Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Honestly, I am kinda bummed about not being with my family for this wonderful and celebratory weekend. Especially missing company carrots, my favorite dish. BUT, I am super grateful right now for Kathy Bunker. Kenady's mother came out for the week and I am getting a real sense of family with her being here. My "stand in mom" for the week- but, Mom, I think about you everyday. 

Anyway, since it is Thanksgiving weekend right now, and I am feeling a bit homesick. I am missing out on all of my favorite foods! Company carrots, brown sugar yams, apple pie, asparagus with holland day sauce (I have no idea how that sauce is spelled), and especially the ever so delicious grapefruit and pineapple slush that my mom makes so well. So, I'd just like to take a minute and talk about my favorite thing, no matter where I am. FOOD! Let's just say this, about 80% of my thoughts are food related, so coming to India, where food is not one of their strongest points, was going to be interesting. But I've found dishes here, that I will miss seriously back in the states, including: 

Parahota! This is a tortilla type thing that just melts in your mouth. They have tons of dough balls stacked on each other, they smash them down, grill it up, and serve it to you on a banana leaf with a side of heaven and an omelet. The dough remains gooey and soft- it just falls apart in you mouth. You dip it in the side of heaven, which is basically just oil and spices but is a taste that I've never had before. It is SO delicious. Not to mention, each parahota costs about 10 rupees, so 22 american cents. So you eat 4, get stuffed, and only pay 1 dollar for your meal.

Chiphati! Another tortilla type thing, but this one contains protein. It is thicker and has a bigger circumference, but it is NOT made of rice, and maybe that is why I love it so much. It is a bit thicker and is served with a rich potato and carrot sauce (along with other vegetables that I've never heard of). Some people wrap it up like a burrito, or you rip and dip it in the sauce. We save all the left overs and eat them throughout the week. 

Indians are so creative. Since there isn't lettuce here, if you get a cucumber salad, it is just cucumbers. If you get a tomato salad, it is just tomatoes. This is what a mixed green salad is.

This is a super good one. Samba! It is a potato mix that is wrapped in a rice patty and then deep-fried. In India, spicey spices are put on things like we add salt to eggs. At first taste, samba burns your mouth because of the pepper, but you find that you just keep eating more and more.

When I spent the day at my friend Raja Kumari's home, she made us two amazing dishes. The appetizer was potato chips that were dipped in a red pepper paste and then fried on the "stone" grill to make this. She served it with a fruit that has to be cousins with the strawberry, which served the purpose of cooling down your mouth after each bite. I could eat these all day.

Then she made us a dish that I will for sure adapt in the States. She took okra, tomatoes, and potatoes and fried it up with sunflower oil. When they were softened and cooked through, she added in Maggie Moos (Top Ramen) and cooked the noodles through. Then, she added two eggs, and waited till they were scrambled. She finished by putting in the packaged seasoning, adding some Indian pepper and serving it to us on a banana leaf with a boiled egg. I will never eat regular ramen again.

Before my trip to Havelock Island, I was not a big fish eater. But we got to pick fresh fish, and have it fried up in a traditional Indian style right before us and it only cost about 5 dollars. He wrapped it in foil and banana leaf, filled it with spices, and cooked it through. Celina and I ate fish at each chance we got. Mainly because meat is never found here, and when it is, there are tons of bones in it. Like in the dining hall, they serve fish on Thursdays and chicken on Sundays, but it is eyeballs and all- literally. So you find more bone than meat.

And the last one I want to talk about is Kaju Flower. This is an Indian dessert that is especially cool because it is cooked with Silver on top. Desserts here are generally not very good- all sugar, no flavor. It tastes like eating a sugar cube. So, I don't particularly like eating them, but they are amazing because of their designs. They are all shaped into crazy things, look like flowers, or have beautiful designs on them. One of my favorite processes is the Silver adding, because you can totally taste and feel the texture of the silver.

So, there is a bit of the food that I've been eating in my time here. I will totally miss some of it, like soy briyani, banana leaf stem sauce, the red idly sauce, etc. In the States, one generally only finds North Indian restaurants, so my goal when I get back is to find some Southern India restaurants. One of my favorite tasks is finding a good restaurant- I am ready to take it on! So Happy Thanksgiving!