COOKING IN ONE'S OWN STEW

Cooking has never been my forte and I am no great eating buff too. I have sometimes even ventured to wonder what must be the resourcefulness of the person who traced some dishes. Imagine to think one could scale up a coconut tree, pluck and crack the nut only to make myriad dishes savour in a different manner. Being the son of probably one of the co-pioneers of a recipe book at least in South India, I empathise the immense agony and trauma caused to her by a son who hardly can polish a plate off without complaining that too much was served. The blunder is further aggravated by the fact that no attention is paid to the ticklers of the tasta or their absence in the peeving glory.

However, life does not treat such souls kindly. Yours truly can vouch for it. Life contrives situations where one has to battle the fires of hunger with a dish to be rattled up by oneself. The icing on the cake of irony is that one is already too sure that the dish rattled up only has a psychological name tagged to it and is not even remotely connected to the probable one. For people who could relish humour at others' cost, this piece would be irresistible.

In the year 1991, I was at Belgaum and we were having dinner at my friend's sister's place. For all practical purposes I was treated as one of the siblings. To top it all I was considered the youngest (being unfair to my friend's younger brother) and my weaknesses were laughed away while the strengths were glorified. As we finished dinner, news came in that one of their relatives had passed away. The nephews were to be in left behind due to their school and college schedules. Being an orthodox family, it was pronounced that they would not be permitted to enter the kitchen nor could they have their grub outside. All was fine till this point. The bombshell was then dropped without the slightest hint. I was told I would stay back till the elders return. I was then told that I would be the COOK.Pray what offence did I commit to attract such a severe punishment was the immediate response. The ifs and buts were simply brushed aside. Instant instructions were passed on the places to locate the various ingredients. I was also designated to pack their baggage and off the family left leaving me in a daze. The youngest of the three nephews was in ninth and the eldest was just out of college. The three musketeers surrendered themselves to my custody. The night passed peacefully since no culinary delight was to be created. Then came the dawn. A bleak dawn of which the three musketeers had no idea. I gingerly asked them whether some bakery food could be a bright idea. They said no. The next three days at least no outside food. My next question was could they at least find some help for me. The answer was no. The salt was rubbed into the wounds by affirming their faith in me.

A shower was had and a ceremonial entry made to the kitchem. Rice was to be washed and placed in the pressure cooker. But how much water? The youngest fellow gave me a measure which I followed. Then came the question of a dish. I looked at the side shelves and started picking a spoon of each powder and dumping then in a vessel of water with a wee bit of salt. A couple of tomatoes was sliced with the effort that would have put any Hercules to shame. I then announced that they should all pray for their well being. After a couple of hours, the breakfast and lunch boxes were ready. I left them to savour the delight and hoped if Almighty was indeed ALL MIGHTY, he should insure and ensure their good health. After a restless day at office, I reached home to find the three waiting for me. Horror of horrors, they said I should not have lied that I did not know cooking while dishing out a tasty dish. I was reminded of a relative who would say that none should venture to name the dish while it is under preparation but should name it only after it is prepared. Two more days passsed with the same fanfare. Truly God was on their side or they were truly tolerant.

The unforgettable encounter with the kitchen ended albeit on a happy note for us but the wishful thinking of medical practitioners was laid to rest.

Lessons are hardly learnt and no attempt to learn this fine skill was made. In 1995 I landed at Panaji where vegetarian food is scarce and rare. But Lady Luck smiled on me in the form of senior colleagues who shouldered the kitchen. The toughest cooking task assigned to me was the removal of the stem from the green chillies. A year later, I was deputed to knead the flour for rolling out chapathies. When they were not around, the Nala in me would emerge and cook rice which would be had by mixing it with the famed curds of southern India. Of course, the pickles imported from our respective homes.

Last week was a reminder of these incidents over which I have regaled many friends of mine. My mother took ill and the kitchen landed in my custody. Imagine converting good healthy persons into patients is itself a bad exercise but here I had on hand a couple of patients who were battling their ailments. But the uppermost question in their mind was not the dosage of the antibiotics or the notoriety of the viruses affecting them. The big question was whether the things I was supposed to hand over to them as edibles would be food worth consuming. Dr Iyengar's words acted as an inspiration and I hoped that they would bounce back to normal health.

Should they bounce back to good health, it shall be three cheers to Dr. Iyengar!!!!
Three cheers to Nala, Bhimasena and all the best cooks, the good cooks, the mediocre cooks and anyone knows cooking including a bad cook!!!!!!!!!!!!