It is a truth universally acknowledged that I am birthday mad. By that I mean going all out to make someone’s birthday special — a treasure hunt across the city, creating a mock radio show, making several books from scratch, reimagining the remembrall from Harry Potter , using the nine-times tables for presents for the milestone ninth birthday (last single digit!), writing (by hand) and drawing the The Little Prince — you get the drift? So now, when I watch my children do the same, I feel relieved. Here is one legacy I have definitely passed on.
But this extravagance in gift-making and gift-giving overcompensates for another legacy, one that waits quietly by my door. I am, of course, talking about that thing on a paper plate, always precariously balanced — birthday food.
While there are several pressure cookers full of food memories I carry in my belly, each whistling urgently and representative of constantly evolving life — the Diwali Mysore pak that can become a fitting returning-dabba filler, the jeera rasam made for fevers can become a mid-week meal, Sunday morning aloo paratha can become packed train food — there is one that has resolutely stuck to its birthday roots. The noodles roll.
Good Lord
My mother calls it Noodle’s Roll, and I think I might like that version better, because it almost feels like Noodle is an overlord at the Birthday Court, magnanimously giving out the rolls on paper plates. The ingredients are so few that they would very well fit in Lord Noodle’s pockets — some flour, butter and milk for the white sauce, green chillies and coriander for the garnish, and salt to taste. But the magic of spaghetti — the only time ‘noodles’ separates itself from Maggi to find its Italian identity — rolled in white sauce and shaped into rolls and deep-fried is the magic of birthdays.
I can’t quite remember when the first noodles roll made its appearance on our birthday menu. We lived in Dubai then, in an apartment complex, surrounded by Sindhi neighbours. My mother, who enjoys exploring new cuisines, said it was one of her Sindhi friends who taught her the recipe. I don’t think I paid any particular attention to the wonders of Lord Noodle in the first few years of my childhood. That is, till we moved to Madras during the first Gulf War, four months before I turned nine.
Favourite artefact
My family had put together a “let’s-make-friends” birthday party. There was an assortment of neighbours’ children and some of my classmates from school, all whispering in groups; the awkwardness of new friendships was mirrored even in the balloons and streamers that looked bare and uncomfortable.
But once the cake was cut and the paper plates handed out, and the famed noodles roll had made its august appearance, things changed. Here was something golden brown and crispy that was not made of potato, that was different from chips and sandwiches, and yet the delicious-melt-in-the-mouth flavour was so familiar that it was almost as if the noodles roll had caught a plane (from the Gulf, no less) and arrived in our midst.
As the deep-fried goodness of Lord Noodle snaked its way into our stomachs, the untangling of words began, tentative fingers of acceptance reached out, and the whispers gave way to full-throated laughter. The divide had been bridged, and the noodles roll became a staple at every birthday party, now firmly lodged in my consciousness. It continued right up to college, that other hard ground of awkwardness, where yet another group bonded over this dish.
Somehow, through the years, the noodles roll became more the thing we talked about than the thing we made; for every birthday that it missed, another year was added, till it became that forgotten but favourite artefact adorning our memory shelf. Till recently it made its first appearance at my daughter’s birthday party, and I am glad I opened that door. Not every legacy needs to be gift-wrapped, some are always better deep-fried.
Ingredients
Half a packet of Spaghetti
Green chillies cut into small pieces – 3 tbsp
Coriander cut into small bits – 3 tbsp
Oil to fry
Salt to taste
For White Sauce
Maida – ½ cup
Butter – 3 tbsp
Milk – 1 cup
Method:
Boil the spaghetti in at least four cups of water with salt and 1 tablespoon of oil. When cooked, wash with cold water, drain and keep aside.
For the white sauce, saute the butter and maida for three minutes in a kadai. Add milk and stir continuously till it becomes thick.
Mix the white sauce with the boiled spaghetti. Add cut green chillies and coriander with salt to taste and knead them all together. Then take little bits and press it into a fist till they become oblong in shape. (Once all of it is made and kept on a plate, you can even refrigerate this and fry later).
Deep fry them in oil till they become golden brown. Serve with ketchup or green chutney.
The independent writer is based in Chennai.
