I caught the articulate Everest Eswaran in the sabha canteen, looking relaxed, enjoying the empowerment he drew from the contents of his silver betel box and went on to introduce the innovative items he had put together this musical season. Excerpts:
BOORI AND STEW: No spelling mistake in this. It is boori and not poori. Like Mysorepa, the liberalist counterpart of the hardcore, dental pulverizer Mysorepak, this boori will not look like a deflated blackish brown coloured balloon, stuck to the plate like a second skin. This boori will be puffed up evenly at the top and bottom and will retain its curvature, till you stab it with your index finger to make a hole for it to cool down. You will wonder at the absence of glistening oil film, while the traditional pooris will remind you of a bayilwan who had his mandatory oil pickling on Saturdays. The traditional urulai masala is also dispensed with, its familiarity breeding contempt. Instead, stew (not olan) will be served; a chunky item cooked with select boiled vegetables, coconut milk, and a dash of chilies to give the off-white coloured dish an authentic bod
PALAPPAZHA SET ADAI: Adai, the shallow fried, crispy pulse wonder has a Malabar slant as well. So does the jack fruit, known as chakkai. Adai is not a light snack, because of its filling capacity and so shunned as a breakfast delicacy. One may require a zinc-lined stomach to digest it, and eat lunch as well. Adai is generally fancied with the side dish of avial, but the traditionalists will demand in addition butter (not salted, please) and pieces of broken jaggery. A few may ask for chili powder, with a splash of gingili oil fresh from the oil-press. The palappazha set adai will be a double circlet, with the interleaving palappazha paste, prepared with special ingredients guaranteed to make your tongue salivate like a mountain spring. Available after 7 pm.
GULGANDHU SUHIYAN: Suhiyan is an almost forgotten dish. This delicacy, is a mixed-breed, a combinatorial of bonda and kozhakkattai, like Tigon, born to a Tigress and Lion. Suhiyan will taste like bonda in the outer crust, but will have a sweet core made of coconut, jiggery and such.My Suhiyan will have gulgandhu, which is a sweet paste of rose petals. There is a snooty school of thought which looks down upon crushing such a delicate flower, a symbol of love, but my take is it will be of use only when it is fresh to make garlands, but what use thereafter, after it has withered? Come to that, if my botany is right, any fruit we eat started as a flower before ending as a fruit.
AMERICAN SWEET CORN USILI: There are usilis and usilis. Some are made with cluster beans, some with banana flower, some with cabbage, some with onion. They may be soft or crisp, having its own individualistic taste. But there is a catch in making the usili. It is mandatory for men who go to Kasi to give up, a fruit, a vegetable and so forth from their intake. My venerable parent/guru ‘Usili’ Subramaniya Iyer, the fourth generation cook, used to wisecrack telling lies should be included in that list. And so avoiding all usili-friendly vegetables, one of which may fall in the negative list of a Kasi-returned customer, I am using American sweet corn. Hope the youngsters who like to eat sweet corn off a cup with a plastic spoon will go in for this.
PAYASA VADAI: My very special! A new entrant to the family of vadais that lazily wallow in sambar, rasam, morkozhambu or thayir is the payasa vadai, I offer this season to tickle the taste buds of gourmet eaters. The medium for this will be paruppu payasam, an auspicious dish served during muhurtha lunch. Vadais, small in size, like mini idlis will be joyously floating therein. Since chilies in the vadai will mar the sweet payasam, they are avoided, but a dash of salt is added. It is customary for people to take bits of appalam ( or a lick of a pickle ) with payasam so the ambrosia does not cloy, but the in-house presence of vadai will make one remember a time-honoured vadai-payasa sappadu.
