Naan

OK, if you look at the picture above, you might think how this classifies as a culinary disaster. i mean, don’t they look good, yummy, delicious?

i got the recipe from Sanjeev Kapoor’s website, yes, he of the ‘khana khazana’ fame, that ever-smiling chef. i had no doubt that the naan would be a success, what it being his recipe and my cooking skills (!!!). Sigh! Sigh and more sigh. When i asked my husband how it was, he replied ‘adum yaiye’ (which would translate into ‘OK’). i should have got the hint then. But looking how good they were, i thought they would taste yummy, better than the rubbery kind you get at some restaurants.

The recipe had baking soda and baking powder. i was thinking of using another recipe that had yeast but thinking of the proofing time, i went for the quicker version. When i bit into one of the naan, the taste of baking soda turned me off. No, i did not screw up and used more than called for in the recipe. In fact, i followed the recipe to a T.

Well, i made 8 naans. We somehow ate 5 between the two of us (we had to, there was no other alternative than to starve and who likes to sleep on an empty stomach? Not me.). i bravely stored away the remaining three telling my husband i would have them for lunch. Of course, my husband discovered them, still uneaten, three days later and threw them away. i was hoping he would eat them. Goes to prove how things never go the way you want them in life. Sigh.

And to think of the time i spent picking out kalonji (nigella seeds) from the panch phoron mixture because the recipe said i should sprinkle them with kalonji before baking and we did not have kalonji i.e. till i hit on the brilliant idea of painstakingly plucking them out from the mixture.

Mysore pak? Barfi?

i love mysore pak. Though i have an on-off sweet tooth, mysore pak is something i cannot resist even though it is so sinfully rich.

Long, long time back, i had tried making mysore pak and it was a success that left me basking in compliments! So, fired by that culinary success, i tried to replicate it, hoping to reap laurels again. i gathered all the necessary ingredients and pulled up my sleeves for all that stirring (for those of you familiar with the preparation of mysore pak, you know what i am talking about). But disaster struck. Either i made a mistake with the consistency of the sugar syrup or with the temperature of the ghee, but what resulted was not mysore pak. i sulked but it did not help any. So we were stuck with something that looked like barfi and tasted a wee bit like what it was supposed to be.

i was so disheartened that i contemplated chucking it away. Better sense prevailed (but not soon enough; it was cold when i tried to cut it and that accounts for the unsightly shape).

i must add that we did manage to finish all of it so it was not that much of a disaster. Or so i would like to believe.