Prema left for Chennai last week, and I am home alone in Findlay.

When men are in charge, without any supervision from the opposite sex, the house is a different place. It is an experimental lab where everything needs to be tried out, as we are never sure how things actually work. And there is infinite freedom, without any rules. Books can be tossed anywhere after reading. We can wear any color socks we like. The dinner plate can sit on the dining table as long as we want it there. And we can use any ingredient and cook anything we want. For some, cooking is the weakest area, but we aren’t afraid to try. It is through these trials that we make insipid food, and enjoyable memories.

My earliest recollections of such daring trials are from Bhubaneshwar when amma left for Cuddalore with Jagan, and Padi, a local boy, was asked to cook for us. Now, Padi was good at running errands, but he had no place in the kitchen: he ran amuck in there! That Monday morning, when we sat at the breakfast table to have bread-uppuma, a semi-solid lump, with mor-kali like consistency landed on the plate with a dull, ploth sound! Prasad and I didn’t know what to make of it, but appa was furious. Upon probing we found out that Padi had used two tumblers of water instead of letting tomatoes provide the juice. Appa took over the kitchen thereafter, and we suffered even more.

Again, in Ashok Nagar, when we three were by ourselves, appa cooked and served us pudalanga kottu with a watery kozhambu that was thickened with rice flour every night till it became a solid block and got firmly wedged in the vessel. On the third night Prasad abandoned us just before dinner and left for Adyar, and appa finally abandoned the kozhambu. We did compensate for the bad dinner by watching a night show movie in Udayam theatre. Could appa have ever imagined taking me to a night show had amma been around?

To be left alone is to us a call to be creative. Once on a train from Bombay to Madras, I found a gentleman seated beside me open a small box of dry powder, pour some fresh cold water and make instant chutney that he offered to me with idlis. It tasted very authentic! He had invented this version of "non perishable" chutney when his wife had left with their kids for her hometown in the south during summer vacation. During his tenure in Assam, ParthaA founded a bridge players’ club in Tinsukia, and indulged in crosswords and e-mails (Naunet was born and popularized). I am also told that he is a very good cook, but can’t vouch for it myself. Adyar athimber is notorious for his ghee-rich, badam halwa and cashew cake "projects" whenever he finds free time and a good appetite. And I know that Prasad is a good cook and manages to write and paint when he finds himself alone in the apartment. It is indeed interesting to note that the artist within us finds expression only when we are home alone, without any female intervention.

This artistic expression was extended a bit too far for Shivashankar’s liking when I was his roommate at State College. It had been more than two years since he had left India, and he wanted to go back home that summer. He was desperately seeking someone to take over his apartment lease so that he would not pay a fine. After much hunting, he did finally find somebody who had just come to the country then from India, and was looking for an apartment. It was my cooking turn that Sunday and I had planned to make pongal with sambar. Shivashankar requested me to make a little more than our normal quantity in case the visitors had not had their lunch as yet, and I obliged to his request. Everything seemed normal before the 1:00 p.m. appointment, when suddenly, minutes before the student’s arrival, the damn Prestige exploded, spilling its contents all across kitchen and the living room. When the party stepped in they found murals made of moong dal, rice and sambar! There was no chance in hell that the student was going to move in. But then, how was I supposed to know that lot of rice and water in a steam pressure cooker with a blocked valve could cause it to explode? I am just an engineer!

By the way, can someone tell me if rajma will go well with spinach in a sabji? I am starving here.

Mukund Narasimhan
Home Page: http://home.earthlink.net/~mnarasimhan