Culinary Baptism

My mom, especially being my mom, issued a mile long list of instructions of dos and don’ts, things I am to say to people who came, called or became curt. My major duty in their absence was to water the plants in the evening and cook dinner. Mom gave a basic menu keeping in mind that I had no known records of any endeavours in the kitchen. I merely had to cook rice, dal and fry the lettuce with spices she mentioned. A minor inconvenience! After all, you have to pay a price for everything in life. It was no big deal and can be forgotten till time calls for a reminder. Meanwhile I was, to put simply, on cloud nine. I could not wait to be alone. Thus, Thursday night ended with dreams of a sweet tomorrow.

Well, Friday morning began as a pandemonium with all the “getting ready” activities. Finally, I went skipping to school thinking of all the fun waiting for me at the end of the day. The “home alone” story made me an instant celebrity at school. I just couldn’t stop telling them about the “responsibilities” and how “mature” one has to be to stay alone at home. All my friends were green with envy. God could not possibly start a day better than this!

3:30 PM, and there I was sitting and watching television and wishing to know what mom would say if she knew what I was doing…Boy! It was great to be alone and I lost track of time. The only reason I got up from the sofa was to get more snacks from the kitchen or to answer phone calls. Then darkness enveloped me…power-cut! I was stuck with a glass of cold coffee in one hand and a pack of potato chips in the other. I had no idea, whatsoever, about the whereabouts of candle and matchsticks. I kept the treasures on the floor to clear my hand. I groped about to find the torch but no sign of any such thing. I walked about and suddenly my mom’s priceless china cup went for a winning goal through some post and hit the net… eh… wall unfortunately, and my heart stopped beating at the crashing sound.

Note to self: pray that mom believes the cat broke it!

Duly panicked I rushed around, hitting myself against every furniture and somehow hit the jackpot when I stumbled over a small side table in my parents’ bedroom and found the torch. But victory turned sour when I fumbled and the torch fell off the table and broke. I groped my way to the kitchen and after ten full minutes of agony located the candle and matchsticks. Darkness gives me the creeps and a date with darkness alone at night is not worth my “broken” cup of coffee!

Then more disaster time.

6:30 PM and I did not water the plants. It was too dark to water. I remembered Grandma saying never to water the plants after sunset and here the world was heading for a sunrise! I desperately hoped that the plants live without water in this heat for one day and mom does not realize it… ever!

So two problems down, one to go and it was party time again. Despite the occasional fear of a man standing outside the window to kill me, I began having a good time in the darkness. Homework can wait, after all no light and two days of holidays to go. So, no guilt on that front either. With nothing to do and tired of eating chips I started looking for other food sources. I opened the refrigerator and voila! A new pack of vanilla ice-cream was sitting patiently on the shelf. The Lord is forever bountiful! I took as much as I thought was more than the usual helping. The clock kept ticking and still no electricity. The ice-cream started turning into ice-milk and I did not know what to do. First instinct was to eat but there was an ethical problem… parents! How can I eat the whole pack of ice-cream without sharing? I walked around the house with devil and angel debating on the floor of moral assembly and whenever I encountered the refrigerator, evil won a round as three more scoops of ice-cream went down the darkness of my mouth, lost forever!

8:00 PM and only a spoonful of ice-cream was left. I decided to quit now as my nemesis was approaching… my baptism to cooking.

I was feeling odd for some unknown reason… to much ice-cream perhaps. I sat down trying to recollect mom’s instructions. I just could not remember how much rice to take. No problem. I decided to take as much rice as I thought was correct and mom would not know a thing. I went into the kitchen. Took a large bowl and opened the rice container. I scooped rice in a small tumbler and poured it down into the bowl. It looked too little a quantity for three people to eat. I decided it needed some more rice and down went two more tumblerful. Hmmm… little more I decided, just a handful to be on the safe side. I washed the rice and there was no way I could stop the rice from flowing out of the vessel every time I poured the dirty water out. Anyways, that over I put the water to boil. It seemed like ages before it finally came to a boil. The rice went in and I took a break. I lost myself in my dreams again. The smell of something brought me back to reality and I as greeted with rice and white-white water everywhere. I was dead meat, I thought. The rice was soft and I had to strain the water. Did that but managed to spill boiling water on my hand. I dropped the bowl, scattering rice all over the kitchen counter and began an Indian war dance in pain. Once the pain subsided I collected the remaining rice and transferred it to the dining table. Then came clean up time…I had no idea how long it took to clean up, but it seemed like ages has passed. I did my best to make sure that mom did not suspect of any wrongdoing.

Then began the next phase of cooking…the dal. My mom had told me to cook the red coloured dal (lentil but I did not know that then). The first (mis)adventure made me more careful. The amount of dal was less. To save time and mess I decided to go for the pressure cooker instead of an open vessel. Well… after putting the on the lid and weight I felt relieved and went back to my dreams. But a loud explosion brought me back to reality. I was greeted with dal spilt over the cooker and the weight had cracked through the glass pane of the self on its way down after hitting the roof. The roof itself was sprayed with a fine mist of something yellow. That was it! I had enough of cleaning up in the darkness. I was not going to clean this one. Let mom come back and do it. The grapes of “home alone” euphoria were sour by now and I wished mom was at home. I did not feel like frying anything anymore.

It was 9:30 PM and still no sign of my parents. I was feeling hungry again and this time I could not eat alone. I was tired after all the cleaning up and began to feel sleepy. I took the chopped lettuce that the maid had left. Frying I found was even more frustrating. Oil is a very funny thing. Never enough to fry the leaves and once the leaves were soft they were suddenly swimming in a sea of oil. I added whole green chillies, garam masala and jeera. That went off without a hitch. I tasted it and felt it tasted funny. I shifted the cooked lettuce to a bowl, covered it and took it to its place on the dining table. I set the table…plates, water,…the works.

All done, I took to pacing in the portico for signs of the car coming towards the house. There was a light breeze and a shyly shinning half moom. I could not stay gloomy in such a romantic setting. I began to feel hopeful that the day was going to end in a nice way until the headlights of the car reached the gate. I ran to open the gate with tear welling up in my eyes. I did not know why?... Anyway, once my mom gave me a hug I was better right away. Still no electricity so parents could not make out anything. I started off with all reports of school and everything I had proudly done …well almost everything. No point in making them worried so late at night.

As luck would have it, electricity came back just as I finished my report and was immediately greeted by mom’s shrieks as she spotted the coffee stain on her expensive Turkish carpet. The shrieks turned into a shower of words soon enough and continued as she moved around the house only to be interrupted by another big scream as she spotted the messed up kitchen and not to mention the roof. She did not know about the cup yet. It can wait I thought. But tired from the journey mom calmed down, accepting the fact that it was my first time home alone.

Washed up, having overcome the initial shock, mom asked about what I had cooked for dinner. She opened the bowl of cooked rice and it had turned into one solid, huge rice cake. It had to be cut and served. At least it made mom speechless. Dal was a sad story. Next stop was my pride and joy - the fried lettuce. She asked about the spices I added. She shook her head as I proudly showed her the bottles. She said, “You added mouri and not jeera. You are not supposed to add that”. I suddenly lost all the appetite to eat. No amount of coaxing could bring me to the dining table. I was scared of death. I knew that wrong spices made you ill and one could die from poisoning. I thought that my parents were going to die if they ate the fried lettuce. I did my best to convince mom to eat whatever is left of her cooking from the previous day. She saw no reason to do so. I went to bed. My parents were talking about their trip and as I fell asleep I prayed fervently, ”Dear God, please don’t kill my parents. I love them a lot, cannot live without them. I’ll water the plants from now on every day without fail. I know I have promised things before and never kept them but this time I will… please, please God”.

Thus, Friday night ended with dreams of a hopefully sweet tomorrow.