Word Attack!!

On shaami…and why I took it for granted all these years!

I must say, I’ve always been thankful that Ammi is a great cook. When I was in school, our maid Rambha would bring hot lunch for me and drop it off at the school gate and I would take it back to my corner somewhere and eat it. I just took everything for granted. Even on days when I got shaami in my lunch box, I would nibble it, share with my friends and wish Ammi had put cheese in the middle like she sometime does.

In case you don’t know what shaami is, here’s a quick byte on it: Shaami is made by cooking boneless meat pieces(some use kheema) with channa dal(not kabuli channa), coriander, chopped onions, a little bit of ground coconut, some adrak-lehsun, garam masala powder, dry red chillies, salt and a little haldi with some water. This mixture is cooked until the water dries and then, when its still warm, its ground into a dough like texture in the mixie. (In my grandmother’s house, I remember seeing her grinding the shaami dough on a traditional ’sill-batta’. I used to watch her roll the heavy oblong stone across the mixture on the flat stone surface, bring it forward, then back and then the whole process repeated until the shaami mixture was ready. All this was eons ago of course. Now, no one uses the sill batta for anything anymore I think.) And then the dough is shaped into round balls, flattened into circles or oblong shapes and then deep fried. The result is crisp, golden brown and because of the perfect marriage of the meat with the chana dal, the shaami’s come out a little firm, a little crisp and very, very tasty.

So everyone does know what shaami is right? Yes, after school, I’ve always assumed that everyone makes shaami as beautifully as my mother and it was a surprise for me when I got married and saw that my MIL’s shaami was not the same. It wasn’t bad, but the dough was not firm enough and hence when it was fried, sometimes they would become too crisp and the taste was different.

Many times I’ve done some part of the shaami work for my MIL. I might have watched over the mixture as it dried on the stove, or I might have ground it for my MIL…or shaped it and fried it, but I had never done all the work for it by myself. Today I wanted to make it and Ammi had come home to drop me off, as I had stayed there last night. She suggested I make kofta but I wanted to make shaami.

Today also, I didn’t do the initial, most important part of putting the ingredients together. Ammi did that, and she put it on the stove to dry. She also painstakingly removed every little bit of fat from the meat, because unless we do that, the shaamis sputter a lot in the hot oil and tend to break.

After the mixture got dried, I wasn’t able to grind it when it was still warm because I had to put Az to sleep. I came back, and got to work, and the mixture was slightly cold. Anyway, I ground it, and realized that there were a lot of the chana dal bits that were not getting ground. Ammi always told me not to use too much water while grinding and although I followed her edict, somehow, the dough was not too firm.

At 2 pm, both kids were hungry and I went to the kitchen to fry the shaamis. I shaped four of them, and dropped two in quick succession in hot oil. Disaster. The shaamis first got stuck at the bottom of the kadai, then when I tried to pry them out, they disintegrated completely. There was nothing left to flip over and I had to drain the oil of all the small shaami bits in it.

SOS call to mom and she said that not everyone can get shaami right. ‘It takes practice’ was all she said.

‘Ok! But what do I do NOW?’ I asked.

Her tip was that I either mix egg white in it, or powdered ‘putane’(Fried gram dal). I did the latter and then took new balls of dough, and fried it. Luckily this time, nothing untoward happened. Believe me…it is one of the most distressing sights you can ever see… of shaami disintegrating in hot oil. Making the perfect shaami is like a test for making good pickle in some cultures I think. I probably failed miserably, but then, I’m not going to give up. Right now however, the shaami I made today will last one more day. The next time I make it, i’m going to be a little more careful. And I won’t take good shaami for granted ever again!!

Over and done with!!

The daawat is over and done with! Last night, everyone came to our home, for the fatiha and dinner. We’d ordered biryani and my mom had made kutt! I don’t know how many people actually know what kutt is, but its this absolutely divine curry that is made from boiling horse gram in water and reducing the broth over low heat(its a process that can take days also!)…yes…then this broth is then given this tingling tadka, and then we add brinjals(never my favorite) and boiled eggs and kofta to it(yum!) In the end, its this dark, deep brown curry that has to be tasted to understand the flavor of life! Now that I have gone on and on about kutt, let me say that it takes a lot of patience to make it as it isn’t something that you decide to make in the morning, and you have it ready in half an hour or even by lunch time. So, its a rare treat and every one loves a dash of kutt.

So, as I was saying, Ammi had made kutt and along with the biryani, everyone loved it. My only disappointment was that since we had decided to have dinner upstairs, all the women were sent off straight up, and the men were sitting below. Hardly any of the women came to my house as we were all upstairs. I mean…why did I take so much trouble in cleaning and dusting if no women were going to come and see it? Only the ladies would actually notice the lovely sheets I had put on the beds and they would see how neatly the kitchen was arranged. I am not a tidy person but when I do take the effort and it goes unappreciated, its a waste!

Nevertheless, some women did come downstairs and they did inspect the kitchen and other rooms…so it wasn’t a complete waste after all. Whew! Now that this is behind me, I think I can breathe in relief and carry on!

Onion Dosa Breakfast and Square Dosa Musings

I had the most amazing onion dosa for breakfast today! Well, it was the first time i’ve had it, and I don’t know if it could be any better, but I’m a fan now!!

It so happened, that I was passing by Balaji Veg(our local veg fast food resto) and I saw a couple eating some sort of square dosa. I was intrigued. It looked crisp and it must have been pretty good because the man kept leaning over his own masala dosa to try some of this square dosa from the girl. I wanted to try it too, but I didnt know what it was called. I know plain dosa - crisp, flaky dosa that disintegrates beautifully in hot sambhar, I love masala dosa, the portly cousin of the plain dosa, with a handful of potato palya peeping from inside, glimmering because a nice fat blob of butter has been tossed over the palya, before the dosa is wrapped up..I know set dosa, but since i haven’t tasted it yet, I’ll assume it tastes as insipid as it looks. But this one, I didnt know what to ask for. At the counter, the man looked busy. I asked him if they have a square dosa but he shook his head. Maybe in the din he didnt hear me.

SO this morning when i went out with Azhaan, I thought, let me try out all the other dosas they have. One of them will surely be the square one. I asked for Onion dosa and the man nodded and gave me the coupon. I had the strangest feeling as I gave the coupon at the other counter. Like, what the heck are you doing with an Onion dosa coupon? You ALWAYS buy idlis, or vadas or masala dosas…don’t you know what you’re getting into?

I watched avidly as the dosa chef spread the batter. Square, let it be square I thought. But it was the usual round. And to my disappointment, he loaded it with chopped onions and coriander. Obviously. Well, what was I thinking? Onion dosa. Obviously it would have onions.

It seemed to take a longer time than usual to make, and I waited as he finally served it on a plate. Two small bowls, one with chutney, and the other with some red curry were kept ON the dosa, and he plunked some white chutney on it. I took it with me outside because there was no place inside. With Az on my hip, I broke a piece and put it in my mouth. It was fabulous!! The long time he had taken over it, (after flipping it) ensured that both sides were crisp, without becoming papery. The onions were half cooked and half crunchy, but it was just great!

When I finished it, I wondered which one the square dosa was. Next time. Next time I’ll find out. And onion dosa wasn’t bad at all!!

Yeh kya hua???

It started because of those severely insipid vanilla wafers that Mansoor brought home the other day. Me and the boys were like, seriously,..what were you thinking? Vanilla wafers???? Mansoor thought it was pineapple since the packaging was yellow. I was like, pineapple? When it comes to wafers its only chocolate for me, and apparently thats the case for Saboor and even Az!

So, I thought I’ll use them in some recipe, called up ammi, asked her for the recipe for some dessert of my childhood that she used to make, by layering custard, wafers, biscuits, custard etc and freezing it. Sidra smsd me the full recipe, and i spent my Sunday evening pottering about in the kitchen doing that.

I followed the instructions, but there are times when your mind seems to be glazed and although you’re seeing things, you’re not really looking. The heat in the kitchen stunned me a bit, and then I stood stirring the custard, a little stupidly perhaps…and there! before I could realise what happened, it had curdled. What was supposed to become a creamy custard became a disastrous curdy mixture. There was no way I could use this. SOS alert! I called ammi, who said that she really couldn’t do anything, as she was sitting some 7 to 8kms away.

‘Make ande ka halwa with it’ she suggested when I sounded desperate. ‘Add some khova, a little crumbled biscuits, some ghee and stir it a bit.’

I quickly delegated this task to my MIL who was glad I was thinking of not wasting food, by making more food. Then, I heated up another litre of milk, reduced it, and started the custard process again. I remember, there was one point where I actually opened my eyes wide, just so I didnt miss anything.

I waited and waited for the custard to thicken. When it seemed slightly thick I switched off the gas and followed the remaining instructions, of cooling it, adding gelatin and vanilla and then starting the layering process.

By this time, my MIL had finished making the halwa. It was not a bad effort considering that it had started out as something else.
When I got down to the exciting part of layering the pudding, I dipped the wafers in juice, arranged them neatly on the base of a pretty bowl, and poured the custard over it. Only thing was that the custard hadn’t thickened and the wafers promptly floated up. What layers, I thought in disgust as I poured the rest of the runny custard into the bowl and jammed it into the freezer. When I peeped into the freezer after half an hour, the wafers were floating and I realized that this was an even bigger mess than the first attempt!!!! I had to hack off a few blocks this morning for Saboor and Mansoor, who kind of liked it, but decided it was too sweet for them. Its still lying in the freezer. I hate it when this happens!!! And by the way, the ande ka halwa is ok. Its not bad, but its not fantastic either!! Yeh kya hua!!!!

Glorious Aamchoor

September 16th, 2007

Whenever I went to Vellore, amma (my naani) would call me aside and when no one, specifically my mother, was looking, she’d hand me some aamchoor. How I loved her for that! Aamchoor was something even better than chocolate!

Sour, tart, dripping with salt…a piece of aamchoor could last for more than two hours if you just nibbled at it. And it was something we often did, nibbling at the aamchoor while playing cards with the others, or simply lazing around in the old house in Vellore, or lying down on that huge swing that was there in amma’s house.

As I grew older, however I started liking aamchoor that was dry and not soft and squishy. I wanted to learn how to make it, but every year, during the mango season whenever I’d put out the mango pieces in the sun, they’d magically grow less and less, and even less, until there wasn’t much to dry anyway. Magic being, one of us who would pop a piece or two on our way to ‘check’ it out on the terrace, to shoo away crows ostensibly.

Last week on my trip to Vellore, I had my first bout of car sickness. I MUST be growing older. I’ve never had car sickness ever! But this was awful! Spinning head and squirming insides! They called for a nice, big piece of aamchoor to quell it. But as luck would have it, no one had any.

At our stop in Visharam, there was no aamchoor in chichajan’s house(he’s my mom’s uncle). Then, in Sathvacheri, there was no aamchoor in my aunt’s house either. I was getting desperate and didn’t want to sit in the car at all!

On our way back, we had to stop at khalajan’s house(mom’s youngest sister) who lives in Alathur. I asked her if she had and she said she’ll be right back. She came back with this HUGE bag of aamchoor and gave it all to me!!!

Azeem also loves aamchoor and he was hankering after it. So I told him, we’d split it back in Bangalore. On the way back, I happily nibbled at two pieces and watched disgusted as Saboor popped a whole piece in his mouth. He used to hate aamchoor when he was small, but thats changed now.

Aamchoor was the only thing that helped me out last year when I was pregnant and had such awful digestion problems. On the way back, I asked Zakia aunty how to properly make aamchoor and she gave me instructions. Will post that later in another blog.

Mmm! Right now, I’m fasting and all this talk of aamchoor is literally making my mouth water. I’d better stop right now.