By the way, like they always do on TV, and like our lovely lady Nigella is demonstrating in this picture here, do the chefs really taste the food directly with the spatula and then dunk the same damned spatula back into the food they just cooked!! And I’m not even going into them adding other bodily fluids in the food.

And I am quite okay with reasonable amounts of lack of hygiene. What’s a little hygiene against the kickass roadside food I say? But all this reality and the back door details are kind of grossing me out.

I think I’m going to stay clear of restaurants for a long long time. And now that I’m reading backdoor stories and getting grossed out, I might as well read Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain and be done with it. Reviews anyone?

Image source

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So, one such blog I used to read and love is waiter rant. Initially, I thought this person can not be a waiter. It must be someone else who’s doing a great job of pretending to be one, coz you know a waiter can not be this witty or write this well. Yes sometimes I can be very crude. But all that changed as I read more of his posts and voila - he published a book! Well I laid my hands on that book a couple of days back and I’ve been having a ball of a time reading it.

I’ve been on a reading spree of late, probably because I have some free time now. With the baby, I no longer have the luxury of spending hours and hours at book stores (Blossom is my favourite). I have a Crossword close to my house, but I soon discovered that if you’re looking to buy a book that’s not a best seller or on a specific subject, Crossword surely won’t be stocking it. All they seem to have is the Sidney Sheldons, Dale Carnieges and other management and personal help crap and in the food section they just have Tarla Dalal and Nita Mehta. So I started ordering books from rediff and I preferred that far more to rummaging through the millions of books in a bookstore. I no longer have the patience to read a bad book. I feel angry and cheated at the end of a reading a book that has nothing much to offer. So I am going strictly by recommendations. I check Amazon for the reviews and then I order through rediff. I was quite liking this arrangement, till I found flipkart. They’re far more prompt, with a decent search engine and generally its a much better experience compared to rediff who has refused to keep up with the times. I hope this is not just due to the initial enthusiasm at flipkart and they keep up the good service as they go forward.

By the way, I am wondering if I am slowly and gradually transforming into one of those book worm type snobs who follow this equation.

# of books read (i.e well-read) => person is smart and worthy of interaction.

Oh god I hope I haven’t changed into one already!

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It might’ve been due to the fact that we weren’t too excited about interacting with a cable guy, yet again. The local cable providers are usually local goondas and their phone numbers are always busy when the cable goes off in the middle of a cricket final on a Sunday. The two channels that we really watch are Pogo and NatGeo and they’re always grainy and have bad sound quality. They always tried to force us to go for the set top box if we wanted better quality. You can’t argue with the customer service agent too much when he’s 6 ft tall and blocks the entire width of your door. Plus if you have cable at home, it’s almost like you’re obligated to watch it.

Anyway, it has been a wonderful time, because we never even realized the absense of cable TV. Whenever we want to watch a movie, we just watch a DVD. I’m sure I’ve used the extra time doing something better, but I can’t exactly figure out what! The only entertainment currently is watching the baby and his appa, outdo each other in the silliness department. The baby of course has a personal reality TV channel featuring mumma and appa, which is switched on at ungodly hours of 2 am by his royal highness. And don’t they dare turn the other side and try to steal some sleep, coz their faces (soft from the stolen baby cream) will be scratched, and how!!!

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And here’s wishing that I don’t send out invitation cards to misery this year. 

Image source

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Today is Vakbaras and the Diwali marathon has officially kicked off in my kitchen! Since I favour farsaan (namkeen/karam whatever)  over mithai just a little bit, the first one in the Diwali series is a farsaan - fried chana dal. 

I’ll let the picture do the rest of the talking and give you the recipe. The source of course is mommy dearest.

For fried chana dal you’ll need

- 250 gms chana dal

- Oil for deep frying

- Curry leaves (5-6 stalks)

For the masala

- Chilly powder

- Salt

- Rock Salt

- Hing (Asafoetida)

1. Soak the chana dal over night or for 6-8 hours in sufficient water (add more than double the volume of dal). Mix all the masala ingredients in desired proportions to prepare the masala for sprinking.
2. Take a heavy thick bottomed kadhai and heat oil for deep frying. Meanwhile, take a big kitchen towel and spread out fistfuls of chana dal on the towel. The dal doesn’t have to be dry. This is just to make sure it isn’t dripping with water.
3. Check if the oil is smoking hot. Turn the flame to simmer, take a fistful of dal and drop it gently from about 2-3 inches above the oil level. You’ll be able to fit in about 2-3 fistfuls in one batch, depending on the kadhai size and ofcourse the size of your fist. If you don’t have any prior experience in deep frying, please get someone experienced do the frying for you. 
4. You’ll see lots of bubbles form as you drop the dal. Till the bubbles settle down, don’t put the slotted spoon in the oil at all. Fry the dal on medium high or high till the bubbles settle down. The colour of the dal should *not* change to pink or red. Before you fry the next batch, wait till the oil is smoking hot again. This is very crucial, otherwise the dal becomes hard to bite. 
5. After frying each batch, add the required amount of masala immediately. This helps the masala stick to the dal easily. 
6. Finally, fry the curry leaves and mix them with the chana dal. 

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- Make an aakash kandil. It’s actually a class 2 crafts project kind of activity, but it is much fun working with glue and cutting stuff with a pair of scissors and making a mess in general. My first attempt at making one last night failed, as I used kite paper which kinda sagged. Today I am going to try again with those glittery wrapping paper sort of thing. No I am not retarded, its just the Diwali fever.

- This one is only applicable to residents of Bangalore. Go take a chakkar of Pottery town (near Frazer Town). It is hardly a town, its more like a busti of potters. We went there last weekend and the whole settlement is running in full throttle, trying to meet the sky high demand for diyas. We also witnessed live pottery making and also watched the pots getting baked in a furnace. It’s a great place to visit now, more so if you have children. You can ask them for a small lump of the potters clay to try out stuff at home. Don’t expect rock bottom prices as the potters have learnt the tricks of the trade, but it’ll still be cheaper than the market prices.

- Cook the goodies  you associate Diwali with. Depending on what part of India you’re from, you can make chaklis, chiwda, besan ke laddus, cholafali, mathri, karanji and what not. There are plenty of resoures on the internet for diwali specific recipes. I have made a small list of 5 things I want to prepare for Diwali. I am still in the “getting the ingredients” phase. Of course, I’ll post the pictures when I actually get around to making them.

This post is getting much longer than I thought. So the next points are going to be very brief.

- Some crackers. One phuljhadi or zameen chakkar won’t push the earth off balance.

- New clothes. This is my favourite part.

- Rangoli and colours. Some awesome Diwali decor ideas here.

- Cleaning the shelves, dusting the windows. This is my least favourite part. But unless I do some cleaning, it just doesn’t *feel* like Diwali.

Let me know how you’re gearing up for Diwali.

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I used scraps from old clothes and also got carried away a little and almost cut the skirt I was wearing, while on the lookout for a pretty print patch. And I have these four very colourful, reversible tea coasters sitting pretty on my tea table. I could do with some finishing tips though. The inspiration comes from here, with the only change being that I sandwiched a sheet of sponge instead of the low-loft batting square mentioned in the tutorial, reason being I don’t know what that means.

So, if you come visiting to my house in the next few days, expect to see me swollen with self-admiration and be ready to receive a pack of 6 coasters.

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And I being the ideal customer every retailer dreams of, obliged and bagged not one, not two, but five magazines! And and the best part is that ALL of them are just so absolutely useless that I just want to sue them or something. Take this one for example. To start with, its called “Better Homes & Gardens”. Yes, if the earth opened up just now, I would just like to die of shame. But that’s only when I think about it now. That moment, I thought that all stylish women seem to read the cosmos and the better homes, basically anything that’s glossy and international. Have you ever seen any manicured babe with perfect makeup on, read an Outlook or Week on the airport? No, right. So I bought the magazine, (which by the way, costs a cool one hundred rupees) hoping it would improve my non-existent skills to keep the home clean and tidy at least, if not making it look good. And boy just how wrong was I!! Under the “living and entertaining” section, there was one Ms. Feroze Gujral giving tips about “how to be a party veteran”. She gives a “festive menu”, some items from which, are as follows:

1. Tamarind dal
2. Haldi potatoes with mustard seeds
3. Dahi with seasoning
4. Kachumber salad

Unless I am reading something wrong here, she served sambar (or rasam), aloo ki subzi, raita and kachumber for the party. Isn’t that what most of us have everyday for lunch? I paid a 100 bucks for someone to rename the items from my everyday lunch to something with a long name, throw it back at me and make it sound like some kind of advice. Gah!!!

Coming up next was a “10 must try dhokla delights”, which basically consisted of 10 dhoklas with different toppings, and I think it was inspired from those toppings they showed in Krackjack adverts. One topping (which they call “delight”) was called “Stir fried chinese greens, peanuts”. Which had exactly two 5mm pieces of spring onion and one peanut halved into two, sitting pretty on a dhokla. Show me one living being in this universe, dogs and cats included, who will be interested in eating or making or even thinking of such a “delight”.

And finally, the one that takes the cake is a one page “recipe” of “grilled tangy corn”. Guess what they were talking about. The good old bhutta. The one you get on the roadside for 10 rupees. But calling it that would be too down market you see. Like Manisha is too desi a name. Talk about Monisha and you’re talking class. Like how the colours pink and purple are cheap, but call it mauve and it becomes stylish.

If this is not daylight robbery, tell me what is? Every time I see that magazine, those 100 rupees come and pinch me. Some take it away please. I’ll pay you the auto fare.

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A kilo of cotton or a kilo of steel?
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The answer as you would’ve guessed is that both have the same weight.

Now imagine carrying a 7 kg sack of potatoes versus carrying a 4-5 month old baby (average 7 kgs). They should both feel equal right? Wrong. No seriously, why does carrying the baby feel soooo much more easier and carrying potatoes of the same weight feel like drudgery? I usually get the whole “its your baby” argument, but I don’t fully buy it, because not all mothers are Nirupa Roys you know.

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1. Do you ever do your dishes?
2. Have you ever chopped a single french bean?
3. Does your personal assistant swap the TV channels for you?
4. Do you ever take a shower?
5. Are your nails and you for real?

I mean I apply nail polish and within 5 seconds, I am sure to get a phone call or a very sudden desire to itch or forget that I just applied nail polish. So sitting and blowing air on the fingers spread out like a fan just never works for me and one of the nails invariably gets ruined. And the base coat, top coat blah is even worse. You have to wait multiple times for the whole thing to finish. So ya help me please!

And on an aside, if I am born with short nails and I refuse to grow them or put on the acrylic ones, but I still nurture the wish to one day have perfectly painted and pretty looking nails, should I just stop existing?

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