THE A. B. C. D OF COOKING

My experience with cooking is a short one, but an interesting one. Coming from medical background..there was hardly any time to develop my culinary skills. But I guess, just like there are maternal instincts in a woman, there surely must be culinary instincts too.. this can be the only logical explanation of my sudden interest in cooking. Infact many of my dental girl friends realised that they too developed this sudden interest in cooking after they became mothers. So I guess it must be a natural phenomenon for an Indian woman to graduate from being married and then getting into kitchen ! ..well most of them ! 

This lead me to think, just like "the way to the mans heart is through his stomach" ..what is the "way to a woman's heart"?? Is  "Cooking " for her family the "way to a woman's heart and soul"? Is a woman incomplete without cooking for her family? ..Probably.

As I started developing interest in cooking, the first thing I wanted to achieve was the same taste in my recipes as MY MOTHERS. I think we all try to search our..Maa Ke hath ka Khanna..Its like a standard against which everything is measured. Anyways..I am still trying to replicate my mums cooking. I get it sometimes..I fail other times. ..all in the hope that one day my daughter will also remember my made food as Maa Ke haath ka Khanna.

So as I cooked... little and more, I formulated my own A B C D of Cooking. .

A - Amount. - the amount of ingredients added. Ill rate this as the most important requirement of good cooking. Imagine to have a well cooked recipe with too much chilly or no salt. But the difficulty lies in understanding this "amount". Its amazes me how my mother dint refer to any scale..just pure andaaza and it was always perfect.

B- Best time to add. - Timing is everything. The right time to add onions, garlic in  hot oil . Or right time to add water in rightly sauted semolina for pudding (sooji ka halwa). If one misses the timing the flavour is sure to change.

C- Contents- Its not just how much we add, when we add but also what we add. Small additions can make a whole lot of difference.Simple recipes can be made a great treat for the palate just by the addition of our magical ingredients - spices. Indians are blessed with the treasure of spices. ..used differently and extensively all over the country. One trick I learned was to stock up my kitchen with all types of  ready made spices. Add rajma masala in baingan and see the difference in flavour. Its amazing that how just by adding a differently made garam masala can change the whole flavour of the recipe.

and finally D - Desire to cook. I firmly agree that the feeling with which one cooks gets imbibed by the food that is being cooked. This is one of the key factors that make a mothers made food so incomparable to anything else. ..its just loaded with so much love and affection. A happily made meal will make you healthy and happy. .

When all ABCD is put together it makes that perfect meal which we all crave for. Recipes need not be exotic..a simply made dal chawal served with a dollop of melting ghee, spicy pickle and onion rings is all that it  may take to make a happy satisfying meal.