Never underestimate the power of browned onions.
I had some the other evening that took me three and a half decades back in a bite. To a similarly rainy evening in Kolkata when my mom had asked our rannar mashi (cook) to make a potato sabzi for her tiffin to take to work next day, to have with sliced bread.
I tasted a bit of what she had made when the dish was ready. I loved it so much, that I finished it all. I am not sure what happened to mum’s tiffin the next day.
I was 13 by then. That was not very grown up of me you could say!
Heat oil, add finely chopped onions, when translucent, add parboiled cubed potatoes, salt and pepper and stir. |
I requested our cook Banu to make a cubed potato sabzi with salt, pepper and onion. This time in our apartment in Mumbai. The city which has been my home for more than two decades. The city where I finally grew up to be an adult you could say.
‘Onion,’ she asked to confirm, when I gave her the recipe, as the version we make at home is sans onion.
‘Yes’, I replied. ‘And make sure that you stir the potatoes till they get dashes of laal (red/ is braised). You will have to stir them attentively’, I said. ‘That’s when the tastes comes.’
This has been a continuous struggle between us. Banu likes to put the vegetables, meat or fish into the pan and go about her work while nature takes its own course. I have been trying to espouse the values of being in the moment to her. Specially while cooking our meals. This time she heard me. Thankfully.
I took some of the potatoes to make a grilled sandwich with in the evening. A piece of browned onion had fallen on to the plate.
I put it into my mouth, before clicking pictures for Instagram, and that’s when epiphany happened.
This was alur chorchori that my mom had got our rannar mashi to make way back in 1987!
An example of what I call an ‘Oil of Olay’ moment in food. After the skin care brand that promises agelessness.