Orange joys

With nothing much to tell and hardly any time for leisurely weekend jaunts, I have taken to capturing roadside colours and flavours. Being a lover of local sights always, and more so when one lives in a colour-chocked, prismatic country such as ours, it's hard to overlook the vibrant joys that are here, there, and everywhere. And quite interestingly, when I was trying to gather a coherent mood for this little post, these different shades of orange came together. Just like that! Like a jumbled picture gradually falling into place, it meant a lot, this little coincidence. Enough to tickle the Monday blues away, enough to remind me how fortunate I am to be surrounded by such an unassuming, permeating colour palette, and enough to bask in the joy of one of my favourite colours.

Brave gulmohars rising up against a belligerent monsoon sky. Baskets of feisty marigolds, those fluffy balls of orange wonders, thronging the weekend bazaar. Mouthwatering rows of roadside chicken tikka being grilled inside a rotisserie as we wait for our to-go, Saturday-night parcel. Two halves of an orange stare at me, trying hard to perk up my Monday-morning mood. And life, suddenly, appears to be not so bad. A little less dull. A little more orangish.   

Monsoon, interrupted

Of late, I've been robbed of many of my favorite things - reading, blogging, watching the rain, to name a few. Thanks to work piling on heap upon heap, I've been away from my world for what seems like an eternity now. I tried, and not once, to come here and drop in a few lines, but every time the words would evade me. True, it's no fun editing academic stuff, because then all you are left with is finding flaws and correcting them. And it's supposed to stay so for a month more.
The only hints of newness that have stumbled across my way, other than one full day of sale-shopping madness, are these hues of green - the ubiquitous Hyderabadi haleem lacing the city roadsides in colourful, illuminated kiosks, and my potted palm that seems to be making most of the monsoons. At least someone's getting to enjoy the rains!

Ladakh, aka 'Little Tibet'

"The land is so barren and the passes so high that only the best of friends or the fiercest of enemies would want to visit us."
~ An old Ladakhi saying

This beautiful saying, framed on our hotel-room door, got glued to my heart for a very long time. True, only a very good friend would dare to traverse through this expanse of tall mountains, high passes, and cold deserts. And, only a fierce enemy like our neighbouring country would intrude with their troops now and then, every couple of months because our borders are iffy. Then there are some who would call Ladakh a No Man's land, and to some it is a land too foreign in its culture that might tickle their touristy apprehensions. To us, it was just perfect. A sanctuary full of natural wonders and kind, ever-smiling faces that make you forget the dust and drudgery of a mad, mad city. A place that heals, listens to your worries, and sometimes even talks back to you in soothing whispers. A place where one can just be.

Bald mountains and feathery poplars, the towering guardians of the place. Leh Palace, the stoic reminder of Ladakh's royal past. Prayer flags lending a hint of colour to rusty doors. The shambled past giving way to a green present. Bleached stupas, the ruins of Shey - the erstwhile summer capital of Ladakh royalty. Sindhu Ghat or the banks of the Indus River, a culturally significant place for the locals. A bactrian camel couple relaxing on the parched sands of the Hunder desert. Sweet-smelling wild roses, one of the scant blooms found in the region. Leh market, where a myriad colours and faces come together. Tibetan refugee shops, chockablock with many a treasure. The market walls adorned with inviting handicrafts. A journey to the culinary heaven via Tibetan momos. Beautiful Ladakhi buildings thronged by poplars and stumpy hills. The Royal Enfield, aka the 'Bullet', the wheels that take you through the ups and downs of the intriguing, never-ceasing-to-fascinate terrain. 
  

The flip side

"Some days in late August at home are like this, the air thin and eager like this, with something in it sad and nostalgic and familiar..."

~ William Faulkner

Only this is just the beginning of August and yet another of life's little ironies happens. Seems like only yesterday when I was choking with euphoria and slathering my joy all over the cyberspace upon finding ilishi in Seattle. That indisputable king of fish, or at least that's what we East Indians think. Now call it preoccupation or mere forgetfulness of the taste buds, we haven't had, or for that matter even searched once for the dear old fish after our return home. Instead, we were on the lookout for our Western favorite - salmon. And what's more, we finally got it! Straight from the Scottish Highlands, although frozen and therefore not at its pretty orangish best like what we used to get in that seafood heaven called the Pacific Northwest, it still tasted good. Just like the ilishi did last year. 

Regarding our little "American" grocery store, I always knew it existed but never cared to visit it. And that was before my life as a foreigner. But now, once back with another world throbbing inside me, continuously reminding me of its riches and beauty, it was a must visit. I can hardly express my emotions, that gush of warm familiarity that rushed through me after stepping into the tiny store last Sunday. Let's just say if nostalgia was a river, I would have been kayaking on it. That's how high I was! Just like I used to be when stumbling upon my brand of curry powder in an Indian grocery store back in the States.

 
Even the once monotonous and ridiculously familiar box of Cheerios made me do a little dance! 

A little bout of self-love

What do you do when you are happy? I cook. Yes, and pretend as if I'm the queen of the world, more so when it is the least expected of times for anything worth celebrating. I am finally done with the Creative Writing course that I have been doing for the past few months and to be honest, I could not be more pleased with myself. Off late the course was getting too much to live with and let's face it - how could one be even remotely creative while chalking out one's cross continent relocating plans. But I trudged through it all somehow, all thanks to our ever patient and understanding tutor.

Now to hop on to the actual reason of the celebration (I do meander a lot, don't I?!) - the result of the final assignment, a short story, came in last week and ever since then I've been floating on cloud nine. Fortunately, I had a plot tossing and turning in my mind, the rough draft of which was lying abandoned from a couple of months. Despite half the work done which made the final draft a tad simpler, I remember I had submitted it halfheartedly. Of course, my routine procrastination played some role in that too. But with the feedback including chunks and bits like "skilled and stylish piece of writing" and "polished and confident handling of dialogue and narrative", I can't help but be a show-off. Well, for the time being at least!

Fanning my amour propre was the sudden rise in temperature to an early summery 72 degree Fahrenheit. Cool evening breeze, a long walk down the old lake trail, counting the cackling geese on the newly leafed trees, a very late sunset followed by a simple homemade dinner of pea and basil pasta - one roaring weekend it was.

Saturday biryani

The heavenly aroma of saffron and mint swirls around the apartment as I write this hurried post. Tender chunks of yogurt-herb marinated chicken tucked inside layers of fragrant basmati. The sweet crunch of caramelized red onions. The juicy tang of tomatoes. All cooked, layered and baked to perfection. And of course garnished with love. Chicken biryani. True, it's a lot of work for just one dish, but it's totally worth it. More so when teamed with cool cucumber raita.
That's our grand plan for a dark, gloomy Saturday. That and Netflix!

Happy weekend.

Dusk

"Never are voices so beautiful as on a winter's evening, when dusk almost hides the body, and they seem to issue from nothingness with a note of intimacy seldom heard by day."

~ Virginia Woolf

This is how dramatic it looked today as dusk fell and I was one of the fortunate few to treasure the scene, for it hovered for just about ten minutes and then melted away into the fathomless expanse of the moody evening sky. Then at once a curtain of calm fell upon the dying day and hushed the accumulated hustle and bustle. Sheer magic!

There is something quite stirring about a winter dusk that excites some very strong, bittersweet emotions. Such evenings back home, as I recall them, were much awaited for by everybody. No snow, no biting chill and certainly no getting bundled and lost under layers of clothes. Just a few months of fog, fragrant gardens (yes, some of our most beautiful flowers bloom in the winters) and a more than welcoming respite from a cruel tropical sun.
I can feel a throbbing, warm gush of nostalgia as I write this, waking up a string of memories that have and will continue to keep me warm through the years.

Ma's steaming hot tomato soup waiting right after homework. Weekend music lessons on the tutor's verandah. A delighted me listening to abridged Shakespeare narrations by father. Neighborhood badminton fun. Giant dahlias, almost the size of our happy faces. Frothing coffees in hostel mugs. Baggy jumpers and long roomie walks. Chicken roll from the favourite fast food corner. Deconstructing matters of heart under the pretext of literary theories. Cardamom chai sprinkled with warm giggles at the university cafeteria. The mock sentimental ghazal nights. Roasted corn on the cob rubbed with lemon and salt. Pillion riding on the motorbike with the then-boyfriend, now-husband. Samosa with fried green chilies... 

Strange, how food rules most of our fond recollections, isn't it?!

Plummy goodness

What does one do with a couple of unused plums? And oodles of boredom? Whip them up together with eggs, butter and flour and let them be friends inside a temperamental oven. The result - a warm and beautiful plum cake for tea, especially for the overcast, drizzly late afternoons that we are beginning to be threatened with. What's worst, they are here to stay. Just brew a fine cup of chai, preferably ginger or cinnamon, and a damp autumn never felt half so good.
Oh and yes, don't forget to invite the birdies. For I've heard a tiny dollop of birdie gossip makes this cake perfectly plumtastic!

For the interested and curious:

Plum cake 

serves 6

2 eggs

1/2 cup milk

1/2 cup butter

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
2 plums, pitted and sliced into thin long petals

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9 inch round cake pan.
In a small bowl, cream the butter with the sugar. Then beat in the eggs and the milk.
In a larger bowl mix together the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Make a well in the center and pour in the egg mixture. Whisk gently till the batter is silk-like fine.
Spread the batter evenly into the greased pan. Arrange the plum slices attractively over the batter (I prefer it the free-spirited, whirlpool way!).
Bake for forty minutes or until a toothpick when inserted comes off clean.
Transfer to a cooling rack and allow to cool before serving.

That Steve Jobs is no more, still hasn't sunk into me. There are some people whom you don't need to know personally to feel that strange void once they are gone. May the man who changed the way we live today rest in eternal peace. In his own words, just "Stay hungry. Stay foolish".

Ilishi love

Finally. After what felt like ages and a desperation that matched the calls of "O ilishi, ilishi! Wherefore art thou ilishi?", I found it. The fish hilsa or ilishi/ilish as we east Indians call it, is an essential part of many a tales of growing up and one of the many reasons of why we are such staunch foodies. Part seafood lover and part geographical genes, the Bay of Bengal to be precise, I don't need to establish my love affair with fish. More so when it is the prized ilishi, aka the King of Fish.
After our move to the States, after four good years of living across all over the length and breadth of this ridiculously vast country, and after bouts of craving so acute that I had almost forgotten what it tastes like, where do I find it? Seattle. The city that has given me umpteen reasons to celebrate life, always. Stacked neatly in a tiny corner of the refrigerator section of an international grocery store, there it was labelled 'Chandpuri Hilsa'. It didn't take me long to crack that code - it was from the Chandpur district of Bangladesh which holds the reputation of exporting the best ilishi in the world. Now, I could not have been more happy had I discovered a gold mine!

Once back from the store I got busy in no time. With ready help from an equally ilishi-deprived husband, the whole fish was descaled and cleaned promptly for that ritualistic rub of salt and turmeric. Since our fish was a monsoon catch which happens to be the breeding time, it also had eggs in its belly. Just like the fish, its eggs too are fried to a golden crunchy perfection and are considered a regional delicacy back home.
As they say, all good times begin with a great meal, and ours was just perfect - a classic Odiya fare of white rice with dal, steamed ilishi in mustard paste, ilishi fry, and boiled potatoes mashed together with raw onions, green chilies and mustard oil. The drone of my incessant cries of homesickness were hushed with the silken, buttery wonder of the King of Fish. But to get there one must really wage a war with the countless obstructing bones. There are just way too many of them!
We did well though, from finding ilishi to revisiting a carefully preserved time and age that is etched fondly and forever in our hearts called childhood.

And yes, yet another quintessential 'foreigner' moment conquered!

Because I cannot go to Italy...

... it must come to me.

Through farfalle with fresh tomato and basil sauce. And National Geographic's gorgeous shots of Lake Como. Viva Italia!

Love songs from my kitchen

Pakora, when it pitter-patters raindrops

Tandoori chicken, get a whiff of the roaring highway side dhaba

Shrimp bruschettas, the perfect bite-sized dreams

Pan-seared tilapia, let your taste buds sing

Penne pasta & Minestrone soup, bask under a Tuscan sun

Hyderabadi chicken biryani, royally yours

Rants from the kitchen

With all the interesting food blogs doing the rounds, I find myself quite incompetent at the present time, lost in a sea of tempting recipes. I am marooned in a studio suite of Marriott which marks the fourth of such stays in this year. In conclusion, I am the quintessential nomad, one who not only lives in five different places in a year, but also has to manage to spread tolerable meals in five different kitchens, fumbling her way across cupboards and dishwashers. Such is the plight of being a trailing spouse!

Now, many on the other side of the grass (and mine is NOT green for the umpteenth time!!) believe this is a privilege - hotel life and hence the luxury of thriving on delivered food. But believe me, all that indulgence lasts well for a week at the most. Then begins the craving for simple home cooked meals. Even the most delectable chicken biryani from the local Indian restaurant becomes tiresome after four shameless visits in a row. And this time it is New Jersey - the Little India of Amrika. We have been on a gluttonous rampage with the Chandni Chowk styled parathas, the Chettinad curries, the chicken puffs and the vada pav. But after a fortnight of almost a crazy eating spree, even Sam, the foodie has begun whining for simpler fares, ones that are made with love and served with care.

My friend and fellow blogger, Somdatta, has recently written a beautiful post on comfort food, which for us eastern Indians is the ubiquitous rice-dal-mashed boiled potato with raw onion, green chilies and a swirl of mustard oil. It is the ultimate soul food and no amount of fish or chicken can supplant the emotion that this classic combo evokes. Thinking on the lines of comfort food, I wonder what happens to one who thrives for almost a month on this comfort food? Like we have been, for it is difficult to throw lavish spreads here, in this supposedly "fully equipped" kitchen which is a mere renovated hole with sleek gadgets. I miss my comfort zone, aka my compatible bamboo chopping board and santoku knife pair, the oh-so-convenient non-stick pots on which you can stir, saute, fry and frizzle the world. Mostly, it is the unique feeling of that space called 'my kitchen'. The maximum I can whip up here is a chicken or a prawn curry, because try anything less runny and it just sticks to the stainless steel surface of the pot. At times I manage a trick biryani, minus the layering and the classic Hyderabadi touch.

I miss the whole paraphernalia, the baking and experimenting, what Sam mockingly calls "lurking in the kitchen". Cooking is a major cathartic vent for me when my inner demons just melt away into the embalming aroma of spices. Isn't is pathetic when one misses one's own cooking? Even if it is the humble dalma (an Odiya delicacy made with dal and vegetables), for which a pressure cooker is a must.
So much for the fully equipped kitchens!

Baker's delight

Plum cake, one of my much prized initial successes as a baker

I came across this little piece of truth in one of the cooking websites - "Nothing is more attractive around the home than the smell of fresh baking". It has been a month and a little more since the baker in me has been on a full-throated song. I must have baked more than five cakes, completely mindless of the bursting calories, and thus jeopardizing our fitness routine and dietary resolutions. I have always enjoyed cooking but had never given much thought to the age-old, classic art of baking. The only baking that I had ever dabbled in before was the traditional American fudge brownie from the oh-so-convenient brownie mix. And that ain't much of a talent. So after reveling in the pride of a frequently complimented cook, the time had come to don the mantle of a real baker. I wonder why it took me so long to think about baking from scratch. May be because I am a little idiosyncratic, therefore the 'new' or the 'different' does not strike me immediately. Somehow I am always stuck with the old, repetitive pattern. There are many 'lates' in my life, including Harry Potter and Friends, both of which have become so crucial to my existence that without them my world would seem rather drab. Before I stray any further, let us get back to baking. So there I was, scouring through allrecipes.com for a simple cake, something that ran the least chance of being a disaster. I went for the orange cake for I wanted something exotic as well, and there I was beating eggs and grating orange zest. I had planned it as a surprise for Sam but the heady aroma of orange and baking gave it away. However the cake had turned out really well, the way cakes should be - moist and soft. Hurrah! With such a triumphant debut, there was no stopping me. I searched for variety and more flavours and ended up making them all - orange cake, chocolate cake, banana muffins, fudge brownies and even a plum cake. The trouble is, if I am good at something, I become obsessed with it till I have had enough of it and this is exactly the situation with my current baking spree. It just feels the most perfect thing to do.

What I love the most about baking, other than the hypnotism of the senses, is that it keeps my mind off from wandering away. I feel a soothing calm while baking, as if it was a healing process. The little swirls of aroma crawling out from the oven purge my mind of the buzzing monotone of life. At the end of a messy day, you know when you add eggs and butter to flour, it turns out perfect. And nobody can take this comfort away from you. Absolutely nobody.

The Sakura experience

Last evening we went out to try some Japanese delicacy to Sakura, a Japanese steakhouse. The word sakura in Japanese means flowering cherry or cherry blossoms. I have always wanted to taste sushi, but for some reason or the other I keep postponing it. Probably it is the thought of consuming raw fish that turns me off. But I always love to learn and experience the different food cultures and Japanese was one that I had yet to taste. So off we went and were warmly welcomed into a place adorned with huge murals of cherry blossoms and other Oriental artifacts. The ambiance was perfect. We were comfortably seated in the grill section of the steakhouse and Sam promised me that it will be a mesmerising affair. We decided our food to be simple, so he went for a grilled salmon whereas I chose to play safe with a grilled shrimp and sauteed mushrooms platter. We waited till we savored the last drop of osumashi (the Japanese clear soup) and the tricky miso (a seasoning made with fermented rice and soybeans) dressed lettuce salad. Then came our chef wheeling a cart of veggies, raw salmon and shrimp and other condiments that were required for the preparation of our entrees. We were seated in a square fashion where the grill consisted the center of the arrangement. And as the restaurant boasts of "where everything happens before your eyes", the chef sputtered off the hot surface of the grill with water followed by the ingredients. The manner in which he used a chopping knife looked like sheer magic. For the next fifteen minutes he was on song slicing and chopping away to the tunes of his knife and the sizzle of the items on the grill. He did it so effortlessly, it looked no less than a performance. In no time the flames boomed, reaching the chimney and our salmon and shrimp turned a deep rust, that lip smacking, perfectly grilled colour. The spices and the sauces that were used in the preparation enveloped us in an aromatic fog. I felt like being transported to another part of the world, one where there were gardens choked with cherry blossoms, where the geisha (a female Japanese entertainer) served tea in her typical delicate and artful way in a chashitsu (a tea room). It seemed like the tea ceremonies from Arthur Golden's Memoirs of a Geisha came alive! Once the food was cooked, our magician chef ladled the food on our plates. Needless to say that such aesthetically prepared food that tickled all our senses soothed our hungry and eager taste buds. What's more, Sam even rated this as one of his best dinning experiences! It was truly a heavenly experience, one that I would love to go for again, probably some day in God's own land of the rising sun!