An AI in an EI Kitchen – Part VI: Learning to love Lonvas

Every true blue, dyed-in-the-blood EI knows his or her Lonvas.  My husband’s credentials were faultless and so, obviously, he loved his Lonvas twice a day, every day, if possible.  I, being a loving wife, resolved to provide accordingly.

The recipe book was helpful – the ingredients and method were the simplest I’d ever come across.  How mistaken!  First heat the oil.  Did that.  Now throw in the pods of garlic and smash them in the hot oil.  Well, that’s exactly what I did.  Have you tried smashing hard garlic in hot oil with the back of a spoon?  The garlic slipped and slid all around the base of the utensil and the hot oil spluttered and splashed (the numerous blisters I sported were testimony to that) and frustration rose proportionately.  Garlic conquered, I added the meat and stirred to let it brown.  Not too bad. Now add the bottle masala.  Not wanting to appear stingy, I added a ladle full. Now add the thin milk from a coconut.  I looked at the coconut in all its perfection.  How does one get thin milk? Called up sis in law.  She explained.  Came back to meat now browned to black.  Removed utensil from the stove.  Cleaned and scraped the coconut and extracted thick and thin milk as directed (thick comes first and then the thin!).  Added as indicated in cookbook.  Added  bottle gourd, skinned and diced (Right? Wrong! It needed to be cut to look like the brackets at the beginning and end of this statement) Tamarind juice and salt to taste completed the ingredients. Covered the vessel and allowed to cook till meat tender.  Opened lid after specified time and looked at an unholy curdled mess.  So much for a simple, can’t-go-wrong recipe!! How on earth did it become an unchallenged favourite?

What unlocked the memory?  An introduction to an EI who remarked, ‘So, you married an EI, do you know how to make Lonvas curry?’  And I replied with aplomb, ‘With both hands tied behind my back.’  Well that would be a stretch, but you get my meaning.  After all the years and having prepared hubby’s favourite at least three times in the week, I am definitely an expert.  I can, in my own estimation, turn out an impeccable Lonvas with its smooth creamy gravy and distinctive aroma.  I love to make it because, yes, it is simple and it lends itself to such a variety of combinations: shark fish dressed with a generous sprinkling of garden fresh coriander leaves; egg poached in the bubbling gravy, vegetables mixed as in a harvest festival, meat and veggies, prawn and veggies, lobster, crab.  I could extol the virtues of Lonvas till the end of time.

The funny thing is that while the EIs love it, others turn up their noses.  I can’t imagine why.

In my unbiased AI opinion, it is delicious! And yes, I could eat it twice a day, every day if possible!!

An AI in an EI Kitchen – Part IV

My introduction to fish was a happy one. I encountered it filleted, flaked, crumbed and fried as in Bird’s Eye Fish Fingers (are they still around?). Fish was delicious, Fish smelt good. Fish came in neat cardboard cartons out of a deep freeze. There was no connect between the aquarium and the meal on my plate.

Fast forward twenty years or so to when I stepped into the EI kitchen and discovered that fish was on the daily menu: every denizen of the deep was fair game. And so I was introduced, in quick succession, to Parkat (Sting ray), Mushi (Shark), Rawas (Salmon) Surmai (Mahaseer), Cupar (Eel or Tuna), Catfish, Ghol (Croaker), Bombil (Bombay Duck), Bhangda (Mackerel) and a whole lot more from the elite Pomfret to the guttersnipe Newtie. And how can one forget the shellfish? Prawns, shrimp, crabs, lobsters, oysters, clams were expensive in comparison but still added their presence to the meal. Each fish was allotted its own masala ranging from red, hot and sour to yellow, to green to reddish brown or brownish red – the ingredients were selected so as to enhance the particular flavour of the fish. Some fish were good for frying, others for stuffing, yet others for curry and some for baking and cutlets.

The fish was still delicious but there was one catch: it had to be fresh! Hello, Indian Fish Market.

My first visit was an education. There sat the women, buxom of build, laden with gold, hair slicked to a shine, baskets brimming with different kinds of piscatorial fare. A stone slab and a mean looking sickle completed the picture. There was a time honoured process involved in the purchase: examine the freshness of the fish by pressing the gills and checking the eyes, then haggle over the price, then sidestep the flying scales, fins and other incidental debris and avoid the ubiquitous cats. All this while being overpowered by the aroma of fresh, not so fresh and some quite stale fish and discarded entrails. It was also tough to avoid the puddles of ‘fish water’ and you undertook the homeward journey trying hard to avoid the accusatory glances of other commuters. Buying fish was not for the fainthearted. Neither was cleaning them – fish always seem to be caught while enjoying their own last meal!

I soon learned the useful trick of sending hubby to buy the fish. The fisher-women loved him and a few became his ‘fast friends’ hailing him as soon as he entered the market and producing for him the best of their stock. He would come home with a lot more than he bargained for, but since the fish was fresh and cleaned to perfection he was readily forgiven: we could look forward to a weekend table laden with the ocean’s bounty.

Those fisher-women with their lively banter and occasional invective are now long gone. The present generation is not so amiable in plying the trade and fish is sold at ‘fixed price only’, take it or leave it. The up-market housewife has also been responsible for the introduction of ready to cook ‘fresh’ fish delivered to the door. The trawler companies are finding it convenient to cut out the middle woman.

Fish is no longer on our daily menu, but when it does make its appearance, we remember the time when the trip from market to table could be quite an odyssey!

An AI in an EI Kitchen – Part I

Far back in time, when I was still a klutz in the kitchen, a brother in law was sternly admonished by his doctor and advised to stick to a rigid diet of plain boiled vegetables. That’s something you can’t go too far wrong with and I happily volunteered. I chopped up the vegetables and popped them in the cooker, but before I topped it with the lid, a visiting sister-in-law sauntered in (my sisters-in-law numbered seven at the time), took one look and asked me what I was making. When I explained, she told me that bro-in-law would as it is be upset with the diet, the least we could do was make it attractive, ‘Food should not just taste good, it should look good!”. We took out a fresh lot of vegetables (the already chopped up ones were consigned to the soup pot) and set to: the bottle gourd was cut into semi circles, the carrots julienned, the potatoes wedged and the peas, thank goodness, were their own petit selves. Steamed to perfection, with just the right amount of salt and then arranged on the plate, those veggies looked as good as any gourmet meal and the delighted smile on bro-in-law’s face said it all. He really appreciated the effort to make a humdrum meal look special.

EI food has always had that extra-special touch. Be it a birthday, an anniversary or a family get-together for any reason, the table is a delight to the eye; while the aroma urged you to tuck in forthwith, the view made you pause and applaud. The meatloaf usually took pride of place with a covering of sculpted mashed potato, the shape being the product of the imagination and nimble fingers of the hostess. The sausages usually ended up as the ‘hairdo’ on a grapefruit face, the salad was presented as a horn of plenty, and sometimes even the rice would be coloured and moulded. The sweet dish was the piece de resistance – once again a sight to behold. This is just a sampling. Different hostesses had different ways of laying the table, each one a masterpiece in its own right. It is hard to believe that all of this was done by women who had learnt the craft from mother in the family kitchen.

Today, food styling is big business and big bucks. Those in the know will tell you that aesthetics is everything and a meal should engage sight, scent, taste and texture. In short, a work of art in every sense.

Suddenly, I am taken back to mealtime in the nursery. A formidably fussy eater, my meals were always presented as ‘pictures’ on the plate so that I could be coaxed into eating the ‘old man’s nose’ or the ‘little dog’s tail’ without realizing that it was actually the food that was going down. The ‘art’ may have been a little rough, but it certainly pleasured the mind of a child.

Somewhere in my AI childhood I felt the EI touch!