I think I can cook.......

In the recent times a lot of lifestyle and living channels have cropped up on our televisions sets teaching us the ways of the rich and the famous. But most of the time slots are filled with cooking shows. Now don’t think that I am against them or that I am being sarcastic, on the contrary I like them a lot, really I swear. I love the way these chefs or everyday people or even sometimes celebrities cook food and all the exotic ingredients they add and all the garnishing which looks all so cute, sometimes I wonder if I could actually bring myself up to eating it and destroying that cute little thing. But still at the end of the day, when I walk up to my kitchen I don’t find half the ingredients they go on to add and I end up cooking the regular dal or sabzi or some other boring dish. Then comes the god blessed Saturday. I go out into the market and buy everything I need and bring them home. I cook with all the zeal and zest and the outcome, a great exotic dish. Everyone in my family is happy. After all, I can cook, I proved myself. A month goes by and I shuffle in the kitchen looking for something and there they are like ghosts from the past, those same ingredients that I had once bought, of no use now, rotting in the dark corners of my kitchen. I curse myself on the amount I had spent on buying them. But alas, what’s done is done hoping no one other than me, see it or I would have to cook the whole charade again.

It was my parent’s 31^st anniversary and I wanted to give a personal touch so I decided to do something special. I decided to throw them a small party at home and I would cook, now come on I did prove myself worthy of cooking, didn’t I? Unfortunately, on the anniversary day it was full moon and my very religious mother preferred to have everything to be veg. and that did not include onions or garlic, a big blow to my cooking plans. Fortunately, I have a friend who is an expert in cooking stuff, weird and unnatural things, you name it and she can cook, deliciously. Uncanny talent, you see. I once heard her saying that she could cook Shahi Paneer. So along with many other vegetarian dishes I decided to cook Shahi Paneer. It was over the phone that I had asked the recipe and I had braced myself for unnecessary ingredients and hours of standing in the kitchen. But when she was done giving me the instructions and I looked down over my note book, it was done in not more than 4 lines. The ingredients were mostly found at home and amazingly the cooking took less the 15 mins. and miraculously it didn’t require neither onion nor garlic.

Now don’t think that we had to compromise over the taste, no. My dad is a shrewd critic and when he appreciates something then it means, it’s worth it. Well, he actually liked it or should I say “loved it”. I thanked my friend and she was glad to be there for help. I proved my worthiness again.

Ever since then I have been thinking is it really necessary to go out of the way to cook something and buy stuff which won’t be required in the near future, cause frankly speaking Indian cooking is nowhere near Mexican or continental or Spanish or Chinese or any other country dishes. It’s kind of obvious, none are to each other. My brother, who thinks he is no less than a reputed chef himself, might not agree with me, because he does go out of the way every time he gets an urge of cooking, which happens every Saturdays and Sundays.

But here, I am talking about the lazy brats like me, who like to eat but with less efforts and miraculous outcomes. For me anything that takes more than an hour to cook should be purchased from the market. I know there are lot critics here who are waiting to pounce on me on this one. But for me I speak the truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God. So not to hurt anybody’s feelings all I want to say is the art of cooking lies when you can make simple vegetable taste like heaven. And I get the opportunity of tasting it every now and then when my mom cooks for me. Not being too emotional, I beg all the motherly people to extend a hand to us and send us such recipes that make us healthy and our tongues an expert for tasting delectable food. (Without much efforts, though)