Sambhar on my Jeans

TRAVELS AND TRAVAILS OF THE BALD AND THE BEAUTIFUL 

Sannidhanam Mini Breakfast Thali

   As I write this, myriad fragrances, including Sambhar, waft around me. Smells of Indian Railways. Smell of Sambhar. I'm so fed up, quite literally, that I'm off any sort of South Indian cuisine  - well, at least for a week. Now don't get me wrong. I love Food. And Sambhar-rice ranks right up there, right next to peanut-butter-jelly sandwiches and khichdi with curds.  Soul food. Yes, you guessed right, my eating habits are pretty  eclectic. Eclectic but not repetitive. That's my point. I can't eat the same stuff. Particularly not the same stuff for breakfast, lunch and dinner. And I, definitely, do mind, dollops of it on my jeans. Hmm overstated?! So what! I mind food droppings on my jeans. Period! But we'll get to that part soon.

   The year 2017 has been a year of travel for the bald and the beautiful. That's yours truly and my better half. I know, you put the donkey before the cart. But for health and safety reasons, I, the donkey, am mentioned first. And Indian English demands the correct sequence to be "me and my wife"  not " my wife and me". See -  the donkey  before the cart!

Alipiri Tirupati

   Travelled a lot. Together as Fire and Ice and separately as Hot and Cool. (Here also, the sequence is not relevant. Again for marital health and safety reasons). Travelled Far and Near. Let's see. Lucknow, Delhi, Guruyavur, Kochi, Bangalore, Udaipur, Tirupati, Tirumala, Shri Kalahasti, Sadum, Hyderabad, Port Blair and in and around Visakhapatnam. Many a great circle paths (and before my naval navigators jump up to point out and hair split the anomaly) and as the crow flies and walks. To think of it, not even three-fourths of the year has gone by. Still more travels beckon.

   The main purpose of these travels were varied. Some for work, some for family functions, marriages, some for fun and some for the sheer cussedness of blowing a hole in our monthly budget. The highlight has always been FOOD. Food of all varieties. And officially my wife is vegetarian. I'll, ahem, stand by that, officially. Both of us are pretty adventurous about our gastronomic exploits. My wife's weakness is NOT a requirement of having a least one rice based meal a day. My weakness, age, a stomach which is no longer made of cast iron and need for a spoon. For the latter, I must submit, that, my objections to eating with bare hands, or to be more precise without a spoon, was more about hygiene. It had nothing  to do with any deficiency in fine motor skills or any North Indian haughtiness. Hey I've been eating roti (Indian  flat bread) all my life with my hands. And.... and..... sandwiches. Though, in my wife's, South Indian opinion, I have evolved in the 18 years of marriage. In short I have been kind of, tamed.  

   To put things in perspective,  of now and then. I do remember a 'Mellu' wedding sadhya (feast) at Calicut (pronounced: Kozhikode : with a lot of marbles in your mouth). Well, yes this wedding. In a crowd of about a hundred or thousand or millions (depending on who is telling the tale) eating the sumptuous itsy bitsy, but numerous, malayali delicacies, off a banana leaf, dexterously with bare hands. I did something worse than our man Oliver Twist. I asked for a spoon. Suddenly, there was pin drop silence. The calm before the Tidal wave. And then the Tsunami of whispers grew into an incredulous gasp. Spoon. Punjabi. (For the uninitiated - for all Madrasi's, as the people South of the Vindhyas are referred to, all people north of the the Vindhya mountains are Punjabi's). That my roots can be traced to both sides of the Punjab and I am domicile of Lucknow, a UPite, and was born in Jammu (and grew up around Kannadiga's, Malayali's and  Tamilians) is an altogether different story. Anyway, I scandalised the entire kudumbam (family / clan / khandan), and  that I am alive to tell the tale, is because I was issued a small ladle. But that could at least be used to scoop the liquid curries. (Curry - in Mallu land, any cooked food other than rice bread etc). In my defense - I did not ask for a bowl. 

   Today I am proud to say that of all my North-South-East-West Indian friends, I alone can squat comfortably on the floor and eat with my bare (cleaned and washed) hands. A trifle exaggerated, but then the focal point being - comfortably. Though rasam still gets to me. That tasty preparation is the devil's device to denigrate evolved-equitable-non-prejudiced guys like me  (you get the idea? Not racist? BTW haven't found the antonym of racist - there is a word miscegenist ! But that tends more to amorous than prejudice). Rasams revenge, that's what did the jeans in. My jeans. And to add insult to injury, we are traveling and I lost the keys. So I have no change till we reach back home and am able to break into our luggage.   

View of Tirupati from Tirumala

   This particular trip we landed up early morning at 0530 at Tirupati. Now any morning that does not involve golf should not begin before 10 o'clock. But then that's another story. Any trip to Tirupati and around is a tale begging to be told. The sheer aura the passion that Sri Venkateswara temple evokes is beyond words. And the stories of the devoted (husband, a lamb called me, who has never ever walked barefoot for hours in pouring rain for any other cause, Marital Bliss). But this fable is about Sambhar on my Jeans. Anyway, so we grab a cab. Not an Ola/Uber, but, dunno why, got lured by a smiling and courteous cab driver into his antique ambassador. I love the people here. Anyone who rides an Amby has to have a heart of gold. That wonderful car, that was, maybe, the only car actually designed for India. Anyway breakfast at Tirumala (at a must eat place called Sannidhanam) awesome Dosa Upma Chutney(s) and SAMBHAR. I'll skip further details but must submit that lunch was a South indian buffet with oodles of Sambhar and a few South Indian dishes masquerading as North Indian and (the Lord be merciful) Chinese (at an over hyped avoidable place called Saarangi). Dinner again at Sannidhanam - Sambhar something. Next morning started with Breakfast - Sambhar Upma.  Lunch after Darshan, Annaprasadam (free food from the God's abode) also, mind you, predominantly Sambhar Rice. Snacks at the market around the temple. (In my memory, so overwhelmed  with one predominant flavour, even veg Manchurian nuggets or Samosas tasted of Curry leaves  and Sambhar). Dinner - called Tiffins ( Dosa Sambhar). Roll over to Breakfast on the go, a mini breakfast thali (an assortment of Upma pongal idli vada dosa coconut Chutney peanut Chutney and Sambhar). 

   

   Lunch at my daughter's school ( a nutritious meal of organic red rice, organic vegetable curries and Sambhar). Back to the Hotel and Dinner, biryani with a side dish that looked like some curry but tasted like ...... Sambhar. Complimentary Breakfast - guess ? This and that and, Sambhar. 

   The hotel kicked us out at noon. So we planned a trip to Shri Kalahasti. The architecture is awe inspiring. Shiva Shakti and the story of the staunch devotees of Lord Shiva - Sri (the Spider), Kala (the serpent) and Hasti (the Elephant). The numerous other stories engraved in stone. Each mural each Shiva Lingum a fascinating story in itsef. That is another Blogworthy account, but for now Lunch. My wife and I decided (notice the sequence), that we must savour the local cuisine, as the locals do. The cab driver suggests a local roadside dhaba or  Mess (named something something some God's name, Mess). The "Meals" are served on a Banana leaf (as the) plate. NO SCOPE of a SPOON here. Excellent food. Now, point to note is that, I have become quite proficient in using my hand to eat. But have yet to conquer the final frontier. Liquids. I mean absolute water consistency. The real McCoy Quick Gun Murugun, can fashion his palm into a scoop and, well scoop up the liquid in one fluent dexterous  motion, that will put the legendary wrist spinner Chandrashekhar to shame. (And as some - some not me - North Indians would say -  Lick his hands to the tips of his/her fingers). And it's done so fast that you don't even have time to say GROSS.

   That's when the Adventure happened. No matter how tasty the grub, the local Mess has to optimise, if has to serve unlimited food at 60 bucks a pop. Water the universal solvent comes to the rescue. The meal is served hot. Hot steaming rice is piled  onto the leaf. And in quick succession the veg and other accompaniments  are loaded onto the rice. So before I could say GROSS, some mixture of dal, rasam and Sambhar flowed downstream. My comical efforts to form walls of hot rice failed miserably and it dribbled along the banana leaf onto my lap. And "All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this" pair of jeans. "Out damn spot, Out."    

   Dinner at Tirupati railway station, veg pulao with a liquid that strongly resembles  watered down - Sambhar. And maybe for the one and only time in my life, I skipped breakfast. Breakfast on the train back home. I steadfastly pretended to be fast asleep. No screams of Chai, Idli, Dosai, Vadai - from the vendors could shake the giant. My wifes prods and pokes were rebuffed equally stoically. Vizag beckons, the train has a agenda of its own, delayed by over 2 hours. Playing mind games. Vendors pass pass by redolent of Sambhar. Friends call, fix a movie date. Lunch - "How about a South Indian Thali Meal". (The correct term is meals:pronounced Mills). Noooo. every inch of my body quakes.  Anything but Sambhar. "We will, ahem, freshen up and have food at the Punjabi Dhaba. Never mind the Curry leaves".  

Punjabi Dhaba Vizag - Manna from the heavens

   Ladies and Gentlemen it's not just my jeans that smell of Sambhar, my entire being, my soul, is Sambhar drenched. This will take some washing.

View from our Hotel at Tirupati

Srikalahasti - Unfortunately Camera's not allowed beyond this point

Colourful Markets that dot the temple towns

The carving on the right is a wooden piece due for restoration - more than 50 years old

Verdant Hills