C – Cook it like my Daddy

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It wouldn’t be an exaggeration if I say baba was the best cook I was blessed with. Some of his signature dishes can never be replicated, however hard we try. He could prepare the most complicated dishes with ease. Mom, dad and my sister all have utterly talented culinary skills. Maybe, that’s one of the reasons the good god dropped me in this family so I can never have enough good food.

When I am away from home, food is what makes me homesick. The fact that I have to cook my meals, is one thing I hate about staying away from home. I was never interested in cooking and my family was not even bothered that I am not learning to cook anything. Because I grew up watching my father cook, I never felt cooking was a women’s job alone. Only later in life when I faced the world outside my home, I came across men who didn’t even walk up to the kitchen to get a glass of water for themselves, forget about cooking a meal.

Maa was required to travel for work and those few days would be a feast for me and my sister. Baba would cook all our favourite things. Mealtimes were happy and enjoyable with him around us. Sundays were specially dedicated to good food and in the morning, he would bring kachori, sabji and jalebi from the local shop, a taste that has remained unmatched to date. Some Sunday mornings were aromatic with aalu dum and loochi (puri) along with some sweet. Lunch was not vegetarian and was prepared by parents together as it required more preparation. One good thing that they did was include the kids too in the preparation. We did not have a mixer-grinder at home and all spices were ground in the sil-baata, a grinding stone, and mostly it was the task of either my sister or me. Our garden had some herbs too and maa would ask for either curry leaves, chilli or tomato while busy in the kitchen and I had to run to the garden to get them. I loved picking up curry leaves as they came out leaving the stick behind and would also leave a scent in my hand. After the lavish lunch, we sat watching a movie on the television, either a Hindi or a Bengali one.

He was also an expert in making chapattis, right from kneading the dough to rolling round rotis, to puff them on tawa, he knew it all. I never saw anyone in my home puff rotis directly on the flame, that’s one thing I taught him after I got married and he found it interesting. Another thing they saw for the first time was me using a knife to cut vegetables, unlike them who always used a bothi, which is a cutting instrument with a curved blade fixed on a wooden base. He learned to use a knife too but maa did not like the idea of using it and preferred her bothi.

Another expertise he had was to make narkel-nadu, coconut sweet balls, that he did from the scratch and I loved watching every step. He would sit on the ground with a big coconut and tear and pull its cover. Then, he would break open the shell and kept a bowl beneath it to collect the coconut water. I watched the rest of the process sipping that sweet water. That same bothi had a round head attached to it which was used for shredding the coconut. He did that all with so much passion. Then came the cooking part, which was the best as it filled the entire house with a sweet essence, and made us impatient. Even our neighbours were aware when he would prepare this sweet at home.

He continued to treat me like his little girl always, even after I got married. Whenever I called him up to say I made something, he was surprised and would ask do you know how to cook it? He would still break the samosa for me so I don’t burn my fingers and would still ask me before adding extra spice to any curry. Nobody can ever replace him, his culinary skills and his love for us.

I am happy I could cook a lot of things for him when he visited us. He loved everything I cooked and enjoyed his meal. I try my best to remember his cooking lessons and cook as deliciously as him but I know that is just a dream. Mealtime was always very important in our family. Even after marriage whenever we had a guest at home, he would talk to me over the phone and suggest what all can I prepare for them. He loved everything spicy and rich with a lot of flavour in it.

A lot of new food items were introduced to him when we started living in other cities and he visited us. Vada-pao, buttermilk, dabeli, dhokla, puran poli, misal and even the fruit chiku was something he tried for the first time. He was always eager to try new dishes, not that he liked them all. He would go to the vada-pao stall and ask them to pack only the vada, not the pao! He would then enjoy the vada with his favourite muri at home and we couldn’t stop laughing but loved his experiment too. That has turned out to be a favourite evening snack for me now.

What makes my mom, sister and me sad is that a man who loved food to the core had to leave the world without eating anything. Cancer struck him twice and on his last few days, because of the surgery, he was not allowed to eat solid food. He was given liquid food through the pipes that he disliked but still allowed the nurse to do it because he wanted to get well soon. He wanted to be back on his feet and live happily again but God had other plans and he left us all silently.

Coming up next-

D – Durga Puja and the Darkest Night

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