interior decorations to do, the dishes to prepare. Yes, everything happened all of a sudden.We decided upon Badusha, samosas and Ladoos, of all three , words stammered when the word Ladoo was uttered, even the fingers trembled when we wrote Ladoo on the menu card. All this left us to have a food trial for Ladoo. I would rather call it a Ladoo trial.

Chef B, is very much confidant and revealed the secret recipe for Ladoo, its color and consistency.His excessive confidence words gave self assurance to everyone present in the kitchen, the result of the food trial - Excess sweet, poor color, and uneven size. Food trial is an experiment , perhaps there is always a chance to learn from the mistakes.

On the day of our school Diwali fest, the process went like this for preparing Ladoos. Bengal gram flour batter, deep fried into tiny boondis with a perforated spoon, the fried boondis went directly into warm sugar syrup, after twenty minutes the soaked boondis were spread out on a tray for shaping(Round shape). Unlike the food trial , the Ladoos turned out perfect, but I sensed some stammering when we uttered the word perfect.

A day after , its Ladoo again at Amaravishi place, the deep fried gram flour batter resulted in soft boondis , then the marriage between the boondies and the sugar syrup began by pounding it with a ladle, which lasted for twenty minutes, not to forget the fried nuts , the shaped ladoos were beyond perfect. There was a balance in everything, now you know the reason why only ladoos linger in my mind after the festival of lights.

I'm not comparing the three Ladoos, its picking the best among all. In future if I come accross any other ladoo, the Ladoo at Amaravishi's place remains the best. I do not want to research the reasons behind it, because I beleive something called Hand of taste in cooking, and it exists in great quantity at Amaravishi's kitchen.

Pancake, pancake & poppyseeds

Whats the name?
The customs of our community in nilgiris are myriad, and the food’s and our eating habits is also the same, there are many who visit our village just to Eat, Eat and Eat. More importance is given to quantity and no wonder many guest get tired, tasting the cup of tea in all our houses. Many from nilgiris know that our community is notable for its hospitality.

I still remember my early years in my village. Those raw plums we pluck, those huts we built with ferns, of all those early memories, and my favorite pancake and the pancake fest are just in front of my eyes. Those pancakes we prepare for the dead ones and cows, the name of the fest is Sakalathy. Star, moon, sun, snake and many things were depicted in front of our houses with ashes from the kitchen, in the center of the front yard a large brass plate with rice; udhaka (badagas gravy) and pancake were presented for the cow, which visit every house to taste, a sign of good luck.

After the cow, it’s the ghost’s turn; it is believed that the dead one’s from each family will eat the pancakes which we throw in to the green bush, and all the little boys join together with handful of pancakes walking towards the south side of village, where it is surrounded with GREEN trees and bushes. As soon as you reach the green, think of your dead grand parents and throw the pancakes in to the wild, I do not know what happens to the pancakes, because we are not suppose to turn back and look at our pancakes.

Today I hardly see any kids with pancakes and I do not see any green trees and bushes, the south parts of our village is crowded with buildings, buildings and buildings. Those were the years gone and it creates a nostalgia in me. The year was 1990 and the name of the village is MANJITHA


Note: the humble pancake contains, refined flour, salt, water, and cooking soda, the batter is then cooked on a griddle, both thin and thick versions are there, for thick pancakes along with abovementioned ingredients sugar, grated coconuts are added. Coconut milk with sugar and poppy seeds accompanies our badagas pancake.

Icecream Fried

Fried Icecream

Yes.. its easy , but has to be prepered well in advance..not a quick dessert tough.
The general principal involved in making Deep Fried Ice Cream is to coat a frozen ball of ice cream in an egg batter, then roll it in cornflakes or cookie crumbs, taking care to make sure the ice cream is fully covered so it doesn’t melt when briefly cooked in the hot oil.
Another variation is to tightly form pound cake around the ice cream before frying instead of battering it in the cornflakes or cookie crumbs.
Making Fried Ice Cream is surprisingly easy and doesn’t require exotic or expensive ingredients. However since the ice cream has to be refrozen several times to achieve the best results, Fried Ice Cream is more of a make ahead rather than an instant gratification dessert, so you’ll probably prefer to make it a day or so before you plan to serve it.
Popular toppings for Fried Ice Cream include powdered sugar, whipped cream, drizzled honey, and/or chocolate, caramel, maple, or butterscotch syrup. Fried Ice Cream is also wonderful topped with chopped nuts or fruit.
The dessert is commonly made by taking a scoop of ice cream frozen well below the temperature at which ice cream is generally kept, possibly coating it in raw egg, rolling it in cornflakes or cookie crumbs, and briefly deep frying it. The extremely low temperature of the ice cream prevents it from melting while being fried. It may be sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar and a touch of peppermint, though whipped cream or honey may be used as well.
If fried ice cream is coated in raw egg prior to deep frying, the egg may remain uncooked due to the low temperature of the ice cream. If the egg is not carefully prepared or stored beforehand, the dish may cause salmonella food poisoning.

Tempura batter: A light batter is made of cold water and soft wheat flour. Eggs, baking soda or baking powder, starch, oil, and/or spices may also be added.

HAPPY FRIED ICEREAM!

I , Fish and Fishes

Try This @ Hotel Riyas, Near Yakkara BRidge, West Yakkara, Palakkad.

Ph: 9447604267, 0491 - 2529975

Seafood Sunday...

Crab, Fried fishes , Prawns, and more intrestingly Squid and Octopus, all these went in with a slow and steady phase. I did not expext my sunday lunch would be full and only of seafoods. The dishes were beyond expectations.


I, along with ten other food lovers, went on a long drive to hotel Riyas near Yakkara Bridge, Palakka, Kerala.We reached just in time for the lunch, with Riya's overwhelming happiness we were showered with great Hospitality.

Fourteen banana leaves covered the table with eleven of us surrounding.First came the prawns, four plates with two mildly spiced and two highly spiced, the jumbo king size prawns were huge with Riya's secret recipe, the taste was astounding. The flesh was firm and to the bite, what an appetizer to start with.

The second course consists of six varieties of fishes, all whole and all fried, all six with diffrent mouth feel, all our fingers and mouth worked without a break. The way the fish is presented is so good , even the Vegans will try the fish.

Three plates of crab with four crabs in each plate was our next course, The mouth watering river crabs took time to eat with bot our hands. A glass of sour buttermilk as sorbet inbetween the courses, truly refreshed our taste buds and increased our eagerness to the next seafood.

With Riya's suggestions and comments in between , with mouth full of fish and crab, the eating and enjoying seafood went on and on. Then came the real delicacy of our day, the squid, and Octopus, cut in to roundles and cooked with mild spice, The way the dishes were served is soo good, I strongly beleive that food is first eaten with eyes, then with nose and at last with mouth. We paid around forty five hundred which is less for Riya's food and hospitality. to end with , its worth travelling all the way to Riya's to taste the seafood delicacies.

Hotel Riyas,Near Yakkara Bridge, Wesy Yakkara, Palakkad. Phone: 0491 - 2529975, Mob: 09447604267.

Who stole my Larousse Gastronomique?

The worst day in my life, I lost my Larousse Gastronomique, it is an encyclopedia of gastronomy. Its the first cooking session for the freshers after a few sessions of demonstrations. I was happy with the kashmiri menu, the same happiness were with the students. Being the first session I was not verymuch concerned with the dress code and observation. Everyone knew the menu, and stood without knowing the recipe.

The briefing was a long one, which left no doubt in them about the recipe, the menu was Kashmiri pulao, Mutton rogan josh and Phirnee. As soon as the table was alloted for the students to cook, my mind was covered with the flavour of chocolate and cocoa. With an eye on the kashmiri menu, I started preparing my favourite Brownies. The recipe was simple and my own version, melt hundred grams of butter and mix in two hundred grams of sugar,mix in two beaten eggs, add fifty grams of cocoa and hundred grams of refined flour sieved along with half teaspoon of baking powder, add one teaspoon of chocolate essence, pour in the mould and bake at onehundred and seventy five degree celcius for thirty minutes.After thirty minutes , I was happy with the outcome, three bars of Brownies with the awesome color and flavor, which created a nostalgia in me.

Students were ready with the presentation, on one table the pulao was mashed and on the other the mutton was dried up, looking at this my Brownies happiness faded quickly, but being the fisrt cooking session, what the students prepared is not bad at all. They created a good impression, I started planning more activities for them in the days to come. All off a sudden ,everything shattered, including their fisrt impression, when someone stole my Larousse Gastronomique. Than the person who stole it, I am ashamed of having them in my cooking session.

Coffee Alco...

IRISH COFFEE
An alcohol drink made from black coffee, sugar, and irish whiskey, toppped with fresh cream. To prepare irish coffee, warm a tall glass and pour in 1 good measure of Irish whiskey.Add about 2 teaspoon sugar, then fill the glass to within 3 cm of the top with very strong hot coffee. Mix to dissolve the sugar, then carefully pour double(heavy) cream over the back of a teaspoonwhich is just touching the surface of the coffee, so that the cream floats on the surface of the coffee. Once the cream is added do not stir.

The original Irish coffee was invented by Joseph Sheridan, a head chef at Foynes, County Limerick. Foynes' port was the precursor to Shannon International Airport in the west of Ireland; the coffee was conceived after a group of American passengers disembarked from a Pan Am flying boat on a miserable winter evening in the 1940s. Sheridan added whiskeyto the coffee to warm the passengers. After the passengers asked if they were being served Brazilian coffee, Sheridan told them it was Irish coffee.

Never mind, any whiskey will do, the only part to concentrate is the coffee, which should be very hot and very very strong. When whiskey is not available , try with the available alcohol, Rum, brandy or……. . When coffee is not available, will tea act as a substitute.

HAPPY ALCO COFFEE……

Onasadhya

A day before Onam, Its 1st of September and we together celeberated Onam, a great start for the asociation activities in our school. All the traditional dishes were there as goes the traditional customs. Mr. Gismon (as King Mahabali) who greeted everyone nad wished happy Onam was an additional attraction. Tough the day started for me at five am , I enjoyed the day wich ended as sweet as the Pal ada pradamam. The traditional dance and the music made everyone happy , around five in the evening everyone parted with the holiday mood, as the 2nd september is holiday for Onam in Tamilnadu.

A sudden surprise on the 2nd of september, and a long drive to Kerala and I am there for the Onam lunch. I thank Amaravishy for the great Onasadhya. I started with rice and sambar, along with went Avial, Cabbage porial and other accompaniments. Then the taste of adapradamam and at last, rice with curd to finish with. The best hospitality with the best food, What else. Onam will not be better than this.

From the Chef Gokul Krishnan

After a long time it happened, a menu compiled, prepared and presented by a student. Mr. Gokul Krishnan, the final year student came with a menu for the cooking session, the menu was a fusion with Chicken chowder, Corn fried rice, Pan fried fish, Sichuan vegetables and Chocolate mint mousse, a perfect fusion menu.

The main aim is to involve the students in purchasing, because if your purchasing is bad then, what follows is really bad. I have been insisting the students to come up with their own menu, so that they learn from the scratch, from the menu planning to the purchasing, to the mis en place, preparation and presentation. Where the students demonstrate and everyone learns including the teacher.


Nothing wrong in questioning, when you are in doubt and when we start accepting our mistakes and correct ourselves, learning becomes more interesting. Once a student of mine, corrected me on the pronunciation of Pizza, and Jalapeno. I learned and very much happy about it. Ironically, in many occasions the students become passive listeners and the effective teaching and listening just fades away after thirty to forty minutes.

The fusion menu, was a result of interaction, and a little of inspiration, I said the dishes will be video graphed and I promised to send the video CD’s to hoteliers, I expected at least a couple of them to come up with different menu, only Mr. Gokul saved my expectations from shattering. Now I see student with new menus and suggestions for the future cooking sessions. I strongly believe that they were really interested in cooking than video coverage of their dishes.

Anyways with Gokul’s fusion menu, everything went well, we ate, we ate and most of all we learned. I thank my well-wisher who advised and helped me for the video coverage. I could have started this long before (Video grapy). But, I did not know then, though, I know now what to do.

Sweet Sunday

Vishnu, my neighbour invited me home for Ganesh Chaturthi, I was not in pink of health, so did my palate. I expected sweets and more sweets and I doubted my palate, becaues when your body temperature is abnornmally high, our own taste buds will deceive us, everything what touches our tongue is bland, just bland.

But with Vishnu's , everything is perfect, tough I had a fever, the taste of the dishes were beyong expectation. with lord Ganesh in mind, I thanked Vishnu for starting my sunday sweet. A glass of hot rice payasam(Kheer) , with some small tiny tempered rice flour dumplings and the delecious sweet which I kept munching and munching.

The recipe is simple and the final dish is impressive. Make a dough with riceflour, salt and water, divide in to even size balls, flatten with palms and stuff it with melted jaggery and grated coconuts, seal it make a dumpling. The dumplings are then steamed for thirty minutes and served either hot or cold. For the savoury part, the same dough is divided into small balls, steamed for thirty minutes and then tempered with mustard, and curry leaves. With a glass of hot rice payasam , everything is perfect. After an hour the taste still lingers in me and my fever gone, I start wondering how?

The quick and the best

Five years ago , I used the phrase"the quick and the best" for the delicious Muffins, the preperation time is not long and the ingredients is not much. The varieties is as many, which you can enjoy to the fullest, an accompanying sweet sauce is better, with just tea and coffee the Muffins are the best.

When the ingredients are measured precisely the baked muffins is a real treat for the waiting tastebuds. The flour in the muffins gives its structure, the eggs help in binding and raising, the fat softens the muffins and the sweetness is acheived by adding icing sugar, a pinch of baking powder in the end will give a perfect raise and softness.

Any fruits can be added for the variety and the same applies to the essence, a teaspoon of cocoa powder gives a wonderful brown color and a drop of chocolate essence give a great flavor, now a simpe recipe for this awesome sweetbread.

Cream sixty grams of margarine and mix in ninety grams of icing sugar, cream to a soft and fluffy consistency and add two beaten eggs, mix well. Add ninety grams of refined flour sieved with one teaspoon of baking powder to the egg mixture, mix well to a battery consistency, forgent not the essence of your choice and pour it in a greased muffing cup or any small cup, bake for twenty minutes at two hundred degree celcius. after twenty minutes, all you need is a good palate and some time to enjoy.

The Chinese and Chocolate pudding

'The first proper briefing' thats how i call it, I showed all the ingredients in google image , so that Mr.G will learn more and be precise in purchasing , and to our favor the purchasing was perfect and the menu its Egg drop spinach soup, Stir fried beef with brocolli, Hakka noodles and chocolate pudding. Again it was a bulk cooking where the rule is, to join together, cook together, eat , clean together and then continue with the dishes, because almost all dishes taste good when it is hot. To start with there is no complication with the soup ingredients, just wash the spinach more than once and stir the eggs at correct time for a perfect shred. The happy soup entered our hungry stomach more happily . A good appetizer A good start.

Stir fried beef with brocolli is Vishy's favourite, which turned out really good . I started with ten pieces of beef for a demo.Which made us use the remaining all of beef and brocolli, what a wonderful combination , our hands and mouth never rested untill we finished the last part of it. With just five meat eaters in our group, seven hundred and fifty grams of beef with two small brocolli vanished in ten minutes after presentation.

The mild tasting noodles is not at all bad with an extra dash of garlic sauce , with all our attention focused towards chinese we completely forgot our Chocolate pudding in the oven, the unique part of the pudding is we never followed any recipe, but knew the functions of all the ingredients which went in to it . This is what i tell everyone, learn the functions of the ingredients, if your dish turns bad, learn from it. Cooking is all what we do,what we invented. Else, still hunted birds and raw flesh should play the major part of our diet.

Together it was a happy ending with stomach full of food and heart full of happiness, I wish the students to learn more and more in the future cooking sessions. After a happy re- briefing about all the dishes, the unhappy Mr. G came with his words of distress, only then I knew that he will not continue with us, and my google image search for ingredients stops here. Before the next cooking session hope someone comes in the place of Mr.G.

HAPPY COOKING!

The Dancing Drink

The best part in Manjitha, is our wedding. Not because of its traditional custom and costume,or not because of our music and dance, above all we have drinks all around. Yes almost all love wedding because drinks all around, the same kind of love applies to our festivals also which happens yearly once. But wedding? Only God knows when

I remember the day, where i was besieged with bottles of brandy, rum and whiskey. And I in the middle acting as a bartender, there is not much of mixology to worry about and I'm happy because its my sisters wedding. I remember my father saving bottles months before the wedding which numbered to one hundered and thirty seven. Its not a surprise to see all the people took their drink neat, and only a very few enjoyed their drink with slow even pace.

I agree with the bitter taste of alcohol, which makes our face frown without our knowledge, but there is always a better way to beat that frowning face. Of all the taste buds we have, atleast one will surely identify the flavor and taste of alcohol, that depends on how you drink. I'm not recommending everyone to drink , but there is nothing wrong in tasting ; a sip of this and a sip of that, is just an apperitif . In Manjitha when it comes to drink there is no diffrenece in age, gender and class - The only thing I'm happy about alcohol.

There is some unhappy part also, people who give impotrance to alcohol than their childrens education, people who give importance to alcohol than their bed ridden mother and many such cases.. for everything there is always an excuse, a filthy lame excuse and this is where i hate the part played by the alcohol.

As said earlier a sip of this and a sip of that is not at all bad, tasting the drink offered by the world of alcohol is a gift indeed, so I'll say Drink, Drink, Drink ,. But do not get drunk, because when you are drunk and full of alcohol, I'm sure you will forget the best moments in your life. So before getting started, make a point to drink with music , dance and happiness and to remember the happiness forever and not to wake up next day with a hangover. I'll end by offering you a dancing drink untill the next post.

HAPPY DRINKING!

The Second cooking session...

With lot of hope , and with lot of energy the second cooking session started and ended well. Mr.G's perfect purchase was an additional support. Though the number of students were less, the briefing took solid twenty minutes.The result, we ended up in bulk cooking.Sweet corn soup, chicken chilli, soft fried egg with noodles and Dates wontons, all eleven joined together with the mis en place.

We started with the soup, and it would have been more better with a good pepper powder, because the compound pepper which we used didn't increse its spiciness, anyways everything is good when it comes to bulk cooking. A piece of batter fried chicken along with the soup seduced our tastebuds for a second and a third help. Its a long term practice to prepare and present all the dishes before consuming, but for this menu , i made everyone to dink the soup before starting the second dishes, because Sweet corn is good when its served hot, and not all soup taste vichyssoise when its served cold.

The noodles was mildly seasoned , just with soy and hoisin sause. The best part is the soft fried egg, rather shallow frying, we deep fried it. The white got gently firm and the yellow was liquid inside, the feel you get when the yolk flows in your mouth is beyond explained. Chicken chilli is as usual - everyone's favourite and dates wontons tasted diffrent. In a comprehensive manner the cooking session created a Shinkows nostalgia. Hope the same energy remains with all the students for our third cooking session.

Shinkows- Chinese restaurant @ Ooty.

For your ears only.....

I give lot more importance to purchasing ingredients for cooking.I beleive that is what makes the end product what it is.Not just blind indent and identification of ingredients is enough for purchasing, when it comes to cooking ingredients a little amount of sense is as essential as salt to any dish.Our indent is a very eloborate one, indeed i write both in english and tamil, with special specification if any. Our purchase incharge is very clever with money, and with clear eyesight his identification of ingredients is excellent, but the ear? Yes, he is having an earing problem, not only the words which enter his ear fades, but also the cooking.

Mr.G has been our purchase incharge for past two year, and everything is perfect in him except his ears. He is verymuch happy with himself, but for peoples around him? everything appears upside down.

Once I indented for crab which we call Nandu in tamil, after hours and hours Mr.G came empty handed only to explain that there is nothing called Nandu(Crab) among shellfish, after which I found that he took my Nandu( crab) for Vandu, which he serched hours and hours at Ukkadam fish market. Its my mistake no proper briefing was given before the purcashe.

Mr.G's eating habit is exemplary and will do anything, when it comes to food. He loves argument and its very difficult to win him, because whatever we say never enter his humble ear, he never waited for the finial touch of the dishes and eats everyting for A to Z what we cook.

For past several months , I did not had any problem with his purcahse , after the crab incident, I explained each and every ingredient before hand, certain times its hard to explain staranise and mace in tamil, he often have problem with NO ( numbers) and Kg ( kilo grams), once he purcahsed twenty kilos of apples where the indent says only twenty numbers.

The real problem is in purchasing for continental menu, and I'm happy teaching indian menu, he copies down the ingredients in local language with his own handwriting . Last week he forget to purchase Bacon( Smoked belly of pork) , after explaining him , what and how bacon is, we had Mr.G back in the kitchen after thiry minutes with Bagon spray in his hand. Bacon and Bagon, no big diffrence to Mr.G's ear, but the cooking session?

I don't want to take chances with Mr.G's purcahse , so I planned to sit and teach him each and everyting , before he leaves for purchase, and today he bought peanut butter for prawns. Wher do i start? How do i start?

A new start

( Manjitha - Runner up - in a tournament at Berhatty Village )

(From left - Standing - Sathish, Vinoth, Rajesh, Rajkumar, Arun, Naran, Yaswanth .Sitting - saravanan, Thiag, jai ganesh, Prasanth, Siripu)

From Manjitha:

Long were the days gone, where Manjitha was full of Cricket and happiness, we play hockey, soccer and what not.But, cricket was our all time favourite. We play in our front yard with dust pan as stumps.I remember the bouncy ball which Sasi( Appa) Stitches with long strips of colored cloths with his unrevealed secret. I remember various tournaments we played, in all, Manjitha had a special place. I remember all our fans, all the applaues, all the broken hearts. I remember the silent tears and the never ending happiness.

Srini's super six were just in front of my eyes and the same goes with Thiag's medium pace left bowling. I remember Sasi (Appa) wicket keeping and Kunna senthil's fast bowling, Ranjith's master stroke and Ashok's throw bowling. Everyone felt envy towards Ashok and Ashok's for organising a wonderful tournament, i still remember the winning moment.

I remember ravi's blind bowling and Dilip's defence stroke. Jai's energy and Hari's excitement. Rajesh the all rounder was always out of the scene. Tough we played with tennis ball, we had massive audience and meticulous commentators, not to forget the third umpire.

A tiny little space is enough for us to play Test matches.Yes , Manjitha was full of cricket, but those were the days gone, what happen to everyone? everything ended with our schooling and today its a new start with our favourite blue jersey and green faces. I Pray , the hapiness last forever.

Tiny little wontons

Almost twenty confidant eyes, nodded before I revealed the recipe foa a chinese menu. I was happy to start the cooking session after thirty long days. Everyone was happy with the menu, but the menu was not a balanced one, the color, cooking methods and the texture was almost same for all the five dishes. The briefing took sixty minutes and their confidant level grew higher and higher.Perhaps , their Six months Industrial exposure training which they finished a month ago must be the reason for their confidant level. I told them, its an experiment and never stick to the recipe, know the functions of the ingredients and apply accordingly.

Everyone took position on their respective tables, looking at their confidant level, i stopped monitoring them and started cooking tiny little wontons, the filing were mushrooms and the dip a spicy garlic sauce. I fried a few and steamed a few, everything went well with the spicy garlic sauce, after seventy minutes i went around to see what twenty chefs and chefies have prepared. Their confidance deceived me, their nodding was just a false impression, rather cooking everyone experimented with the dishes and damaged it as worse as possible.

Table number one fried the whole leg of chicken, rather deboning and cutting into dices for "Chicken in hot garlic sauce". I said to saute garlic with soy, tomato sauce and add stock and then to thicken it with cornflour paste, but table number three , thickened the stock itself with cornflour, the wierd scene went on and on with each and every table . The fried rice with diffrent color and diffrent texture and all possible shapes of wontons, all fried with and withour filling. I am suppose to taste all the dishes and comment on them, but i went back to my table only to eat the tiny little wontons which i prepared ( Sometimes food will lessen our stress /depression/sadness/guilt). I did not comment on any of the dishes nor i tasted any, because it was I who briefed the recipe of an unbalanced menu and I promised to do better next time.

Secret Recipe..

From next week its “Eat what you cook”, it doesn’t meat that I will stop dining out, twice a week its “Eat what others cook”. With inspirations from Amaravishy, I shifted to a new location, in real, there is nothing much to shift, I am learning purchasing.
Boiling milk on the first day is very auspicious, we all know that. I purchased a Stove where you have to pump for pressure and use kerosene as fuel. My first purchase was a real bad one, because if you stop pumping the flames goes down and the first day I pumped for continuous fifteen minutes to boil half liter milk.
Where do is start, the first day with and without any ingredients to cook, we managed with milk and biscuits and for brunch, a good restaurant (Annapoorna) nearby with wonderful sambar and slightly on the higher selling price is one which I chose for dinner, rather dining out I packed four masala dosas home. The waiter made me wait thirty minutes only to say that there were no more masala dosas, then why did he took the order?
His response was an alternative tomato masala dosa, without the potatoes, I didn’t mind, just drinking sambar for dinner would be enough. Everyone in Coimbatore knows about that popular sambar, one of my student who worked there, as supervisor couldn’t get the recipe, at last he gave up after six months. So what? It’s an assignment and an experiment for the next cooking session, where the students will prepare sambar similar to that of Annapoorna ‘s sambar. Experimenting with so many sambar recipes is a good teaching and learning experience, but soon will try to find and reveal the secret.

A sample recipe:

Ingredients

Sambar Thoor dhal- 1 cup Any Vegetable of your choice- 1 cup (drumstick, carrot, beans, raddish, kohl rabies) Onions- 2 (chopped) Tomatoes- 2 (chopped) Tamarind extract- 1/2 cup Sambar Powder- 1 tsp Red Chili Powder- 1 tsp Turmeric Powder- 1/4 tsp Asafetida Powder- 1/8 tsp Garlic- 3 flakes (crushed) Mustard Seeds- 1/2 tsp Urad Dhal- 1/2 tsp Salt Oil- 1 tablespoon Chopped coriander leaves (cilantro)

methodPressure cook thoor dhal with garlic and mash well. Steam the chopped vegetable with onions, tomatoes, turmeric powder and salt. Mix the cooked thoor dhal and steamed vegetables together. Add tamarind extract, red chili powder, asafetida and sambar powder. Boil this until the raw smell of tamarind vanishes. Heat oil in a small pan. Add mustard seed. When it starts to pop add urad dhal and fry until it becomes golden. Remove from fire. Pour this seasoning over the sambar mixture. Heat for 5 more minutes. Garnish with chopped coriander leaves .

neither soup nor stew

GOULASH:
A Hungarian beef soup named after the keepers of Magyar oxeb( gulyas). The origin of this dish, which is now made with onions and paprika and garnished with potatoes, dates back to the 9th century. At that time , it consisted of chunks of meat stewed slowely until the cooking liquid completely boiled away. The meat was then dried in the sun and could be used later to prepare a stew or a soup, by boiling up in water.

Traditionally, goulash is made in a special cauldron(bogracs). There are number of regional variants according to the cut of beef and the cooking fat used( pork fat or lard) , but purists agree that goulash should not include flour or wine, nor should soured cream added just before serving. Hungarians regard Viennese goulash as a flout- thickened version of genuine goulash soup: in Hungary the latter is sometimes served with potatoes and csipetke( small quennells of egg pasta, poached in stock)

RECIPE:

Peel 250 gm onions and slice them , Cut 1 kg beef in to large pieces( 80gm each) . Melt 100gm fat in a large casserole. when it is hot, put the meat and onions and brown them. Add 500 gm of quartered tomatotes , crushed clove of garlic, mixed herbs , salt pepper and finally 1 tbsp of paprika .Add enough stock to cover the meat, bring to the boil,then reduce the heat, cover and cook for 30 mins.Add quatered potatoes and boil till the meat is cooked. Adjust the seasoning.

Paprika: a spicy seasoning ground from a variety of sweet red pepper.

In the Soup

The Larousse Gastronomique defines soup as a liquid food served at the beginning of meal or for lunch, a snack, etc. Like this there are so many definitions, and we too order soup at the beginning of a meal, thinking the purpose of soup, that is to increase the appetite, but many times the purpose deceive us.
I would call the soup as our first food, when humans invented cooking some nine thousand years ago, they wouldn’t have thrown away the water in which the meats/vegetables were cooked. So consuming both the liquid and meat/vegetable comprise the definition soup.
Unlike today where bread and bread rolls were served alongside, traditionally the soup was poured in a bowl with slices of bread in it, which makes the bread soft by the time one consumes it. Is bread an accompaniment for soup or the soup a tenderizer for bread, whichever way it is, soup and bread always marry well.
Another definition say ‘Soup is a food that is made by combining ingredients such as meat, vegetables in stock or hot boiling water, until the flavor is extracted forming a broth’. A wonderful definition. Only when it is flavorful it will increase your hunger. But, Gazpacho a cold soup is prepared by grinding all the ingredients and emulsifies with oil, it is not only flavorful but also avoids the boiling procedure.
Both the definitions of soup has the presence of meat/vegetable or any solid food, but again the soup Consommé is a highly flavored clear soup without any meat or vegetables in it, why Consommé. Our own Rasam have all the features of a soup and is an excellent appetizer.
For a long time the evening meal in France consisted solely of soup, so one drinks the liquid, chew the meat/vegetable, with or without breads. The stomach is full and no further courses; today the same heavy soups still occupy the place under Appetizer. Once I mistook tomato soup for sauce and started spreading it on the sliced bread, the soup was so heavy and thick which makes you to dip some snacks into it.
Rather finding fault with soup it is better to know what one order, because soup always goes in first and not to forget that our stomach needs some space for the remaining courses. The classification of soup is myriad and will confuse you more on that next time. By the time you can say what is your favorite soup.
HAPPY SOUP!

What is for dinner ?

What would you like to have? Often many people dine out with specific dishes in their mind and whatever the dish in mind was ordered first and then come the three main courses – the rice, roti, some pastas or noodles. (Forget not the starter before and the dessert afterwards) Everyone is used to it, when our mind is filled with chicken or mushroom, we just do not order chicken or mushroom alone, a rice, roti or some farinaceous course will also end up in our table. These three courses have become a habit when we order from the menu.
I tried eating mangoes with chill powder and salt, a plateful of bhel poories and a glass of sweet limejuice for dinner. Everything was good, with my heart and stomach full; I enjoyed eating with hundred pair of eyes watching me on the street. Eventually, when I reached home I couldn’t stop tasting some reheated biryani before entering my sleep. (Is that a habit?)
My father, always have ragi porridge after dinner and my granny drink lot of butter milk after her dinner, for them the meal is incomplete without the ragi porridge or the buttermilk. And at the same time they cannot have only the ragi porridge or buttermilk for their dinner. I ask them what happen if they couldn’t get neither porridge nor buttermilk after their dinner, and my question was always unanswered.

How often do we waste the food? even if its a laste bite, does everyone leave the plate without a single grain of rice /food, my mother used to tell if we waste the laste mouth we wont grow tall, with that fear in mind i eat the plate clean, and today everyone call me chintu.

When it comes to eating it is we who frame the rules, the courses and their accompaniments, when you are happy with the meal, why worry about a la care and table d hote. so what would you like to have a proper menu with diffrent course or whatever your taste buds needs?

HAPPY EATING

How do i teach?

Once upon a time, I have criticize the use of OHP( Over Head Projector) in teaching, the real fault is not with the OHP but with the OHP sheet/transparancy sheet, because many just copy the content from the book into the OHP sheet. Once it is projected overhead, the students just copy the content blindly into their note books, where the words from the teachers mouth just fades away. When i started teaching, the black board and the diffrent colored crayons came to mind, fortunately in my school they had white board with black marker.

I was very happy with the white board and the black marker, untill the day my colleague Ann experienced a very bad incident in the class. she forget the black marker in an instance of hurrying to the class and used a green marker given by her class representative, after drawing a wierd layout of a medium size hotel for fourty minutes with her green pen on the white board, she found that the layout couldn't be erased. We tried all possible solutions and chemicals to erase it, and finally the white board turned into a green, black, grey color, which ended up in our useless storage room.

The fear of permanent marker, made Ann and many other teachers to use OHP , but still i was not convinced and went to class with neither marker nor OHP. The topic for that day was cuts of meat and i started with chicken, then with pork, lamb and beef. I was literally acting as a chicken in the class room using both my hands for the wings of chicken, i bended down to teach cuts of pork and other meats, exposing my thighs for ham and belly for bacon. i do not know how many understood and After solid fourty minutes , i was happy , that there were no cuts of frog in the syllabi.

Hardly very few learned to cut, so the next week i purchased a couple of chicken, and a demonstration even helped Subramaniya Iyer to enjoy cutting a chicken and then things concerned with the cuts of chicken became very clear to the students. But, with the pork, beef and other meats, i was not able to find any slaughtering house in the town. The alternative - a vedio about the cuts of meat, unlike the live demonstration, the video can be rewined as many times as possible till the students understands the concept.

Even now i hate the copy cat OHP/transparancy sheet or the one Mr.XXX use which is twelve years old( Don't he feel like updating? Or Is he lazy to the core?). and today with all the modern technology available ,with the use of ICT in education, the virtual learning and many.Its worth trying all possible methods . It is very much easy to criticize, in the end, how far you are able to make the students to understand the concept is all that matter.

HAPPY TEACHING AND HAPPY LEARNING.

An education isn't how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It's being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't.

Alcohol Part 1

I know many people who have lived and died because of Alcohol. Yes, my neighbour a fourty three year old farmer cannot live a single day without alcohol, and my grand father who passed away a year before beacause of consuming too much of home made local alcohol. All his life he has lived In an Absolut world. the picture on the left is not entirely true, its " Alcohol - the cause of - and solution to - all of life's problems"

Once upon a time,many villages in Nilgiris prepares Alcohol, for any happy or sad occasions, where every village with its standard recipe.But Manjitha is out of all these. Its maybe because of the nearby factory. I'll tell you how. For many in Manjitha, the source of income for food and booze is from the factory, almost every single house has one or the other working in factory..........

now the Alocohol part.... You get pure alcohol inside the factory, and many employees will try it whenever there is a chance, and for them there is always a chance. When all the money goes into alcohol, what do they do for living?

My grandfather got countless memo for consuming Alcohol during working hours and many knows that he has consumed more Alcohol than water in his life time. Like my grand father there are many who just drink, drink and drink,. Everyone in pink of health till the last day of their life, all beacuse of their food habit,and many is verymuch intrested in this (Link)

Today , the same old drinking continues, but the eating habits ???? I'm not against drinking, i'll tell everyone to Drink but not to get drunk. Once a student asked me what Drink Responsibly mean? I said its without troubling others and without troubling yourself, but whatever it is, there is no problem in drinking when you stick to this (Link)

There are lot of excuses than reasons for one to drink, once my friend Ashok said, i just drink two days in a year, the day when it rains and and the day when it is not raining. When will he end his bachelor life? Because in our community girls are verymuch concerned about Alcohol, they dont want to spoil their life by marrying someone who drowns his life in Alcohol.

Once, I along with my friends went to a tasmac party, we tasted fried chicken (i.e)before the drink and fired the waiter for its salty taste...... Too much of salt, but, after a couple of drinks, my friends were happy with the chicken.What happen to the saltiness? then i tought all food taste good when its with Alcohol, but again my taste buds got that salt , salt taste. the solution - another extra large. Does alcohol really kills the taste buds? how many questions in this post and too many questions arises when i talk about alcohol, i like everything about alcohol except this......

and before you post your comments , i would like to say that there is nothing wrong in drinking, but getting DRUNK??? there are many reasons, but the top ten are here (link)

Cotton like

Biryani with any meat is always good, let it be with chicken, mutton, beef or sea foods. But mutton biryani is more flavourful compare to other meats. To me, there are best and worst part in mutton biryani, the worst part is, when the meat is not cooked/raw and the best part is, when the meat is cooked to soft, tender and cotton like consistency.Yes, cotton like consistency, thats what my chef said in our school fest when preparing Hyderabadi Biryani.Since then i have been trying to taste one such biryani.

Thanks to Amaravishy, after fourteen long months i'm tasting one such biryani at venu's coimbatore. The portion is adequate, more accompaniments, the deep fried meat balls, a kheer after the meal is perfect, a perfect lunch. The mutton in the biryani is soo soft and like my chef said its cotton like. Twice i have been to venu's , only to taste the unique mutton biryani. The more of mutton, dosen't mean that i'm against other meat, i love meat in any cooked form, sometimes when it is overcooked , i'm just tired of chewing, but that is what you suppose to do when it is overcooked.( get tired/ keep chewing)

All the meats looks good , when its in the dining table. But in real - a wild boar, a mongoose , a frog? how many will imagine all these? but whenever i see a deer , a rich - red , delicious gravy comes to my mind, thats how i tasted my first game dish. Not very often we get a chance to eat game, when a chance arise, don't stop and don't miss to grab some. from the frog meat, which i tasted in goa to the liver and blood porial in madurai, all meat is good and delicious. When it is cooked to correct consitency and and cotton like, its more good and more delicious.

How fast can you.......

I have to learn the art of slow walking. I'm not a good walker, the step i take, the way my body moves, the short swinging hands, the dancing legs. Its wierd, for anyone who see's me walking. Its a short wierd scene. Because i walk really fast and funny, but its hard sometimes to compete with my head.

Yesterday my eyes were glued to my colleuges walking steps, the even pace, slow and steady, Oh! they enjoy walking.I couldnt remove my eyes from that scene.I wonder wheater is it the heavy lunch, or the hot summer....for that slow slow....slow walk.

The same quickness i have adopted for eating & cutting. Yes, I'm a quick eater, i remembered once having lunch with a school principal, a slow eater indeed. me being a quick eater, ate - five ,six, five , bhaturas to his two bhaturas , from that day i'm trying to eat slow.When it comes to cutting, i am verymuch happy with my speed. Accidents happens only when i experiment with my speed limit.

My first interview, after my graduation, the additional director asked me how fast can i cut a carrot? My answer - a little slower than chopping a bunch of spinach, sometimes questions may be more stupid than the answer.

Many times, the style of cutting the vegetables/meat and its speedness for mis en place, creates a good impression on the person who cuts the vegetables/meat.but will he create the same impression in the food what he preapares? I have had many studens who cooks well, with a slow mis en place, All one need is, start from scratch, know the functions of ingredients and above all love what you do. If the result turns out bad, remember to learn from mistakes.

HAPPY COOKING!

From Manjitha

From Manjitha ..... with Love..

What comes below, is one of the traditional food of Badugas community, almost all the villages in Nilgiris have seen this.But today, its hard to see those grains which we use for preparing the dish. The grains we call Bathha and the dish Atchikke, the grains can be stored for as many years as possible, as today hardly anyone cultivates it, we get it from Hasanoor( a place near Sathy).

My granny says Nilgiris Grain(Bathha) is the best for making Atchikke and she has fifty years old grains in her storage( does grains keep sooo long?) the grains can also be used for making porridge and Bathha Hittu ( Grain Cakes/dumplings). Whatever the varities are, my all time favourit is Atchikke - a delicious sweet, at home many have asked me what on earth makes me to eat Atchikke, when I'm in Manjitha, i tought not to trouble my granny for Atchikke, but my tongue couldn't stop asking my granny for those sweet , delicious Atchikke.


Pounding the Bathha and Removing the husk

The dish may look simple, Ironic is its method of peperation. The grains after sun drying has to be washed twice and then pan broiled, Oh! Those tiny green grains spluttering on the pan, its a real joy pan broiling it, then comes the pounding process. Its long, its hard and its tiring, where the pounding process doubled or tripled depending on the size of grains, after pounding the outer skin is removed, and then the process is verymuch simple.

Yes, the process after pounding is as simple as eating. Soaking those pounded grains in hot water and mixing with sugar and with grated coconuts and onto the serving plate. Before, spooning everything into the mouth, a final finish goes in, which is a mixture of powdered cardamom, fried grams, poppy seeds and some chopped bananas.Its a warm food, tough its summer in Manjitha, i couldnt stop with a single plate, and my grannies storage contains more grains ( Bathha) for the days to come. My palate is curious to taste many traditonal foods from the badugas cuisine, and Manjitha has it all.