on an impromptu break….. and reminder for WBB

this is just one of those things that happen when you least expect it!! my in laws are here and we had planned a week’s trip, first to the temple town of Tirumala, the richest pilgrimage place in the world (and a nightmare where crowds are concerned!!)…..and a few days in chennai to meet with family…..but as luck would have it…my laptop has konked off and will take till i get back on home ground to be fixed….with all the visiting we’ve been doing, there’s hardly any time to do anything else anyways….so am on a blogging break till 28th and hopefully will get back after that…in the meanwhile, please keep sending me your entries to WBB….i am recieving the entries, but may not be able to get back immediately…will do so once i am back….but let the madness for mangoes not stop!!

Ciao!!

Am back……from maldives!!

the pathway to the jetty

Back from vacation….i don’t think I can put words to describe the last week…..lets just say that it was the best time we’d had in a while and that is saying a lot…… its been four days that I’ve been back…but haven’t recovered from the hangover…. So be warned….this is going to be a really long post…….. J

Cochin was the first part of our trip…. We had to leave later in the day than planned and that set us back by some hours because K had to catch up on work….anyways by dusk we reached kochi and the one remarkable change in the landscape is that the billboards advertising real estate have far outnumbered the one with gold and jeweler…that’s quite some change!! Evening was spent with my college friend D and family….next morning we were back again for a fabulous spread of typical Mallu breakfast…..i was almost dizzy with excitement…so pardon the fact that I didn’t take any pictures….plus the family isn’t really used to rowdy food blogger picture taking mania…and I wasn’t about to give them a crash course, so I abstained….but I will tell you what we had (from what I can remember)……..puttu, payar, carmelised pazham (banana), sambhar-vada, egg roast and chakka Kozhukatta ……….we didn’t need lunch till 3.30 p.m…that says a lot!!

I met up with A and her lovely family and a passing remark a few days earlier that “our respective better halves share the same name and come from the same region so we may be related for all you know!!” turned out bizzarely true!! Not only do they hail from the same ancestral village, and have the same family name….we’re some 5-6^th removed cousins!! we had such a ball talking about all of this… and with all of us (A has a delightful young daughter and 5 people in the room!!) we hardly spoke about food blogging…..i received a very gracious and totally smacking gift of home made chocolate brownie muffins…what we couldn’t polish off after they left were quickly demolished in Maldives…..

We flew to trivandrum on Sunday night and could hardly sleep…whatever sleep I managed were filled with aquamarine dreams of Maldives…that’s the exotic destination K booked for us as a belated valentine celebration for us…..the plane trip takes about an hour from Trivandrum and thanks to an ancient Air india aircraft with foggy windows, I couldn’t see much of the blue waters when we landed…..maldives is a group of islands in the Indian Ocean….it is a very popular tourist destination and has some of the best coral reefs around it….for more on Maldives, look here.

The first thing that strikes you when you come out of the airport is the heat!! It was 2.00 p.m and really hot…tropical island after all!! It was a minute’s walk to the boat jetty and a speed boat ride of about 40 mins took us to our island resort…..you hardly notice the time….and I was amazed at what I saw….water in three shades of blue…everywhere you turn…..brilliant aquamarine, a little darker than aqua and inky blue…..and every now and then we passed other island resorts……we reached eriyadu, checked in and got our breath back from the Maldivian assault of beauty….the island we stayed on is a really small one…you can walk around circling it in about 20 mins….there were beach bungalows all around the island…small little chalet type of ones, with a pretty comfortably furnished room……pretty….the bathrooms were cute…a tub with a shower, sink, toilet and another open air shower place….another door leading directly out from the bathroom and outside to the side a thoughtfully provided tap with a wash area so you can rinse your feet and gear without spreading sand in the room….

every time you turn you want to take a picture

We walked up to the jetty and watched the crystal clear waters…..i can’t believe there were fish in water as shallow as 6 inches!! We met a couple from Singapore and struck up a friendship with them….watched them snorkel and looked on in wonder….I’ve never swum in anything other than a pool…..K doesn’t swim and is water phobic…..all our beach vacations are to indulge me….. with more than a little encouragement from this couple, we picked up snorkeling gear and decided to try it out in the shallower waters near our bungalow…..

these feet belong to K…..

I cannot even describe what it is like….firstly, the waters are so clear you can see almost the whole ocean underwater….fish come into water as shallow as 6 inches….. and eriyadu is supposed to have the best house reef in all of Maldives….which means that if you were to stand about 3 feet of water, there are live corals all around and hundreds of fish……all you need to do is float on the water and breath through the pipe that you put in your mouth which is attached to your snorkeling mask…..pretty simple….but scary….for me who needs to know that I can touch the bottom of the pool…wearing flippers and standing in the ocean was very intimidating….i was scared out of my wits….plus the bad part of having a house reef in such shallow waters means that theres hardly anywhere you can stand without seriously injuring yourself on those “very pretty to look at, but will royally cut you” corals……..it took a while to get rid of that fear, by which time it was sunset and you cant see much in the waters with no light…..

the diving centre at sunset

The next morning, our friends from Singapore decided to give me moral support and said they’d snorkel alongside me….near enough for me to grab them if I needed help…..i will be forever indebted to S and V for this…..it is a whole different world under the water….i swam over corals of so many colours, white, pink, orange….some of them have tips that are almost fluorescent….imagine a white coral with purple tips that glow…..different sizes and shapes….and spread all over the bottom of the ocean….and nestled between these corals…were fish of more colours, shapes and sizes than I had ever imagined…..i saw about a gazillion fish …………triangular zebra striped fish, yellow with purple, yellow with blue stripes, sword fish in white, black and some shades of brown…their swords longer than their bodies, clown fish that looked like nemo, orange coloured fish, round ones, flat ones, long ones, sting rays, blues, greys, purples, greens…there was one called a parrot fish which was parrot green and its mouth, fins and tail were crimson!! I can go on and on….but I wont….because I simply wont be able to describe what I saw, and will bore you with my mindlessly exciting memories….lets just say that when I was snorkeling, I forgot that I was actually looking under the water…..its a different world, with as many shapes and colours and flora and fauna as the one above the earth…..it makes you lust to see more and before I knew it I was in water that was about 20 metres deep!! It’s like you calmly float in shallow water and suddenly the temperature of the water changes to really cool….and you are looking down an underwater valley of about 20-30 metres of steep drop…….I had to really will myself to keep calm…and tell myself that I can float back to the shore…..it just doesn’t let you have enough…..so each morning before and after breakfast for a couple of hours and then late afternoon till sunset, K and I would snorkel…sometimes on our own and sometimes with S and V….. every day you see something different…..on the second day, V and I went very close to a beautiful fish we saw at the bottom of the ocean….we were in waters about 4-5 meters deep…it was so beautiful….we noticed another snorkeler violently gesticulating at us…..we came to the surface and she warned us that it was an extremely dangerous fish…we’d just been about 4 feet away from a Scorpion fish.

While all the fish in the ocean are beautiful…the smaller fish are in schools of a few thousands….some of them look like fish curtains….and if you hold out bread (which we did to make them come closer) they’ll even allow you to touch them in a flash….. two most remarkable things that I saw were a sea turtle ambling along…..and an oyster opening and shutting…… it was a white scalloped one about the size of my palm with some furry trimming on the edges.…..

Our four day vacation was over too soon!! The food was pretty good….a mix of continental and Maldivian….good spread for both vegetarians and meat eaters…..we met some pretty amazing people…..there’s a diving school run on the resort which is run by an Ex- german mariner (hot looking guy with naturally streaked hair!! 22 years on the beach….)…we met enthusiasts who have been coming to the Maldives and this island in particular for between 5-18 years!! people who have done scuba diving about a few thousand times…..oh the stories they can tell and the pictures they can show you…..one guy captured shots of a manta ray (a really huge ray fish) on the second day we were there……..there was a nice beach bar with good food, cocktails and music where we’d relax after sundown and before dinner……

We got back to Hyderabad via Trivandrum, spending one night there to catch up with some friends of mine and I managed to do some shopping for traditional Kerala lamps. Whats a vacation without shopping for a girl??

As I sit here typing this out…..i am thinking two things……what a fabulous experience it has been….K and I want to definitely go back….and what a long post this is!! If you are still here…thanks for reading through!!

taking a break…..

what could be more exciting for a girl……..

• much coveted weight loss
• meeting a dear friend
• meeting with a fellow food blogger for the first time
• surprise vacation to an exotic tropical land with the love of her life??
• all of the above??

yes people….am so giddy headed that i just hope to be able to finish my packing and get to the airport in one piece!! i’m off today and will be back on the 8th…..so for then i will be away from what gives me my daily dose of kicks…. the blogging world….i dont post that often, but am always catching up with all of you on a daily basis…..for once, my highs will have to come from somewhere else!! when i am back, i hope you will bear with the aftermath of the excitement!! in the meanwhile i leave you with the recipe of a simple yet completely fulfilling indian dessert…the ubiquitous Firni……

Land of beauty and a thirst quencher ~ Chaas

blue skies, crystal clear glistening waters of the Arabian Sea at Mandvi, Gujarat

the coast at mandvi

typical saurashtran meal

Gujarat is the land mf myriad shades….the land of beauty…..in people and nature….of rich cultural heritage…of arts and crafts….of a community that is knit together….of festivals and colours…and fabulous food….K’s parents migrated to Ahmadabad in 2003, K himself spent 6 years of his childhood growing up in Kutch in a place called gandhidham…that’s where his parents now live….since then we make one trip a year to spend with them ….i can go completely berserk shopping at law garden, rani ka ajeera or lal darwaza at one of the hundreds of shacks/shops selling crafts, arts, clothes and jewelry ….. not be disappointed at 2 a.m if I want to eat cheese sandwiches, or chaat or have an ice gola….… I love the place before this my only connection with Gujarat was that my mother studied there….graduation her career there…she always speaks glowingly of the people and the culture and the way it shaped what she became….so much was her love for the food from Gujarat, that khichdi and kadhi, shaaks of different kinds, shrikhand, aamras, khaari seeng and chunda was what I grew up on…..sadly, I don’t make much of these except for khichdi and kadhi which is on my top five comfort foods list…..

I was obviously very happy to see RCI – Gujarat…. instead of any of the elaborate dish, I planned to post of this fabulously versatile, thirst quenching drink “chaas” which no gujarati meal is without…..infact in households and restaurants alike, your glass of chaas will be refilled if you so much as tilt it half way through…..a super summer cooler….it can be your best friend if you want something light yet nutritious to fill you up…..

these beads are a thoran (wall / door adornment), made of beads and bells, their colours and tinkling bells are a delight as they sway in the breeze….i picked these up on my last trip from an artisan’s co-operative unit

Chaas is made of yoghurt …it is a spiced buttermilk….to be had on its own or to wash down a full meal….chaas can be mildly or strongly spiced, seasoned or not….the avatars it can take on are many….all delightfully satisfying …..this is off to RCI – Gujarat, hosted by Mythili of Vindu this month, and the brain child of Lakshmi of Veggie Cuisine….

Impromptu Vacay

like fire at our feet and the devil on our tails K and i decided to surprise everyone in bangalore by getting there unannounced!! the expression on my mother’s face was worth all of it!! i believe the best things in life are unexpected and on friday, the whole family, Amma, brother, SIL, baby, K and i, loaded a few clothes and a tonne of baby paraphenelia into the car and drove off to pondicherry!! we had a swell time and got back last night….back to hyderabad with amma in tow this evening….i have a tonne of catching up to do…but have yet to recover from the great time we had…….first family vacation in 20 years!!

Airline food anyone??

On Saturday as I sat between two gentlemen enroute Bangalore aboard the jet airways flight, I wondered what was in store as the snack they’d serve……considering the stray dogs outside a few airports in india almost wag their tails when they spot me and the bouquet of airlines I travel by, I know what to expect…and I surely am not in the least bit expectant of good food on a domestic airline, I know that for the 40-80 rupees that the airline pays the five star kitchen for the meal, there is painfully little you can actually buy in the said hotel coffee shop… considering the food is cooked at least 24 hours earlier, there’s little the staff can do except reheat it to death before they smile their plastic with too much blusher induced cheekbones smile, pleasantly asking you as they roll the cart down the aisle, (they cant help it, I am not judging them….i am merely making an observation)…what can I serve you sir / ma’am, veg or non veg? here you go sir / ma’am, enjoy your meal sir / ma’am…..

I get airsick behind the wing, so the only seat as far in front as I could get on the stopover flight was the one that had me sandwiched between a man blissfully asleep, spilling out of his seat onto mine and hogging all of the armrest to my right with a man warned not to sleep during landing and take off on my left because we were in the emergency exit……and was trying his best to amuse himself with the clouds outside the window

I’d just had time to eat some breakfast and apology of a sandwich for lunch and was famished enough to look forward to the food on an airplane by the time I was seated in it at 4 pm. I’d spent the previous few hours booking the ticket, closing up the house and packing for this surprise trip. I don’t miss an opportunity to pop by to see my mother, that this flu induced trip made me pine for her some more was making the plane fly too slowly……. both the gentlemen on either side of me refused the food and I looked like the glutton who wanted to eat so as to tell the story when I reached home…every bit desperately hungry I couldn’t care about public opinion…… I asked for the veg meal and carefully untied the complicated knot on the cutlery, spread the napkin on my lap and pulled back the foil…….with as less movement as I could….didnt want to wake my right side neighbour and the leftie was finding solace in the clouds so I could have some privacy with the meal

The snack menu usually has a sandwich / idly/ vada/ cut pieces of dosa / uttapam or similar savoury snack, some fruit and a dessert of some sort….i was horrified…at first glance…..what i was staring at it looked like atleast a few days old idly, dried, revived and fried with some onions and something unfathomable in the way of a spice powder….i forked some into my mouth, scared that it would bounce off the fork and land on the laps of my co passengers….. and wasn’t disappointed….it was tasteless and so I let it be….moved onto what looked like two pieces of white tyre….it was…..flubbery paneer…half cooked and tasted like what I think rubber tastes like…I was ready to burst into tears…..the aloo bonda that sat next to these two albinos was the only thing I could swallow……before I had time to react, I told myself that this wasn’t in the least tough, was warm enough and I had to eat lest my head pounds me to death…..almost tasted gourmet after the first two encounters with the food…….i tried my best to precariously open the little dish which I thought would have the fruit….. it contained something chopped and brown with what looked like a tadka….actually it looked like pieces of wood…..it tasted pretty close to wood too…this time i was sure it would waltz off the fork and land on my neighbour….what I suspect spent its life thinking it was dhokla, turned out to be wood in disguise drenched in chutney…..i closed the coffin…oops lid and let it lie….by now the lumpy excuse for chocolate mousse tasted divine….i sipped the packaged orange juice which I thankfully saved for the last to wash everything down, folded back the offending food in the foil and sat back hoping they’d clear the tray faster than I could cry……when the lady politely remarked “you’ve hardly eaten anything” I couldn’t hold back and said in my most solemn voice “I tried my best”. It wasn’t her fault…but it wasn’t mine either….i mean I know its precariously placed to serve a decent meal when you’re bleeding revenues, but serving cut wood is hardly the option…I mean a chutney sandwich would’ve been fine in place of the dead idly…..i have rarely been so scathing of my observations…mostly I refuse food…and I realized that I was doing the right thing….but what if you are really hungry?? And hey…I was paying for this wasn’t I ?? i felt so cheated…..did they think in their bid to compete with all the low cost carriers that anything would do? that no one would notice? or worse still that the customer could be taken for granted?? I wonder if anyone reads the feedback forms that are filled and does it make any difference…..i don’t know…..what I know is I will continue to refuse food on this airline….i’d rather allow my head to pound me to death till I reach a place I know wont make me cry because of what they serve…..