Those Delicious Letters - a year and half

It has been more than a year since my book Those Delicious Letters was published. After last October (Oct '2020) , I never got back the mojo to promote it and I didn't do anything. Really nothing. I am thankful to the many reviewers who reviewed it on their blog, Instagram, media et.  I am sorry I was not able to reply to many of them or thank them for their kindness.💓

This holiday season, Dec 15th being the global publishing date (August 20th, 2020 the original date), on a whim I checked the book rating on  Amazon, and guess what ? 

Those Delicious Letters - Amazon.in -- The darn book has a rating of 4.3 with effing 241 reviews, 97% of which is organic. I am a chhota mota author and that is a lot of reviews for me!! Yes, 3% of the initial reviews are from friends and few readers, whom I had coerced to  write one 😝, soon after the book was out. But rest all were folks who read it without me forcing them to 😍

Those Delicious Letters - Amazon.com -- 4.4 with 177 reviews

Those Delicious letters - Goodreads - Goodreads rates it at 3.88 with 225 ratings and 83 reviews !!

Of all the reviews, the one most precious is a review written by my Baba. I am not sure if he read the book in its entirety, we did not have any discussions over the content or the plot line. The book was not in one of the genres he would read. The font was not big enough and though my mother mentioned that he sat around with it in the month of last September, I doubt that it held his interest. It was my Mother who actually read the book  as I would have expected her to.

But that is not important. What is important is Baba was very excited about the book and would religiously tune in to all the lives I did as part of book promo last August-September. He shared all my book posts on his own FB wall (something I was very embarrassed about at that point). He was excited about the web series offer asking details that even I had not asked my publishers.

And then he wrote a review on Amazon.in. I DID NOT ask him to write it just because I thought it would be difficult for him to post a review on a platform other than Facebook! He didn't even tell me that he had posted a review. But there I found it one fine day much later.  Notice how he has put in a sales pitch about discounted price and no delivery fee 😂😂

My Baba was not a foodie at all. He had no love for food unless it was a Bengali mishti. He did not like cooking and found the whole process highly over-rated.  Many a times when we would urge him to learn some cooking, he would say he could make tea, buy his mishti from stores and put together a Doodh-Pauruti-Gur for dinner, that is all that was needed for him to survive!!

When I got an offer for my first book from Harper Collins, he was happy but could not fathom how "me" of all people could write a cookbook. "Tui physics ar engineering pore ranna r boi likhbi keno bujchi na" !! Maybe he was worried about the kind of recipes I would unleash on the world. Or "Ranna r Boi" was not a thing he felt was worth writing, though once the book was out he championed it the most.

So anyway, I had really wanted to write a novel which was not a "ranna r boi", a cookbook, and show it to him. I don't know why as a 40+ woman, I felt like I had to prove my literary merits to him but I am so very thankful that I could do that and he could be a part of the book even if for a short time.

Thanks to all who read it, enjoyed it, loved it and shared your stories with me. I am so glad that I could spread a little happiness and cheer through my books.

If you like what you are reading, get Bong Mom's Cookbook in your mailbox

Enter your email address:

Delivered by FeedBurner

Prerna's Strawberry Chutney

Sometime back I received my signed copy of  Prerna's The Everything Indian Slow Cooker Cookbook. Need I say, I was thrilled.

The author Prerna Singh is also the author of IndianSimmer, a beautiful blog in its own rights. I have been a long time admirer of her blog and I was looking forward to her book. Given that I am not much of a slowcooker person and do most of my cooking on the stove top and use my pressure cooker far more than the slowcooker, I was curious too. But I must tell you that book is a treasure of recipes and they are delicious, slow cooker or not.

I liked the section "Basics of Indian Cooking" a lot which explains many of the cooking terms and spices used in Indian cooking.There is also a section on Basic Sauces and Spice mixes which has recipes for Pav Bhaji Masala and Tandoori Maslaa which I am making next for sure. There are fifteen chapters in total with an array of about 300 recipes encompassing appetizer to beverage.

I tried the Five-Spice Strawberry Chutney spiced with paanch phoron from her book and though I did it on the stove top it turned out great. It is a simple chutney spiced with the fragrant paanchphoron and sweetened with jaggery and the naturally sweet strawberries. The chutney turned out really good and for recipes of that and more  check out her book on Amazon

A's Saturday Night Mutton Biriyani -- cut and paste

Last week I went to the library.

And then I checked out 3 books.

One of them was "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society". Now this book I have been hearing about for a while now. However I never checked it out. "The name sounds intriguing" is as far I went.

I have a difficult time when it comes to choosing a book at the library. Gone is the time when I would pick up any written word and read through it with baited breath. Gone are the days when many a summer afternoon in absence of anything worthy of reading,  I would flip through the frail pages of the "Beni Madhab Sheel Ponjika" -- the Bengali almanac, its jacaranda cover fluttering helplessly like the fine petal of Nayantara, and read through muhurtams and lewd advertisements on the back cover without any idea of what they were trying to sell. Those were times when, if the librarian of our small town sent home a word about their newest consignment, I would rush to inhale the fragrance of fresh ink and paper without losing a minute.

Now, not so much so. I just cannot read "any thing" these days. At least not on print. Anyway I read so much of "anything" and "nothing" on the web that when it comes to a book I want something which I can feel happy about later. Like a good biriyani. One that will not make me gulp down pepto-bismols in retrospect.

So when I check out a book from the librray I want it to be something I look forward to going home to. Last month it was "Fried Green Tomatoes at the WhistleStop Cafe". I have not seen the movie and I don't review books but all I can say is I enjoyed reading it immensely. A couple of months before that was "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn", again another wonderful book(thanks I for reminding).

Last week it was "The Guernsey...". And it is a book that not only makes me want to rush home, put up my feet and start reading (which does not happen everyday) but it scares me as to what will I do once the numbered pages are over. It is a book I want to go on forever. I don't know if it happens with you but it often happens to me. I panic about a book getting over, I panic hearing about an author slowing down and not writing enough. I still remember the immense sadness I felt when I had finished reading all of what Lila Majumdar had written and published. When the series "Ruku-Shuku" in Anandomela had winded down I had moped around for one whole month. When I closed shut "Gone With The Wind" I did not know what to do.

"The guernsey..." seems to have that kind of an effect on me. I do not want it to get over and when I do finish the last few pages I am going to be a very unhappy soul.

If I think of it deeply, it is a lot like a good biriyani or a heavenly egg roll or a bowl of Tom Yum soup.

Now given that I have spent my free time reading, I did not cook  a biriyani. In fact I rarely ever cook a full fledged biriyani. Most of my biriyanis are short cut affairs. The husband man however cooks a mean Biriyani following a friend's recipe and the fact that the friend's recipes is of US fame makes sure that his is pretty good. However once, with a sidelong glance, I happened to see the ghee that he puts in that Biriyani.That made certain that  I never dared to try my hand at it.

That Mutton Biriyani we will talk about another day.

This Biriyani today is sent by a dear friend, a friend of long ago whom I lost touch with and then connected again over the blog. Strange Stories. Amazing facts. Now since I am a very nice person(ahem!) and only keep nicer company(amen to that), it was only natural that my friend took time from her busy life to not only cook a Biriyani but also take pictures and send it to me. I mean she sent the recipes and pics, not the biriyani, though the latter would have definitely been much welcomed.

Over to her for the recipe as well as the pictures. I loved it how she split the work between two days and wrote the recipe accordingly, makes planning easy. I have no contribution to this recipe's deliciousness other than "cut and paste". Also she cooked this dish at her home in India so the microwave settings etc. might differ from other region.

Aditi's Mutton Biryani (North Indian style)

Ingredients & Preparation:

1. (Friday evening)

Mutton (front leg preferable for tenderness) –  750 g
Plain Curd (prefer Nestle) – 300 gms

Wash mutton pieces carefully with hot water to remove skin and hair. Marinate with half of the curd and keep in refrigerator (not freezer) overnight. Should be taken out well ahead of cooking and be in room temperature while cooking.

2. (Saturday morning)

Ghee – 6 tsp
Shah Jeera (Black Cumin) seeds – ½ tsp
Onions – 2 large finely chopped
Red Chili powder – 1 tsp
Garlic paste – 2 tsp (generous)
Ginger paste – 2 tsp (generous)
Coriander seeds – 2 tsp roasted and freshly powdered
Salt – 1 ½ tsp
Curd – ½ of section A beaten with half tsp ready made Shahi Garam masala powder (Shahi garam masala by sunrise is the best)

Heat ghee in a non-sticky wok or pressure pan.  Put shah jeera as phoron. Add onion and fry in high heat stirring constantly to nicely golden brown, take care they do not get burnt. Add red chili and garlic. Saute till fragrant. Add ginger and saute. Add coriander powder. (May sprinkle a little water if required). Stir and then add mutton. Saute well till muttons are brown and oil separates (do not overcook as they may dry up – its better to use a lid while kashano). Add the salt towards the end of kashano. Add the curd and saute well. Add sufficient water. Boil and pressure cook for 15-20 mins in low flame. Open the lid when pressure drops and boil to evaporate any residual water (there shouldn’t be any residual water at all or the biriyani will get messy). 

3. (Sat day afternoon)

Long grain basmati rice (best quality) – 375 gms
Salt – 1 ½ tsp
Bay leaves (1-2 pcs)
Black Cardamon – 1
Green  Cardamom - 4
Cinnamon – 2 inch * 2 pc
White pepper corn – 8 pcs
Cloves – 8 pcs
Mace (javitri) – 2-4 pcs (sizewise)
Nutmeg – ¼
Wash the rice very clean and put them in a strainer, for 30 mins.

Boil sufficient water in a deep container with lid. Add salt. Add the spices (can make a bouquet garni if possible, if not, use a slotted spoon while removing) and boil in the water (covered) in low flame till the colour of the water turns light brown.  Remove the spices.

Pour washed and strained rice into the boiling water and stir immediately once. Boil for 11-12 mins approx (rice breaks but not fully done when checking) in the open container. Close the lid and drain the water carefully, very fast. Drain till the last drop possible. (Best way is to hold the container with two cotton-gloved hands over the support of the faucet). Shake the container, tuck the lid and spread the rice immediately on flat trays. You may cover the rice with a net and put under a fan to cool. The rice should not bend or break in the whole process and get completely cool.

4. (Once the rice cools)

A microwavable earthen / ceramic pot with lid
Indian Saffron – quantity depends on freshness
Full cream milk – 50 ml
Kewra water – 1 tsp
Mughlai scent (edible) – 3-4 drops (this makes the difference)
Whole wheat dough – 1 ball (to seal the lid)
Edible Saffron colour – a few drops

Heat milk in a microwave oven and add saffron. Boil in micro high for 15 sec. Mix with the colour. Sprinkle the milk on the rice unevenly.

Take a sufficient sized ceramic microwavable bowl. Place 1/4 of rice. Arrange 1/4 mutton with gravy. Place next layers the same way. Final layer should be only mutton. Spread the remaining gravy with ghee (from the pan) on all the sides. Mix kewra water and scent. Sprinkle on whole top of the bowl. Close the lid to lock the aroma - seal with flatten wheat dough like a ribbon.

Put the bowl in micro 10% (not more) for 70 mins till the seal becomes hard. Break the seal. Mix up once and serve immediately. Enjoy.

BandhaKopir Tarkari -- a quick cabbage stir fry

For the better part of the last 7 days I have been home and so has the kids. That meant almost no computer time and no blog hopping either. Who would have the heart to keep sitting at the computer when the wireless mouse has been carried off by the little kitty ? And who would dare to open the laptop when one remembers what happened with endless plugging in and unplugging of the former ? The littlest one seems to have a penchant for doing everything that needs to be reprimanded with a big "NO" and then that doesn't stop her either, it just diverts her to doing the next.

By the time they went to bed it would be very late and the precious little me time I had there after, I spent reading Ruth Reichls' "Garlic and Sapphires", a charming read about her life as a food critic for New York Times, more precious because I could savor only a few pages each day. Something that she said in the first few pages of the book had struck a chord and remained with me.

"There is no right or wrong in matters of taste", she says " It's just a matter of opinion. And in the case of restaurants an extremely subjective one, given that no one has the faintest idea if what you taste when you bite into an apple is the same thing that I do." -- Ruth Reichl in Garlic and Sapphires

Isn't that true ? While I may praise the steamed Hilsa and prostate before it, you might find the pungent mustard smell disgusting. While you may be thinking Curd Rice is the ultimate in good food, I might think "blah" ! If we still narrow it down to two homes from the same region and same culture, I might think the cabbage dish with potatoes and spices that I have had since childhood is the only decent way to throttle the suffocating cabbage flavor you might say that the way cabbage was at your place, lightly spiced was the best.

When I had posted BandhaKopir Ghonto last time, a reader wrote in saying he had found the dish more spicy than he is used to. Perfect, that was his opinion. In the same post there was a comment by Eve's Lungs about a Bandhakopir Tarkari( a Cabbage Dish) done with the minimal of spices. I loved her recipe for its simplicity and yet was not sure if I could endure cabbage with so less to camouflage it's true nature. It turns out her cabbage dish is another favorite in Bengali Kitchen and my friend N vouched for it too.

So I went ahead and made it, I had little to lose, it was very simple to make anyway. The simplicity of this Cabbage dish floored us. To my utter disbelief, I loved it. The husband again said, this was like the cabbage dish from his neighborhood picnic. He had said the same thing about the BandhaKopir Ghonto, remember ?And I realized I have no idea what he is tasting when he is taking a bite of that cabbage and that a lot about what you are tasting has to do with the memory you are matching it up with.


Read more...

Bandhakopir Tarkari -- a cabbage stir fry

What You Need

The Vegetables

Cabbage ~ about 6-7 cups chopped in shreds
Tomato ~ 1 whole chopped small

Spices

PaanchPhoron ~ 1 tsp
Dry Red Chili ~ 2-3 whole
Roasted Cumin Powder ~ 1/4 tsp (optional but good)
Red Chili Powder ~ 1/4 - 1/2 tsp according to taste

Salt ~ to taste

Oil ~ for cooking

How I Did It

Chop Cabbage in fine shreds. You can also use the packets of coleslaw. I had about 6-7 cups of shredded cabbage. Soak the chopped cabbage in water for 10-15 mins and wash well.

Heat Oil in a Kadhai/Saute pan

Temper the oil with 1 tsp of Paanch Phoron and 2-3 Dry Red chili

When the spices sputter add 1 whole juicy tomato chopped. Saute till tomato softens and has no raw smell

Add the cabbage, a little at a time. As you add the cabbage saute and fold in with the spices.

After you have added all the cabbage add salt and Red Chili Powder to taste, mix and cover. Intermittently take off the cover and saute. Covering and sauteing helps in cooking the cabbage faster and also requires less oil I think. You may need to sprinkle a little water while cooking or the cabbage will stick to the pan and char.

When the cabbage is almost done, add 1/4 tsp of Roasted Cumin Powder (dry roast whole cumin seeds and grind to fine powder) and mix.

Once the cabbage is done adjust for salt and seasonings. If you want you can add a little lime juice to the end.

Now for the extra crunch, I crushed about 1/4 cup of dry roasted peanuts and added them to the dish. This step is optional and NOT part of the traditional method. Note: This adding peanut thing is totally my idea and I liked it since of course it was my idea :). Add peanuts at your own risk.

Enjoy by itself or as a side dish with rice and dal for lunch

Happy Deepavali and Food Memoirs

May the lights this Diwali banish Darkness from our lives

Happy Deepavali
This Diwali I don't have a recipe to share with you, instead what I will share is ahem knowledge, about food and memories
Nupur's this post had opened up the beautiful new world of Food Memoirs to me. And I couldn't think of a better opportunity than Sra's The Write Taste, to share these gems with you.

I am not much of a cookbook reader. Cookbooks are too much of a burden, they make me feel very, what do you say "lacking". I cannot read a cookbook at leisure, I feel I need to get up and stir something up from the book, I feel I owe that to the authors and that takes away the charm of relaxed reading.

The food memoirs on the other hand are simply beautiful. You get to delve into food intertwined with life and that is like sitting by your grandma, listening to her stories while she kneads the dough, rolls it out, stuffs it with spiced pea mix and fries up puffed karaishuti'r kachuri while all you do is take in the smell, the taste and the stories without lifting a finger.

It all started with Ruth Reichl's "Tender on the Bone". Honestly I hadn't heard of Ruth Reichl before and when I turned the first page there were no expectations. The first page after I was a huge fan and had researched her head to toe on the internet.To read more about this famous food persona go here. I will leave you with an excerpt.

"Most mornings I got out of bed and went to the refrigerator to see how my mother was feeling. You could tell instantly, just by opening the door. One day in 1960 I found a whole suckling pig staring at me. I jumped back and slammed the door hard. I had never seen a whole animal in our refrigerator before, even the chicken cam in parts. He was surrounded by tiny crab apples and a whole wreath of vegetables.

This was not a bad sign: the more odd and interesting things in the refrigerator, the happier my Mother was likely to be."

Next was Madhur Jaffrey's "Climbing The Mango Trees". Now Madhur Jaffrey I knew, from movies and from her cookbooks. Only I hadn't really thumbed any of her cookbooks. This book however is a beautiful read, you are transported into pre-Independence era Delhi and Kanpur and you get to peep into the life, times and food of an Indian family heavily influenced by the West and yet firmly rooted to the Indian culture.

Following is an excerpt from the book where she describes the Lady in White who would arrive with her wares, "daulaat ki chaat" at breakfast

"The Lady in White was the color of milk. What mattered most to us, though, was not her milky color but the milky ambrosia that she carried on her head.

Yes, balanced there, on a round brass tray, were dozens of mutkainas, terra-cotta cups, filled with daulat ki chaat, which could be translated as “a snack of wealth.” Some cynic who assumed that all wealth was ephemeral must have named it. It was, indeed, the most ephemeral of fairy dishes, a frothy evanescence that disappeared as soon it touched the tongue, a winter specialty requiring dew as an ingredient. Whenever I asked the Lady in White how it was made, she would sigh a mysterious sigh and say, “Oh, child, I am one of the few women left in the whole city of Delhi who can make this. I am so old, and it is such hard work. What shall I tell you? I only go to all this trouble because I have served your grandmother from the time she lived in the Old City. First I take rich milk and add dried seafoam to it. Then I pour the mixture into nicely washed terra-cotta cups that I get directly from the potter. I have to climb up the stairs to the roof and leave the cups in the chill night air. Now, the most important element is the dew. If there is no dew, the froth will not form. If there is too much dew, that is also bad. The dew you have to leave to the gods. In the early morning, if the froth is good, I sprinkle the cups with a little sugar, a little khurchan [milk boiled down into thin, sweet, flaky sheets], and fine shavings of pistachios. That, I suppose, is it.”

Those cups were the first things placed before us at breakfast that day. Our spoons, provided by the Lady in White, were the traditional flat pieces of bamboo. Heavenly froth, tasting a bit of the bamboo, a bit of the terra-cotta, a bit sweet and a bit nutty—surely this was the food of angels."

Thanks Nupur for the wonderful reads and thanks to Sra for an opportunity to share. Looking forward to reading more of Ruth Reichl over the next months only my reading is hugely slowed down by lack of time and I keep on renewing these books over & over. In the process I keep coming back and re-reading them again but the charm is there each time, every time.

What are your favorite Food Memoirs ?