(Wo)men and food

“Njan cinema director akumbol ninne ente padathile nayika akkam”
“Njan director akumbol ninne ente padathile naya akkam”

(Roughly translates as:

When I become a director, I will make you the heroine in my film.
When I become a director, I will make you the dog in the film.

If you know Malayalam, you can truly appreciate the humour in the words….it doesn’t sound quite as funny when translated into English.)

This was a conversation between a guy and my friend back when we were in school. Those days, eve teasing as far as I was concerned meant comment-adi (commenting) and ended up in us thinking of the smartest repartees that we could……and sharing them with our friends over the lunch break.

Of course, my college days helped me rethink my definition of eve teasing once I came into contact with the pinching, grabbing, touchy-feely types. To this day, I do not understand what pleasure a man gets from pinching the butt of an unwilling female.

The Mumbai molestation is a classic case where the power of the mob has overpowered the sensibilities of the individual. I think many of those involved are probably quiet people in their individual lives who wouldn’t dream of doing something like this. But in a group, their basest, most raw selves came out….

A group often hides the individual ‘coz when u are in a group, you often feel that nobody can see you……

Reminds me of William Golding’s Lord of the Flies…….Do you see the similarities???

There I go…..I’ve digressed so far from the recipe that I wanted to talk about today. But then, news like this often has that kind of effect on me…..

On days like that, I long for food that is soothing to the palate….not too spicy……just a delicate blend of familiar ingredients that taste good and fills the tummy up with a comforting warmth. Vegetable Kichdi is almost always the feel-good dish that I fall back on. It is a fuss free one pot dish that can be cooked entirely in the pressure cooker or by using the microwave. What I have here is the microwave version.

What you need:

Rice - 1 cup (I used ponni raw rice)
Masoor dal - 1/4 cup
Moong dal - 1/4 cup
Onion - 1, chopped
Tomato - 1, chopped
Green chilli - 1
Veggies - 1.5 cup(I used potato, bell pepper, carrot, and green peas)
Cloves - 4
Cardamom - 3
Oil - 2 tsp

Wash the rice and dal and then soak it in 5 glasses of water for 45 minutes.

Take 1/4 tsp of oil in a microwaveable dish. Add the cardamom and cloves to it and heat for 45 sec or until the aroma comes out.

Add the onion, green chilli, tomato to this and m/w for 3 minutes or until the onions brown well. Now stir in the chopped veggies and m/w for another 4 minutes.

Add the rice and dals to this along with the water in which it was soaked.

Cook on 750 watts for 10 minutes. Then lower the power to 650 watts and cook for another 10 minutes. While it is still hot, stir it well....the khichdi should be well cooked and a little mushy.......the grains of the rice should not be separate.

This is a whole meal in itself......does not need any accompaniment. If you'd like to, though, you can pair it with some fresh yogurt or kadhi

Note: Microwaves vary vastly as far as cooking times go.....you will need to experiment and find the right time settings on your microwave.

This goes to Srivalli for her MEC-Tiffin event.