My bragging board - all about my adventure!

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.
                                                   

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.

                                                 

Periasamy, my man Friday & his guests in Retreat.

                                    

                                              

                                       Grand children Avni & Abhinav visited me in Mysore.

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.

                                       

That is my cottage 114 at Suvidha.

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.