Medu Wada..Successful at last

For a very long time I have been trying to make Medu Wada. I tried in various permutation and combination but was never able to get it right. The taste used to be good but not even once did I get the shape right. Finally this monsoon I got it perfect. So here I take the pleasure of sharing the recipe...sorry only the photographs.
The batter

Getting fried

The end product

13/7

Last Wednesday my son wanted to have pastries so I took him to the nearby cake shop. While we were enjoying our pastries I got a call from my husband. He was quite tensed and wanted to know where we were. He told me that a bomb blasted in Mumbai few minutes earlier and it is better for us to get back to home as soon as possible.
Again another terror attack on Mumbai. This is the third strike in last four years. I suddenly felt angry, sad, frightened and above all helpless. I asked son to finish his pastry fast. He is too small to even understand all this. When I came out of the shop a saw a plastic waste bag and a chill went down my spine. There could be a bomb in that plastic bag. That may explode anytime killing me and many others like me. I tried to board an auto but none of them were ready to go. It was raining, autos were refusing and phone lines were jammed. The same story that gets repeated after every bomb blast. Only the rains were a new addition this time.
When I reached home I saw my father strolling anxiously on the balcony. I started getting calls from my friends and relatives from all over the world. I spoke to many of them after a long time. At times only tragedies forces people to make calls. I was assuring all of them that we were fine but at the same time I was wondering how long can we stay safe. Next time it could be. This fear gripped me. My neighbour was stuck in the road for five hours.
The question now is Why do we suffer this everytime. And how long would we suffer?

My memories of Kuwait

For past couple of days am missing Kuwait like anything. I wish I could go back and enjoy the sunset at Scientific centre, or enjoy the showarma at cannary. I miss the lanes of old Souk and Shark. This is my pictorial recapitulation of my lovely city.

Day 3

I was awake till 12 am only to clean the mess created by my son. Today I woke up 2 hours past my scheduled time. I would like to congratulate myself because in spite of waking up late I was able to finish things within time. Yippieeeee.
Now let me come to the “Salman Khan” effect on my sonny. Sonny is a huge fan of Mr. Khan as he keeps on imitating Salman in every possible way. When my son was 1.5 years old, he could immitate the dance steps of the “hud hud dabanng” song with perfection. Now he copies the “dhinka chika” song. Imitating song and dance is fine but when it comes to the other aspects of life then it becomes quite annoying. For example my son just doesn’t want to put on his shirt because Mr. Khan never does so. He has also started considering me the villain of the Khan movies and bashes me up anytime he feels so.Honestly I am going through abusive days.

Day 2

Day 2

If you have kids it is near impossible to follow schedule. When you make a schedule you never consider the re-working part. Whereas, if you have kids, then the re-working bit would occupy most of the schedule. For example; in my schedule I thought of making the bed. Obviously I meant it to be done once but with my son around I had to make the bed at least 4 times. First I tidied it and soon after my son started jumping on the bed, so again I had to make it. This followed for atleast four times. Same thing happened with the living room floor. Once I cleared all his toys from the floor, within seconds he threw his toys all over again. So many times I had to bend that I can easily become the brand ambassador for some back pain relief cream.
After doing and re-doing I gave up on my schedule and decided to follow only as much as my son permits. My entire self is now a slave to him. The worst part began in the night. I was planning to go to bed early. Since evening I had a bad headache so I planned to sleep early, but as the saying goes, man proposes god disposes. Just when I was about to sleep my son started crying. Not only was he crying, he just became so violent. He started hitting, biting and beating us. He was crying inconsolably. We were just not able to figure out what had happened to him. Finally we decided to take him to the hospital. The entire way he was crying but the moment we entered the hospital he was as calm as a lake in spring.
Later on we realized that more than any physical pain he was emotionally upset. The entire evening I and hubby were busy watching television so sonny must have felt ignored. Typically single child’s problem. Anyways today I did not even try to follow any schedule. Did not even bother to cook breakfast. phewwww

Day 1

Today was the first day of my schedule. Well, I would say, I was partially successful. Today I ‘almost’ woke up quite early in the morning; I snoozed my alarm for about 5 times and finally woke up 45 minutes behind my schedule. Yesterday night my neighbour's daughter was locked out and she was waiting for her parents at my place. Her parents came home at around 11:30pm and we went to bed after 12 am. Therefore I was not able to sleep the required eights hours.
After waking up I definitely took the lime juice. The meditation part was only for 30 seconds, I got too bored to take it further. I was just about to leave for my brisk walking when hubby dear woke up and declared he wants to take the privilege of going for a walk. Husband’s logic is ‘Why would a person like me need a walk..It is only for the privileged class who go to office and not for the working class homemakers’. I once again “sacrificed” and stayed back home for my sleeping son.
Next, I concentrated on preparing the breakfast, when, “pyaaaaaaaa” son woke up. He came crying to the kitchen and demanded that I carry him. He said “Ma kule” He cannot yet pronounce the ‘o’ and all his “o’ are replaced with ‘e’ or ‘u’. Therefore ‘kole’ is ‘kule’, ‘boshe’ is ‘bushe’ and ‘potty’ is ‘petty’. After getting on my lap he declared ‘ma, petty” and so I rushed him to the loo. This sudden urgent job displaced me further from my schedule.
At last after overcoming few hurdles, breakfast was ready, lunch was packed, bed was made, and room was cleaned (cleaned and re-cleaned, as every time I was cleaning son was messing it up). It was time to drop sonny to school. After dropping him I decided to enjoy some ‘Me-time’ and went to a bookstore(my favourite place on earth). I was just leafing through the pages of Amitav Ghosh’s River of Smoke when I got a frantic call from my neighbor. He said that my door was not opening. My maid had come to work and she was not able to open the door as it was jammed. I bid goodbye to Ghosh and his new book and came home immediately. In front of my door, I saw: my well built neighbor, his petite wife and my maid all were clinging to the door and trying in different way to push it open. I also joined them, but I knew that if my ‘huge’ neighbor was unable to open it “ami to kon chaar”. Finally carpenter was called. He opened the door in a fraction of a second. Thank god! Atleast I didn’t have to stay stranded in front of my door for the rest of the day. All along this door episode I was cursing my hubby. It was his negligence that we were stuck. He knew about this problem long before but never bothered to fix it.
Anyways Day 1 of my journey was quite eventful. looking forward to day 2.

Organiser

Finally I have prepared a schedule for myself. Something that is practical and achievable.
Wake up
Drink lime juice with warm water
Yoga and mediatation
brisk walking
prepare tea
prepare son's morning milk
prepare husband's lunch to be packed
prepare breakfast
serve breakfast
make bed
clean the house. first the entire house then one scheduled room for day
give son a bath
take bath
get son ready for school
drop him to school
prepare son's lunch
listen to music
cleaning/ bank work/ newspaper reading
pick up son from school
lunch time
put son to sleep
blog time
rest
evening tea
evening snack for son
take him down to play
serve dinner
post dinner cleaning
drink milk
personal beauty care
sleeeep time zzzzzzzzzzz

Things to do

After becomg a full time home maker I often used to miss my working days. I used to miss my office cubicle, my office PC, the coffee machines, the cafeterias, the board rooms. It is something I still miss but at the same time I always look at the glass as half full. So now I know that I can do few things that would have been impossible to do had I been working. The most important one is spending time with my two and a half year old son. I enjoy giving him a bath, dropping him to his playgroup, attending his parent teacher meetings, taking him for his annual day rehearsals. I also enjoy time with my father. The other few things that I can do is sleep in the afternoon (he he he).
All said and done I often feel that I am not exploiting my time at home fully. I am falling prey to laziness and therefore it is time I should start doing something meaningful and creative and enjoyable with my time instead of grumbling.
Here I have prepared a To-do-list for myself.
I should blog on a regular basis
I should take out more time to read
I should listen to good music
I should exercise
I should pursue my dancing
I should tend to my garden
I should cook better meals
I should clean the house
I should watch more movies
I should organise myself
For now I think this is enough. Let me see what else I can do. First thing I will have to chalk out a plan for this. Will do that in my next blog. That should become a guideline for all the other lazybones like me.

Curry Leaf

I brought some ripe curry seeds from my Kolkata home. After coming home i started drying those seeds. My trusted aide U had advised me to dry the seeds before planting. I diligently started drying them. Due to the monsoon drying them was little difficult. Being the impatient one that I am, I stopped drying them as soon as I ran out of patience.I soaked the half dried seeds overnight and the following day planted them in a pot. Now I am waiting for the seeds to germinate. It has been only one day and am already feeling impatient. Oh god please give me some patience.
watch this space for the later reports on the growth of curry leaves in my kitchen garden.

The Gardener

"Jakhon pratham dhoreche koli amar mallika(curry patar) bone"
Recently I have started taking interest in growing plants. On my recent visit to Kolkata I found that the backyard of my Kolkata home was full of weeds and unwanted plants. So one day I along with my trusted aide U started cleaning the backyard. It took an entire evening to de-weed the backyard.
Once the cleaning was done there was not much to do apart from planting few seeds. We started with gourd followed by green chillies and curry leaves. The result was awesome, within a week small sprouts of chillies grew and the gourd also sprawled quite fast. I was really happy.
My mother was an ardent gardener but I was never. Maybe slowly with age I am gaining interest in things that require patience. Often I look at myself and feel that slowly I am becoming like my mother. Nowadays I look like her and also feel like her. Maybe I understand her more now than I had ever before. Only if she had been alive to see the new 'me'.The guava tree that my ma had planted still stands in our Kolkata backyard only the planter is far away. Trees and plants give you a sense of stability that none other could give. So here starts my new avataar of a gardener. lets see how long it lasts.

Udaipur trip

For the time being only the photographs will do the talking

Creating a blog is easy but maintaining it is difficult. It is more difficult for a lazy woman like me...I have never been a diligent woman, I do not have the tenacity to pursue anything. But doing little is better than doing nothing. Therefore although infrequent but still I do keep in touch with my blog. At least the silver lining is I have not abandoned it altogether. So here again i try to resurrect my lost forte

Missed you

Oh my dear dear blog...i missed you so much....staying away from you was as painful as staying away from one's own child. July was bad and August was no better, but hopefully things are little bit calmer now. I just keep my fingers crossed. I am tired of all the chaos.

Blogging and cooking

This is like the puzzle what came first the chicken or the egg, in my case it is replaced with blogging and cooking. I was always fond of food but never fond of cooking. It was to me like a very mundane chore that I did with a very grim face. We always had a cook and I always thought that the cook is the most indispensable person in my life. But as we all know that "change is the only constant", things didn't remain the same.the most interesting part is how it changed. After quitting my job in order to take care of my son, I was mostly staying at home. I became very restless. I decided to channelize my restlessness and started a blog. A blog that would primarily speak about me, my emotions, my daily chores, my vacations, my passions.Initially I wrote a short story in my blog and then inspired by other co-bloggers I wrote a recipe and then there was no looking back. I started filling up my blog space with recipes, this also led to a sudden surge in cooking. I do not know if I am passionate about the blog or the food. I suddenly started monopolizing the kitchen, which was ever since the sole domain of my book. She didn't naturally take this insurgence sportingly and left. The strange part is I felt good after she left. I suddenly feel free and am on a cooking spree like never before. lets see how long it lasts

Dal puri with a difference

I think very soon I will achieve the title of "re-use queen". I have started reusing leftovers to such an extent that I am almost getting addicted. Human kind should give me a standing ovation for this. In this age of global warming and food crisis I am trying to bring back equilibrium and push back the disaster with my reuses.
Well, I share this credit (I am assuming that you are already standing and clapping for me, being a Leo I survive on applauds)with both my mother and my mother-in-law. Both the women had OCD(obsessive compulsive disorder)in not wasting food. My mother used every single part of a vegetable to cook her meals, it included the skin, seeds, stem and what not. The same with my mom-in-law, infact my mom-in-law is so much in love with leftovers that she would even keep aside a single leftover aloo from a macher jhol to eat the next day. Although these habits of both the mothers irritated me once upon a time but now with age I have started realising their benefits. In today's age where preservation has become the key word for survival I think these age-old methods of our mother's should lead us to better future not only for our own families but for the entire world. Mothers take a bow.

Yesterday few of my husband's vegetarian friends came for dinner. I had prepared mixed dal, lauer torkari, begun bhaja(this dish is a hit with hubby's veg buddy's) raita and halwa for them. They loved the Bengali lau and begun bhaja so much that they literally neglected the dal, which I had prepared in a non-bengali style(hats off to simple Bengali cuisine). Negligence of the dal lead to it's leftover.I suddenly remembered both the mothers and following them I utilised leftover dal to make tasty dal puris. This Dal Puri is slightly different in preparatin nevertheless it is very tasty and above all it saves your leftover dal from heading the litterbin.



Preparation

Leftover dal (any variety)
2 cups wheat flour
1 pinch ajwain
1/4 cup water
2 tbsp vegetable oil
salt to taste

Take the flour in a bowl and add the dal, ajwain and salt to it. Mix well. Slowly add water to knead it into a soft dough. Make small balls from the dough. Roll them into small circles. In a tawa fry them adding oil. The same way as we fry parathas. Alternatively you can also deep fry them in a pan like puris.

Eat them with chilli pickle and curd/yogurt.

Fine Balance

Just finished reading A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry. Well I was never a Rohinton Mistry fan but it was my Friend Kaustav's insistence that compelled me to read Mistry. I remember all those bus rides on our way to office when my dear colleague used to hammer me with Mistry praises that finally a bought a copy of Tales from Firozshah Baag. After completing it there was no looking back. I started reading Mistry the way many others read Harry Potter.. My beloved friend always said that Fine Balancewas perhaps Mistry's best piece of fiction, and I do not dare to differ.
Let me make a confession; I am a very classist person at heart, I am not the kind of person who would enjoy the Premchand genre of literature, infact I read them with condescending attitude and often never relate to them. Therefore I initially thought I would never be able to enjoy a novel whose protagonists are landless chaamarstrying to find foothold in Mumbai( strangely the name of Mumbai is never mentioned in the novel). contrary to my belief i ended up empathizing with the chaamars.
The novel takes on emergency head on. From nasbandi to city beautification to forced rallys everything is there. This novel deals with untouchability, loneliness upperclass snobbery, fraud godman, student politics, police torture, beggary, pavement dwellers, infact it deals with real India. The India which is often ignored by the upper class bourgeois. The India about which we often suffer amnesia.

Mom (o)

The craving for Momo is increasing by leaps and bounds. Craving for a food, she didn’t touch for 15 years after that fateful day. She used to feel a strong resentment towards Momo. She often thought the food as the reason for her tragedy. And therefore she kept herself away from it. But now suddenly she is feeling the strongest urge to have it. Initially she tried to fend off the craving, but it slowly overwhelmed her. Throughout the day she was only thinking of Momos.
Then one day she thought of ordering Momos from the nearest Tibetan delight. She picked up the phone and dialled the number but the repulsion crept back and she kept the phone.
More than anything she was scared of her father’s prying. Ever since that incidence she deliberately abstained from Momo, and her father always felt her abstinence illogical. No doubt her father would be happy to see his daughter forgetting the past, but she was too embarrassed to answer any of his questions.
Finally she abandoned the idea of buying it and decided to secretly prepare it at home when the others would be away. The very next day she clandestinely went to the nearby mall and bought all the ingredients. She kept them in the freezer behind other stuff, safeguarding them from peeping eyes.
Throughout the night she was unable to sleep. She was having a strange feeling. She was feeling guilty although she had no reason to feel so, but still she felt culpability. For the last 15 years she had always held this particular food responsible for her misfortune and now all of a sudden she was dying to have it. Throughout the night she felt uneasy and memories of that unfortunate day came back like a movie flashback.

She could see and feel that fateful morning when her mother was preparing ingredients for Momo. It was she who had requested her mom to prepare Momo. From early morning her mom started chopping onions and garlic, kneading the dough, making small balls. She was served steaming hot Momos before she left for school.
Her mom promised Thukpa and Momo after she returned from school.
Even in school she was not able to concentrate. Her mind was only thinking of Momo and Thukpa. Just after the English period she was excitedly discussing the prospect of having momo after school with her friends, when the school office bearer came and asked her to come along to the Princapal’s room. She was surprised with this sudden summon and also scared. Even after thinking a lot she was not able to think of any recent misdeed that could lead her to the Principal’s room. She silently and anxiously followed the bearer.
After entering the principal’s room she was surprised to find her neighbour Mr.Tandon sitting in front of her Principal. Immediately she thought that this man has come to complain about her to the principal. She recollected that the previous week she had not taken Mr.Tandon’s daughter in the game of “chor police”. May be that has irked this man, and he has come to complain.
After she entered the room her principal called her and held her hand very politely, she saw no anger in the principal’s face. He very politely asked her to go home along with Mr.Tandon. She was surprised. Why was she being asked to go home? For a moment she thought maybe her mom wanted her to have the Momo right then. Maybe her mom was as excited as her and couldn’t wait to serve her.
With great anticipation she started for home. When she entered her home’s lawn she saw almost all her neighbourhood people waiting. She was surprised and thought that maybe her mom has called all of them to have Momos.
Mrs Tobden, came and hugged her. She was taken inside. Mrs Tobden was walking very slowly and carefully as if not to disturb anybody.
Slowly they entered her parent’s bedroom; she saw her mother lying on the bed. A plateful of momo was getting cold in the side table. She wondered why her mother was sleeping when there was houseful of guests. That was the day she last had Momo.

15 years later, today she is going to have it once again. Throughout the day when her husband and father were away she made the Momos. In the evening she sat in her veranda and had the first bite of Momo after 15 years, and with the first bite she felt her baby kicking inside her. She became sure that it is going to be a girl. She now knew that her mother is coming back. Her mother was signalling her to get back to her favourite food and not blame it.





Recipe for Momo

Ingredients for Momo
250 grams minced chicken/mutton
2 cusp flour
2 onions chopped
2 cloves garlic chopped
4 green chillies chopped
1 inch ginger chopped
2 shallots chopped
Coriander leaves
1 tsp soya sauce
¼ tsp vinegar
2 lemon juice
2 tsp pepper
Salt to taste

Ingredients for the chutney
2 tomatoes chopped
2 cloves garlic chopped
1 inch ginger chopped
4 red chillies
1 tsp olive oil

How to prepare Momo

Marinate the chicken with lemon juice and vinegar and refrigerate overnight. Take the marinated chicken and add chopped onions, garlic, ginger, shallots, chillies and coriander leaves to it. Mix thoroughly and add salt, pepper and soya sauce. Keep the filling aside.
Take flour in a bowl and add salt to it. Add water and knead into dough. Make small balls from the dough. Roll the balls into small round and put 1 tsp of filling in the middle. Fold the round into a semi circular shape and seal it. Steam it for about 20 minutes.

How to prepare the chutney

Put tomato, garlic, ginger and red chillies in mixer and blend it into a fine paste. Pour olive oil in a pan. Pour the paste into the pan, add salt. Simmer the paste for sometime. Serve the Momos along with this chutney.


Spending a considerable part of my childhood in Gangtok I naturally developed a liking for Tibetan food although, I never tried preparing them at home. This food fiction encouraged me to prepare momo for the first time at home. With all humility I admit it tasted awesome. This is my entry for the second edition of Chalks and Chopsticks hosted by Bong Mom. The first edition of chalks and chopsticks was hosted by Aqua.

Creative recession

I believe I am going through a creative recession. For the last 2 weeks I am trying to write a story for the second edition of Chalks and Chopsticks but not being able to do so. Lat time when Aqua held the event I wrote it almost in a day's time. What is happening to me this time?

Kolkata-The city of warmth

I received a forwarded mail today, and i must confess it brought tears to my "probasi"eyes. Ever since I left Calcutta, missing my city has become a daily ritual. Therefore today these words of kindness for my city really moved me.

I am copy pasting the mail.(as it is a forwarded mail, i hope there is no copyright issue)


Most modern Indian cities strive to rise above ethnicity. Tell anybody who
lives in Bombay that he lives in a Maharashtrian city and (unless of course,
you are speaking to Bal Thackeray) he will take immediate offence. We are
cosmopolitan, he will say indigenously. Tell a Delhiwalla that his is a
Punjabi city (which, in many ways, it is) and he will respond with much
self-righteous nonsense about being the nation's capital, about the
international composition of the city's elite etc. And tell a Bangalorean
that he lives in a Kannadiga city and you'll get lots of techno-gaff about
the internet revolution and about how Bangalore is even more cosmopolitan
than Bombay.

But, the only way to understand what Calcutta is about, is to recognize that
the city is essentially Bengali. What's more, no Bengali minds you saying
that. Rather, he is proud of the fact. Calcutta's strengths and weaknesses
mirror those of the Bengali character. It has the drawbacks: the sudden
passions, the cheerful chaos, the utter contempt for mere commerce, the
fiery response to the smallest provocation. And it has the strengths
(actually, I think of the drawbacks as strengths in their own way). Calcutta
embodies the Bengali love of culture; the triumph of intellectualism over
greed; the complete transparency of all emotions, the disdain with which
hypocrisy and insincerity are treated; the warmth of genuine humanity; and
the supremacy of emotion over all other aspects of human existence.

That's why Calcutta is not for everyone. You want your cities clean and
green; stick to Delhi. You want your cities, rich and impersonal, go to
Bombay. You want them high-tech and full of draught beer, Bangalore's your
place. But if you want a city with a soul, come to Calcutta.
When I look back on the years I've spent in Calcutta - and I come back so
many times each year that I often feel I've never been away - I don't
remember the things that people remember about cities. When I think of
London, I think of the vast open spaces of Hyde Park. When I think of New
York, I think of the frenzy of Times Square. When I think of Tokyo, I think
of the bright lights of Shinjiku. And when I think of Paris, I think of the
Champs Elysee. But when I think of Calcutta, I never think of any one place.
I don't focus on the greenery of the maidan, the beauty of the Victoria
Memorial, the bustle of Burra Bazar or the splendour of the new Howrah
'Bridge'. I think of people. Because, finally, a city is more than bricks
and mortars, street lights and tarred roads. A city is the sum of its
people. And who can ever forget -or replicate - the people of Calcutta?

When I first came to live here, I was told that the city would grow on me.
What nobody told me was that the city would change my life. It was in
Calcutta that I learnt about true warmth; about simple human decency; about
love and friendship; about emotions and caring; about truth and honesty. I
learnt other things too. Coming from Bombay as I did, it was a revelation to
live in a city where people judged each other on the things that really
mattered; where they recognized that being rich did not make you a better
person - in fact, it might have the opposite effect. I learnt also that if
life is about more than just money, it is about the things that other cities
ignore; about culture, about ideas, about art, and about passion. In Bombay,
a man with a relatively low income will salt some of it away for the day
when he gets a stock market tip. In Calcutta, a man with exactly the same
income will not know the difference between a debenture and a dividend. But
he will spend his money on the things that matter. Each morning, he will
read at least two newspapers and develop sharply etched views on the state
of the world. Each evening, there will be fresh (ideally, fresh-water or
river) fish on his table. His children will be encouraged to learn to dance
or sing. His family will appreciate the power of poetry. And for him,
religion and culture will be in inextricably bound together.

Ah religion! Tell outsiders about the importance of Puja in Calcutta and
they'll scoff. Don't be silly, they'll say. Puja is a religious festival.
And Bengal has voted for the CPM since 1977. How can godless Bengal be so
hung up on a religions festival? I never know how to explain them that to a
Bengali, religion consists of much more than shouting Jai Shri Ram or
pulling down somebody's mosque. It has little to do with meaningless ritual
orsinister political activity.The essence of Puja is that all the passions
of Bengal converge: emotion, culture, the love of life, the warmth of being
together, the joy of celebration, the pride inartistic ex-pression and yes,
the cult of the goddess.

It may be about religion. But is about much more than just worship. In which
other part of India would small, not particularly well-off localities, vie
with each other to produce the best pandals? Where else could puja pandals
go beyond religion to draw inspiration from everything else? In the years I
lived in Calcutta, the pandals featured Amitabh Bachchan, Princes Diana and
even Saddam Hussain! Where else would children cry with the sheer emotional
power of Dashimi, upset that the Goddess had left their homes? Where else
would the whole city gooseflesh when the dhakis first begin to beat their
drums? Which other Indian festival - in any part of the country - is so much
about food, about going from one roadside stall to another, following your
nose as it trails the smells of cooking?

To understand Puja, you must understand Calcutta. And to understand Calcutta
, you must understand the Bengali. It's not easy. Certainly, you can't do it
till you come and live here, till you let Calcutta suffuse your being,
invade your bloodstream and steal your soul. But once you have, you'll love
Calcutta forever. Wherever you go,a bit of Calcutta will go with you. I
know, because it's happened to me. And every Puja, I am overcome by the
magic of Bengal. It's a feeling that'll never go away.

Fuchka

One food I absolutely love is Fuchka. Therefore after leaving Kolkata, the first thing that I started missing was fuchka. My life became dull and depressed without the presence of fuchka. My evenings were no more spicy and hot. At times I felt so desperate for fuchka that I used to think of paying a two day visit to Kolkata only to have fuchka.
Pani puri is definitely a dish from the fuchka family, but the similarities are as same as between Nirupa Roy and Rakhi Sawant. Therefore my taste buds were never satisfied with the sweet pani puri and craved for the hot and spicy version. Initially I felt a total repulsion towards pani puri, but slowly I started giving it some benefit of doubt. Still it was not able to conquer me the way fuchka did. I often used to direct the panipuriwalla to make it like puchka. In most cases I became the butt of ridicule.
Finally my hard days came to an end. Last week I had fuchka here in the city of hopes itself. Thanks to hanglas for importing a fuchkawala from Kolkata. This man has brought relief to troubled and starved souls like us. I almost felt orgasm after having the first bite of Kolkata’s fuchka after three long years. May this man not face the wrath of Raj Thackeray. Amen.