Living alone in a small town, I was often invited for
sumptuous meals at people’s homes. Being
poor at cooking, I used local catering services to return the hospitality. Life
followed a smooth pattern until one day, a senior officer insisted that I cook
a home meal for everyone. No amount of protests by me or my divulging what a
hopeless cook I was would cause him to relent.” Ours is not to question why,
ours is to do or die! ” I thought and took up his request. A date was chosen
and invitations made.
Being the only other medical officer, apart from the
commanding officer (CO), I could not get leave from my morning OPD duties for
that date. Also,the CO did not at all seem to share my perspective that the
situation fitted the ‘emergency leave’ category. I enlisted the help of two
bais (lady helpers) for the cooking. My
Sahayak (male helper) was entrusted with
sprucing up the house and carrying over drinks from the canteen.
On the day of the party, I returned from work in the
afternoon to the aroma of cooking and assumed the menu would be mostly prepared
. I thought of the special finishing touches I would give. I was in for a rude
shock : only two dishes were done; one bai had not turned up at all and the other had to leave in a hurry as she
was urgently needed at home. So there I was, with five hours left to go for a
big party with poor culinary skills and no manpower ! Various plan ‘B’s raced
through my mind. A cancellation would seem I was evading my social duties. I
wondered if I could ask one of the invitees to come and help cook ( their own
dinner) but then decided against it. Whereas this practise was acceptable on
travel and living shows, in real life it would not go down well at all !
Desperate measures were needed. I explained my predicament
to the Sahayak and told him that he had to venture far beyond his normal call
of duty for that day. Some time later, I was preparing the gravy and seasoning and
the Sahayak, whose only relationship with food so far had been eating it , was
cutting vegetables. I tried not to let it perturb me that the vegetable pieces
, being so slowly and painstakingly cut by him, were of completely different
shapes and sizes or that tiny bits of peel were still sticking to them. I
reminded myself that at this juncture our sole aim was just getting food (of
any sort) on the table. Anything else was a luxury. I strategically put large
quantities of gravy over the vegetables to hide their unevenness.
Later in the afternoon, a dear friend, my CO’s daughter, called
to check how I was doing. In the course of describing the reasonably grim
situation, I discovered that I had not factored in dessert ! My wise friend had a brainwave which mitigated
my feeling of despair. All we needed was a quick ride into town to pick up fruit and fresh
cream -a timeless classic. She soon brought her moped to my house and I
instructed my Sahayak to keep a benign
overwatch on the last dish, mutton curry, for the short while I would be away.
The reluctant chef was petrified at the thought of being left alone in a
kitchen with a simmering dish but I told him the situation just could not
accommodate a breakdown on his part. I pointed out to him his robust innings
with the vegetables. I told him the tough part was over, now only a delicate
flick of his wrist was needed - to turn the burner knob from high to sim after
the requisite whistles. My counselling
worked.Thankfully.
We quickly found the fruit and cream but on the way back,
luck deserted us as my friend’s moped had a flat tyre. Providentially,a boy she
knew lived nearby. I was greatly releived to learn this. She told me however,
that she found his attentions unwelcome and normally went to great lengths to avoid him. I
pleaded with her to make the supreme sacrifice of being showered with unwanted
attention for the sake of my dinner. Half an hour later, the boy, whose cup of
joy had run over ,was dealing with the puncture at an unhurried pace (he wanted
his lady-love near him for the longest), my friend was fuming and I was fretting. The supreme irony was
eating the tasty snacks served by his mother even as I worried about my own
amateurish menu.
When we reached back home around 7.00 pm, the first few
guests had already arrived. The Sahayak (who was in the loop over telephone) had
told them I would be back very shortly and they were wondering about this most unusual
welcome. I tried to slip in quietly, but unfortunately, the guests managed to glimpse
my dishevelled clothes and the large packages in my hand. I smiled weakly at
everyone, murmuring excuses, and they smiled back encouragingly. I changed
faster than Superwoman and went to the rescue of the dishes and the chef. My
heart sank completely at what I surveyed-the Sahayak had clean forgotten the
whistle count and the mutton was in shreds ! I thought the only way out was to
give the dish an exotic name and pretend they made it like that in some
less-visited country. My brain toyed with names such as ‘Rare fibril mutton
venison’and ’gourmet stringy surprise’as I regarded the damaged dish.
During the course of the evening, I alternated between
kitchen and drawing room while the guests chatted amiably. My friend helped me
cut the fruit and blend in the cream. Finally,the time came for dinner to be put
on the table. The women called their little children to eat first. One look at
the dishes on the table and the adults quickly grasped the situation. The
innocent children however, stared suspiciously at the slightly strange looking food
and loudly asked what each dish was. Even after their mothers had somehow correctly
identified the base vegetable, and told them the name,they were not easily
convinced ! They kept voicing their doubts loudly, despite stern gazes from
their parents and my ears kept turning a deeper shade of red. The adults, in
contrast, were kindness personified, going about their business of eating very silently,
hiding their disappointment well. I
noticed that all took very small portions of everything except the two dishes which
the bai had cooked. Many asked for bread alongside, which thankfully, I had.
When the dessert came on, there was a palpable sigh of
collective relief. Everyone was still
very hungry and there was nothing that could go wrong with fresh fruit and
cream. All heaped their plates high. But they had not reckoned with my
persistent streak of bad luck that day. The grapes were sour. The guests
laboriously picked small fruit pieces off their plates trying to avoid the
grapes, which was rather difficult given the creamy disguise each little fruit piece wore. Unfortunately for all (by Murphy’s
law of disasters - if he has one such) grapes just happened to be the signature fruit of the dish.
At last the guests left. I imagined hearing hunger rumblings
in their stomachs as they said their goodbyes. In silence, I contemplated the day’s events and the used plates
with uneaten grapes arranged along their perimeters. I consoled myself with the
thought that the guests had certainly enjoyed each other’s company at least.
Life went back to the usual pattern and for a long while no one tried to
disturb the system by introducing novel concepts such as home –cooked meals at
young officer’s residences!
