Happiness Quotient

A colleague told me this little incident, a jolly fellow, who seems to be a person with unimaginable normalness living a worry free life (if there ever was). He was on his bike on a cool Sunday afternoon going about his way when suddenly a lady in a car swerves and stops bang in front of him practically toppling him over from his Sunday afternoon cruise. A petrified silence later, just as a mini mob was gathering around, he decided to do something which a normal person wouldn’t. He smiled, he had a large smile on his face and that was all what was needed for that lady to get that color back on her face. She got off from her car; automatically the crowd dispersed as though assuming that these two knew each other and there was no major “scene” going to take place; and she profusely apologized for her misjudgment and they went their way, shaking hands, relieved that nothing untoward or disastrous had taken place.

Now fortunately no one was hurt but just a little shaken up, and ultimately, it left both parties with just a scary memory. What ticked in me was the fact that this reaction can only come from a content person. Look back, every time you lose your mind, short fuse your temper or merely snap at someone in anger, it’s all the bottled up frustration of a past memory, situation or experience. If one is truly content and happy, it shows, and it shows in every possible situation.

I try and keep a cheerful aura around me whenever I can, this could be anytime – from the drive to work in the morning with the music on full blast or when I sipping on my coffee during a short break at work staring out from my cabin onto the vast uninterrupted view of the ocean (thinking about what’s cooking next), or even in the maddening crowds in the train ride back home some day’s (yes, I admit with my Ipod plugged in). I have attuned myself into dividing my stress time during stress time and cheerful happy content times at any other given moment. I have come to realize that the more I keep this feeling around me, the easier it is to deal with the other elements of life. Yes, there are times when things are out of hand or uncontrollable, but there’s always a break and that’s the moment you should seize to shroud yourself in happy thoughts.

Cooking makes me happy; creating dishes makes me even happier. I am the most content when I am with my ingredients and kitchen. You can wake me up at an unearthly hour and ask me to whip up an omelet and I am raring to go (yes, it has happened one summer over at a cousins place, he did not know the “C” of cooking and that fat ass was hungry at 3:00am). I love getting creative with food, and it usually does snowball into a marathon session of crazy plotting and planning which takes the better part of my time, but the end result – accolades, which in turn – makes me happy!

A small creation I whipped up during a talk-a-thon with my photographer. We were tossing around ideas on what to shoot next (another major role player in my happiness quotient), I was going Asian she wanted to go “something on bread” and that got my creative juices flowing and decided why not combine both. This little dish I created, is quite a hit, though have to still make it for a larger audience, I’d definitely like you to try it out. It’s a breeze and sure-fire hit at your next cocktail do.

Ingredients:
1 French Loaf (Sliced thickly)
1 clove garlic (minced)
2 tablsp Sesame Seed oil (you can use olive oil)

Crispy Spinach Topping
3 large bunches Spinach (washed, dried and chopped into thing strands)
1 tablsp Sesame Seeds (Til)
1 Green Chili Sliced
1 tsp Sesame Oil (Or Olive Oil)
1 tablsp of – powdered sugar, salt and white pepper (mixed)
Oil for frying

Spicy Mushroom and Tofu Topping
6 white button mushrooms finely chopped
6 Babycorn – sliced diagonally into roundels
100gms – Tofu, cut into small squares
4-5 cloves – sliced garlic
2 tablsp Light Soy Sauce
1 tsp Celery chopped finely (optional)
1 tsp Red Chili paste
A sprinkle of five spice powder
Salt & Pepper to taste

Procedure
Mix the garlic and oil and keep aside (the longer it is kept the better it is)
Place the slices of bread on an oven proof tray and spread some garlic oil onto each slice.
Place under a grill and toast till lightly crisped.

For the spinach topping
Heat oil in a deep bottomed vessel and add half a bunch of spinach strands in the oil. Make sure you don’t add too much as the hot oil tends to spill over the sides if not in a deep enough vessel. Deep fry till the color changes to a dark green. Remove with a slotted spoon over layers of absorbent paper napkins. Fry all the spinach, this should leave you with about 1½ cups of fried spinach leaves.

In a wok, heat a little oil, toss in the chilies and sesame seeds, when the seeds crackle toss in the spinach and toss around, remove and sprinkle generously with the sugar-salt-pepper powders. Keep aside.

For the Spicy Mushroom and Tofu Topping
In a small wok, heat the oil till smoky, throw in the garlic and almost immediately add the mushrooms, after a quick stir add the rest of the vegetables. Toss around with the soy sauce followed by the chili sauce. Remove and sprinkle some five spice powder and keep aside.

To serve
Top each slice of bread with the stir fried spinach, top with the spicy mushroom mix and pop into the oven for a few minutes to heat it up a bit. If serving immediately, toast the bread right before tossing your toppings.

This dish is a bit over the top with fried spinach, but the finale is a yummy toasty crunch with a spicy soft topping.

A feather in my cap

There's a fine line, there is always a fine line. I always wondered what the big hoopla was about the humble mushroom. I'v been subjected to nose wrinkling, poisoned stares and annoyed expressions through the course of mushrooms whenever ordered or made. 

This is a little anecdote year's ago, when mushrooms had just become popular in and around town. We had gone on a road trip down south with extended family and had stopped over at an udipi for lunch. Since we were a large group, peak summer afternoon sun beating down mercilessly, we were ushered into a private terraced area of the restaurant covered with banana baby trees and money-plant leaves veining their way through the walls and ceiling , brushing dangerously close to the waka-waka fan. We were seated on a pink, sunmica covered table with steel mugs of chilled water and plates laid out, spotlessly clean. Once our gang decided to accustom ourselves to the surroundings (not used to stopping over in a small unknown town, abruptly for lunch) and took our places, the laminated menu was brought out (complete with a retro poster of a bollywood movie? and Om Puri staring out at you with a grumpy expression amidst pictures of random South Indian dishes?). Everyone ordered the usual:

Group Member 1: One Idli and one Sada Dosa, two chutneys, no sambhar

Group Member 2: I'l have one Sada Dosa with a plate of Idli and make it one Idli one Medu wada in one plate

Group Member 3: One Butter-Masala-South Indian-Special-Cheese-Onion-Chilli-Dosa for me, avoid the Coriander please (like that was a hindrance)

Group Member 4: Lime Juice Soda - Sweet (poor fellow, threw up in the car. There has to be 'one' car sickness member in the group, otherwise it's not a road trip)

and so on... 

One person stood out (not me), and asked the waiter: What's todays special?

What came, was special. A simmering and spicy concoction of baby button mushrooms (not the horrid, briny, tinned ones) in a coconut gravy, true Manglorean style with steaming white fragrant rice with just a hint of chilli. Now that was what I would call a gourmet inspired dish - so what if it was in a small town, and so what if mushrooms were just in vogue. 

We landed up ordering a few of those plates, barring a few, who were tucking in the normal fare with the usual nose wrinkling - annoyed expression which was fair competition to our friend "Om Puri". 

The argument here is, why do people STILL perceive mushroom as some sort of non-vegetarian ingredient. I have seen (again, I go back in time) triumphant yelling on devouring a whole mushroom, like it was an achievement by itself. Yes, we all know its a kind of a 'edible" fungus (whoever said 'edible' and 'fungus' at the same time, scary) but it is so. I still know of a lot of people, especially vegetarians, who detest mushrooms, purely because they assume it to have a life of its own and probably a dish equalling hunting down your own game and roasting it, and somehow, that ideology just does not seem to die in some people. Well, to one's own I guess. As for those who attempted it, their triumph equalled that of crossing the thin line from vegetarianism to hardcore meat eaters (whatever makes them happy).

I enjoy this humble ingredient, always have! I have had many an experiment which rarely failed. I love stir fried mushrooms and there is an art in getting the right texture to your mushroom before using it in your final dish. Ideally mushrooms should never be washed as they absorb the water in which they are washed like a sponge, but you can and must clean them with a dry cloth, and then peel them. Look closely at the point where the stem meets the cap, with a sharp knife, reach under the cap and peel a fine layer from the stem right till the top. It should peel of easily like a hot knife on butter. Do it on all sides and you will have a perfectly dry  and pristine white mushroom cap without the need of washing it. 

You will observed that when cooked, mushrooms (especially the white button ones), which consist of a high percentage of water, release a lot of it (but natural). So if you are going to wash your mushrooms, they are going to absorb and release water while cooking. In the process, they shrivel up and turn slightly rubbery, in the process losing their earthy flavors. The right way to cook mushrooms is to thrown them in the pan with a little oil which is kept on high heat. Toss around quickly with a wooden spoon and ensure you dont squeeze any of them. No salt, no additives should be added at this point. Once you feel the oils coated the mushroom and the steams pouring out, immediately turn off the gas and plate it out, keep aside to use, as required. You can add, garlic, dry herbs or anything during the cooking process (as an added flavouring, complimenting the dish you are creating) as long as there is no water based ingredient. This is what the right texture of mushrooms in a mushroom dish should be. You can add these to gravies, sauces, pastas or anything for the matter. 

I have created a delicious dish, a spontaneous creation as I love using seasonal ingredients and mushroom being versatile, can be mixed and matched with many ingredients. This is a juicy concoction of baby Green Tomatoes, Green Garlic, tangy lemon and Stir Fried Mushrooms in an Asian stir fry sauce. 

  

Ingredients:

1 pckt Button Mushrooms - Halved

2 Baby Green Tomatoes (Diced)

4-5 shoots - Green Garlic (Finely Chopped, including the green shoots)

1/2 Lemon - Sliced Thinly

1 tablsp Olive Oil

1 tsp Chilli Flakes

1 tsp Light Soy Sauce

2 tablsp Oyster Sauce (Vegetarian version can be used)

Salt & White Pepper Powder

A dash of bitters (optional)

A pinch of dried celery (optional)

 

In a wok, heat the olive oil on high heat, throw in the mushrooms and toss around on high heat. When just about ready, throw in the chopped garlic and stir fry till fragrant and till the garlic has browned in a bit. Add the Soy Sauce and Oyster Sauce stir fry and tossing well without lowering the heat and add all the seasoning's. Add the lemon slices, dash of bitters and tomatoes and stir fry till the sauce coats the ingredients evenly. 

Plate it out in a shallow dish and serve immediately.   

Getting back on the bandwagon

It does pay to get back on track when down and out. I had a bit of a run in with our friend the "Flu" & his hot sidekick "Fever" last week and was completely zapped out of all energy stored for the week.

The first few days were reminiscent of old grandma recipes with hot starchy rice dishes, various cocktails of milk, honey, turmeric, spices, ghee, tea, and other ingredients which only my house help could identify as medicine with chants of "baba, it will do wonder's for you, just one cup, ok - half, ok - no - dont drink it but pinch your nose and gulp it down" the hot liquid should scare those germs away in a jiffy. Well I buckled down to all the pampering and confusion, emerging victorious, but definitely felt as though the illness had been coughed away, or rather frightened out of its wits.

By the end of the week, I had my taste buds reactivated, I had to dig into something a little more luxurious, indulgent with a hint of tasty. Of course, the idle mention of ordering in or digging in at some fancy restaurant  was shunted by the other members of my family who threatened me with doctors and more grandma recipes, I quietly crawled away into my corner deciding what to do next.

Well, I have been blessed with making food myself, tasty food to an extent. I decided, my new-found energy and rigour could be put to good use in the kitchen and I could jump right back on the bandwagon of what I do best - cook !

This was the time to get spontaneous, I selected the first few ingredients which caught my eye and landed up making a delicious spaghetti dish which is simple, defined, garlicky, the way I like it and best of all - a perfect antidote to boring, tasteless dishes which I have been through in the last week

Ingredients:

1 cup Spaghetti (Cooked in boiling water till al-dente, drained & tossed in a tsp of olive oil)
8-10 Button Mushrooms (Sliced thinly)
4 Babycorn's (Blanched & Sliced)
A bunch of Baby Spinach Leaves
1 small Onion (quartered & separated)
8-10 Garlic cloves
1 tablsp Chilli Flakes
2 tablsp Olive Oil
Salt & Freshly Crushed Pepper
Grated Parmesan Cheese (optional)

Peel and crush the garlic cloves with the flat side of a large knife or a spatula

Wash, trim and roughly chop the spinach leaves and keep aside

Warm the olive oil in a pan till well heated but not smoking, toss the garlic and stir well till fragrant but ensuring the garlic does not brown. Toss in the mushroom and turn up the heat to high, toss around well, adding a tsp of olive oil if it gets too dry. In about a minute, turn down the heat and add the onions and spinach leaves. Once the spinach leaves lose water and limp, toss in the other ingredients including the spaghetti, babycorn and seasoning's. Toss well, crush more pepper atop the dish if required and sprinkle the grated parmesan. Serve immediately.

Bless taste !