My mother likes to tell the following story about my birth. I arrived before the due date and was a strapping, healthy baby of about 4 Kg. It had been a long drawn out forceps delivery and the doctor had taken a spoonful of honey with the purpose of giving it to me, to energize me after the birthing process. I am told that I seized the spoon, put it into my mouth and started licking the honey. All this, even before the umbilical cord had been cut.The doctor remarked jokingly that I would always have a good appetite for food.

Today, several decades later, I have lived up to his prediction. Food, especially good food, means a lot to me, in all its varied forms.

I was brought up in India in a family where my grandmother decided the rules in the kitchen. Her rules were extremely orthodox and they were followed with strict rigidity. No eggs, fish or meat were allowed to enter the kitchen, they were to be cooked on a stove outside. Even onions and garlic were put under this forbidden category of items that were termed by her as 'impure'. However, she was the one who did the cooking, supported by my mother and I can still remember the meals she used to cook at that period in my life. Today, with all the modern gadgets that belong to a kitchen in West Europe, I would still have a hard time coming up day after day, with dish after dish of delicious food, without the rejuvenating flavor of either onion or garlic.

One of the dishes we had often were fried cabbage with peas and potatoes. Spiced with cumin, coriander and turmeric, they were served with hot chapatis, or even better, crispy luchis (fried bread puffs). In winter, there would be an occasional accompaniment of fried cauliflower, in summer, fried eggplant, or fried okra. Dessert was an important part of the meal. Very often it was kheer (sweetened condensed milk). The ingredient used for sweetening was very often a syrup from Bengal called Notun Gur which is the syrup tapped from a kind of palm tree that grows in Bengal. Some Americans, who have tasted it, call it 'Indian chocolate'.

Cows are still considered holy in India and they are prized for their milk. Most families, when I was young, used to make their own butter from the cream obtained after skimming the milk that was delivered daily by the milkman who lived nearby. Some days, when he was late, I would be asked to go and get the milk directly from the milkman and I could even see the milking process. Today, my children have never seen a cow

• 1
• 2
• 3
• next page >>

---

Add your voice

Know something about Reflections: Mealtime with the family?
We want to hear your view. Write now!