Mundane Musings

Beetroot - I can't believe I managed to live a large portion of my life never having eaten it...thanks to my mother, I guess. She never made beetroot at home when I was growing up. Maybe coz dad hadn't liked it or perhaps  mum never knew how to cook it. The way that veggie leaked colour was not appealing to anyone in the family and to date I am sure my brothers too don't eat it at home. Fast forward to 2020 and after marriage to Mr. vegetarian, S, I have come to like this deep purple root vegetable. S had a way of making you try out things...he made it look so appealing on his plate or got it made often times by the Cook that ultimately one is forced to try out the same.  Every Tuesday out came the beetroot cutlets to grace his plate after a day long fast. At first I ignored them...beetroot...yuck, beetroot cutlets... slightly better but why did they look so dreadful?  And then when I got around to making them and found myself popping a piece in my mouth to test the textu...

Now that I have started to cook again after a brief hiatus, my blog posts on cooking should get filled up a bit and my camera skills should improve too. It's funny how I almost forgot how easy and satisfying it is to make mundane recipes. So I have started to record my exploits (ahem) in the kitchen and shall post a few recipes which I feel absolutely obliged to share. This thakkali rasam or tomato rasam recipe is mummy's, as is virtually most of the recipes I refer to for regular cooking.. What I love about this rasam is it's tangy taste from fresh tomatoes accompanied by the pungent taste of crushed garlic. Oh and how can I forget? I love it because it is so insanely easy to make and needs practically zero oil. One moment there I was boiling the tomatoes and the next moment I found myself seasoning the rasam. It took me probably 15 minutes to make this yummilicious concoction, despite not having a ready-made rasam powder and having to boil and cool the tomatoes. Ba...

I am back, making up for the dismal posting of this month. I have been meaning to post this since last week, but this post had taken precedence. There are certain lunches when there is absolutely no need for a gravy or a curry, as the side dishes take over the meal completely. I was privileged to have one such lunch this Sunday. Bakrid has only just passed by, but the bounties of the festival linger on. I had some meat left over from the Qurbani and when mum visited us this weekend, I was all gung-ho about making something with it. Like always, I start with grandiose plans - like making a nice lamb pie with it, or a meat pizza or spaghetti. But the lack lusture response from the ones eating it, had me cajoling mum to make her mutton chukka recipe. Everybody has his/her own recipe that has minor variations of the original (depends who you are speaking to) and we love mum's. S, who stays clear of red meat and fish, makes an exception for mum's mutton biriyani and mutton ...

For a person with a weak stomach and will  , I sure do know how to abuse it. The result - I'm down with an unclear diagnosis of a stomach bug or a peptic ulcer. Well, that's what my doctor intoned from behind his masked mouth. But all that is secondary. What is important is that I am forgoing a lot of good food because of my ulcer. Including besan ke laddoos from Siddhi Vinayak Sweets, the flavoured, to-die for, butter popcorn from Sathyam Cinemas, my cardamom flavoured chai (tea), butter murukkus which my mom made for her son-in-law (yeah that was not meant for me in the first place. How low have I fallen?) and the good food which I served to guests for dinner on Saturday. Is there a silver lining here, I ask myself. Nope. Zilch. People tend to lose weight on a diet devoid of such succor and love. But my body fat simply loves me and has no intention of leaving me. So nope...no silver lining here. In addition to this sacrifice which I must say makes my brain as active as ...

If like me, you have a spouse who loves home cooked food and if like me you enjoy cooking for him then you will understand the reason behind this post. But before that, if you’ve unsuspectingly believed all that I’ve written above, then S would be happy to nudge you in the right direction. Firstly I don’t really enjoy cooking – not in the boring everyday cooking way. I rather like the oh so cool, ‘cooking when it fancies me’ – kind of way. Yeah there it is…out in the open. Sigh. Secondly, I do enjoy cooking for him…but er… if it agrees with what I’d like to eat myself. Read – chocolate oozing brownies, cupcakes, sweets, roast chicken sandwiches, pasta etc etc. Well, I hide behind ‘my love to cook for him’ excuse every time, but he is no soul mate for nothing. He sees through me…every time. Hmph!  Anyway, it sounds kinda nice on the blog I must say, that I enjoy cooking for him. And I make up to him by tweaking a recipe so that the finished product is something that he will ind...