Early experiments started around 2000.
Became single in early 1999, both son and daughter married
already and away from home in Chennai & Uma (my wife) suddenly left me.
Staying in a large duplex apartment just behind our new Hospital on P.H.Road, I
was somewhat busy with own surgery practice, managing the Hospital and also
being a home maker. Interested in cooking since my childhood, opportunity
knocked heavily on my doors and I threw open all doors! My first “Guru” in
cooking (after my mother and my wife) was Prabhakar Bhat, who was running the
canteen in our Hospital and became my partner in cooking adventure.
My routine during those busy days.
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| Our new hospital at Chennai, and our Duplex Flat behind. |
Up by 5 a.m., I used to be ready for my morning surgery,
after making bed coffee, some substantial breakfast like Idli Chutney, Dosas,
Adai Dosa or Uppittu or bread and
butter. Surgery starts just around 7.30 a.m. on most days and before that on
Mondays because of Rahu Kalam. Back home by 11 or 11.30 0r rarely even 1 or 2
p.m. if any emergency comes up, I would quickly prepare one or 2 dishes like
Sambar, Chutney, Palya etc for noon and
night and rice in rice cooker. A brief siesta and evening coffee by 3.30, back
to the grind till 7 – 7.30 or rarely late. Have to see patients, look into
accounts and take charge of any cash and then only back home. Night dinner
would be left over dishes and some fresh rice. If rushed for time either at
lunch or dinner, I would manage with some readymade Podies like Dal podi or
uddina hittu or cucumber tomato raitha and my favourite curd rice and mango
pickles. I managed like this till my Son and Daughter in law joined me in 2001.
Then a full time cook was employed and I had to miss my hobby of cooking! My
whole routine changed for better or worse.
The retirement bug bit me!
Soon retirement bugs bit me and I started looking for
suitable city and place to retire. It was my dream to retire in a large
farmhouse with plenty of trees and plants. It is in fact this dream which led
me to buy properties here and there and many costly misadventures. Finally I chose 4 plots of 120X80 feet each
in Mysore in 2003 and built a “farm house” as per my plans and retiring from
practice moved to Mysore in December, 2004.
The Mysore experience with Periasamy.
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| Periasamy, my man Friday & his guests in Retreat. |
Grand children Avni & Abhinav visited me in Mysore.
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| Daughter & family on one of the visits. |
My next culinary adventures were in Mysore with my man
Friday, Mr Periasamy as my partner. He was good in making many Tamil recipes,
particularly “molagu rasam”, some sambars and kootus. He was a quick learner
and soon mastered many Udupi dishes like all kinds of Tamblies, Kattu saaru,
Kudu Saaru, many chutnies, Goli baje, adai, nice Kai Huli (Mor Kolambu) and
even some sweets like Payasams, Hayagriva Maddi etc. We also started by trying
out various dishes from Kalaigner, Jaya
and some other TV channels. Generally Periasamy and me would discuss the
recipe, try it out and if necessary modify it next time. If reasonably
satisfactory our next guinea pigs were my daughter and son-in-law. They used to
come once a month to Mysore for a stint of free medical service in a tribal
hospital in Sargur. If these 2 also liked it, that dish is standardized and
offered to other guests in future. We learnt and experimented with many kinds
of recipes and tried quite a few twists and turns, some of which were
Periasamy’s own ideas. His Beans Kai Huli, several Pulavs, many tamblies were
fantastic.
My present/ Final destination at Suvidha.
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| That is my cottage 114 at Suvidha. |
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| Some other cottages at Suvidha. |
To make the story short, I moved out of Mysore for good in
mid 2013 and after a period of uncertainty settled in a nice Senior Citizens’
Colony, called Suvidha in Bangalore. I have a 2 bed room row villa with a mini
kitchen having an Induction stove, a microwave oven (rarely used) and electric
rice cooker; no cooking gas. We residents have the option of getting all or
some of our food from the canteen or cook whatever and whenever we felt like
cooking. This was again another great opportunity for me to try out my cooking
skills and also share and learn from other neighbours. Our canteen at Suvidha
had many problems including financial, apart from the basic menu and preparing
methods. Few friends and myself offered to improve the canteen affairs. It was
another opportunity to interact with our canteen cooks as well as some experts
in Andhra and Gujarathi cuisine. We standardized and regularized the menu,
introduced some new dishes and a Sunday special lunch and some more. Happy to
say that canteen food is far better, services improved also financially also
making a small positive impact.
Having a free hand, I experimented more and more and some
new twists turned out to be good. This Blog is to share some of my experiments
to not only enhance taste but also make food healthier. An online course on
Nutrition for Health and disease prevention also helped me improve my
perspectives and culinary skills.
