I was introduced to the music of Oum Kalthoum by a friend many, many years ago. My father-in-law turned out to be a great admirer, too, and had brought back an album of her songs during a trip to Egypt. Her deep and rich voice was mesmerising, and it came back to me, all these years later, when I read this little passage in a book called A Gourmet’s Journey: Discovering the Exotic & Erotic in Food .
The year was 1970. The writer of the book, Jasleen Dhamija, was in Beirut and had been taken to a speciality mezze restaurant by a friend, Raid, originally from Palestine. They sat by the seaside, sipping ouzo (a fennel drink I am sorry to say I have had close encounters with), and listening to the “passionate singing of Oum Kalthoum, the heartthrob of Egypt.”
The table, she writes, had been laid out with labaniya, yoghurt dishes, cheeses, salads, tiny kababs and seafood.
“I laughed and said, this is fairy food. Raid said, ‘No, no, this is demonic. Taste the creamy cheese, if you want to taste something more tender than a kiss. Oh, bite into the little kababs. Don’t be harsh. Just nibble, as you should know how.’ He had me blushing and we were soon holding hands,” she writes.
Instant digestive
The book, published by Women Unlimited, is peppered with little nuggets like this. She recalls her growing up years in pre-independent Abbottabad, living in different parts of the world when she was with the United Nations, and discovering people and food.
One day she is in a temple in Manipur, having bhog , and another day, in Calcutta, in a brightly-lit, chandeliered room in the house of Lady Ranu Mukherjee , a connoisseur of the arts.
In the Vaishnava temple, they were served 27 vegetarian dishes, and the temple authorities apologised for the meagre fare, because they said they did not have enough notice.
“The platter was oval shaped fashioned from green banana leaves, with cups made in the form of boats in which they served dal with pineapple, and fresh tendrils of peas sprinkled with spicy roasted gram flour... We ended with a dessert of lime, cooked in sugar syrup, an instant digestive,” writes Dhamija, who is known, among other things, as a textile art historian.
The meal in Calcutta started with shukto, a mix of vegetables. For starters there was boneless hilsa. Then came rice with moong dal flavoured with the fragrant leaves of gondhoraj lemon and green chillies. Fish curry and mutton roast followed, and for dessert there was bhapa doi cheesecake.
The reminiscences speak of different times and regions. She writes about Gandhi visiting their Abbottabad home, and how he knew Kasturba had arrived because the rotis were suddenly perfect. She recollects travelling with the doyenne of textiles, Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya, who, while a vegetarian, always insisted that Dhamija be served the local non-vegetarian fare.
Slight spice
The leitmotif of the book is food and friendship. A passage about breakfasting with a stranger in a fancy hotel in Denmark is most entertaining. Dhamija always wanted to breakfast on caviar and champagne — and there was this man having just that. She asked if she could join him, had some caviar on blini, and then offered him an Indian version.
“I took a fresh blini, poured melted butter and a light sprinkling of onions on it, surrounded it with scrambled eggs. In the centre I placed a dollop of caviar, squeezed some lemon juice, a little freshly ground black pepper and a few drops of Tabasco… We ended our breakfast with Brazilian coffee and a Havana cigar.”
There are some wonderful recipes in the book, too. Dhamija, who is in her 80s now, has gifted us a collage of food and friends, with just the right bit of Tabasco on it.
The writer, who grew up on ghee-doused urad dal and roti, now likes reading and writing about food as much as he enjoys cooking and eating. Well, almost.
