A 'cooker' (i)n me !

 

 

 

Kitchen is the most important room in the house. Our lifespan is decided here. A right portion in wrong quantity or wrong portion in right quantity can rest you in the restroom for the rest of the day.

I have a dubious record of setting fire to my house ,twice I did when I was less than 7 years ,since then I was never allowed to even light a match box at home, I was even barred from entering kitchen, however,  my love for Jaggery and Horlicks couldn't stop me find my way into the kitchen . During the course if anything was broken, I was the one who will be  invariably summoned. If the stove didn't burn, my mother will look at me like  its  you???. ..So much so that even if  a fire engine entered near my area , ..my father would ask ..Got anything to say???? 

So I never got a chance to cook anything ...apart from stories ;).... It continued till my first marriage. ... I mean my only marriage!

           Some of my friends cook a bit but talk a lot.... Whenever  they were alone they try new dishes and i was always invited.... One dude asked me how it was after a non-veg treat and I asked him how did he prepare that Chicken sambar???   He never invited me after that.

           So last summer when my wife had gone to Chennai. ...the distance of 1200 kms forced  me to cook. ...birth of Nair's Kitchen :)

Women always boast of cooking... Is it that hard? Just add 1 glass of rice, 2 glass of water and 3 whistle. ..my wife often says ... so I decided to start from rice, sambar and slowly move on to land-food, seafood and junk food. ... :)  After all....the top chefs in the world are men.

My wife ‘cooker’ always used milk cooker, rice cooker and coffee cooker.... I mean maker. ... :)

 So cooking rice must be a piece of cake. I entered the kitchen remembering 1,2,3.... Took a glass of rice in a Container ..Quick washed, rinsed and dried it like washing machine.... Then poured 2 glass of water. But there were 2, 3 cookers of various sizes. I used to ask her which whistle is for which cooker ??  ... Right then my mother called me. She was with all pride. I didn’t know how the news spread like cooking fire !

She asked me about the menu and gave some tips too ! I crosschecked my 1,2,3 formula....  started to search  for a lighter or a match stick for half an hour and called my wife thinking how irresponsible she was.... She respectfully( take a guess) replied "God, I had told you many times, it is right beside the stove".

The cooker was on the stove and the time was ticking like bomb and yet no whistle. White smoke was fuming. I was nervously moving around   like pregnant woman and called my wife. She again confirmed 1,2 and 3. When I returned to the kitchen, the white smoke has turned into black and the room was like war zone. If smoke detector had been installed, I would have become world famous and got Oscars for food.... All the apartment mates were at my door enquiring why was I celebrating 'Bogi' inside my house.

I panicked and switched off the stove and opened the cooker. Whole rice had burnt and the cooker was totally black inside.... Safety valve and gasket had evaporated into thin air. The cooker looked as if I had stolen it from Hiroshima. ... Shell shocked, I stood there feeling numb. Again the phone rang and it was my wife. Whenever a husband does some thing wrong, don't know how wife will know that.... I guess that's 7th sense and its called Wife's sense.... I was senseless for a second. I told all was well and dropped the phone...after 10 mins again called her and narrated my "Operation Food" in detail. She asked ..Did you pour water outside the container? I sat aghast....because I did not :(

         Once my wife returned she went straight to kitchen to ascertain the damage .Till this date she keeps that cooker as a souvenir. Till this day, whenever she sees the black cooker I can hear her mind voice which says  "No common sense at all."

While looking back,... If I had poured water outside the container that day who knows...  I might have gone on to become a world best chef :)

 

Never the less, today I cook pretty decently ,thanks to that episode -my eye for detailing has gone up!