Whose recipe is it anyway?

Like everyone in this world does, I too believe that my Mom is the world's best cook.

From Bombay's pav bhaji to the south's idli and dosa, to Hyderabad's biryani, to Kashmir's dum aloo, to Gujrat's dhokla to Bihar's litti to Orissa's pitha to the Indian sadakchhap pani puri (the way I like it), she can make it all and more.

And she's a Monica when it comes to the kitchen. Even to this day, although my friends swear by my cooking (well, some do), I dread making rotis for her. That, in spite of my belief that I have come a long way from the days my rotis used to be papads. Don't laugh now! Everyone's first roti, as a rule, is an Australia-shaped papad.

And what I find immensely admirable about her cooking is that she only picked up these skills after she got married. Being the daughter of one of the wealthiest guys in the state, she'd never had to enter the kitchen, let alone cook a meal before she got married. For someone like that, to give up a university lecturer's job, and go to Etah, a small town in Uttar Pradesh as the wife of a guy she barely knew, must have needed real guts.

She often relates how she started picking up culinary skills, along with bits of hindi, from her neighbours. Armed with her broken hindi, she attacked recipe books and hindi magazines (they had zillions of Indian recipes) with a vengeance. And soon, she was such a pro that the neighbours would ask her for cooking tips and recipes.

I still remember how envious my friends used to be in school, when I would open my tiffin box during lunch, and be surprised every single day, while they had to be content with their daily dose of paratha and alu ki sabzi.

When I came to Singapore, she was really worried about my food, cos I had never really bothered to learn any cooking when I was in India.

"Don't eat too much of Chinese food, okay? It has a lot of MSG." She'd warn me.

"What do I eat then?"

"Cook your own meals, beta!" She'd say.

"Me? Cook? Hahaha! Good one, Mom!"

Within a year of landing in Singapore, I had started cooking.

Often Dad would often email or sms to tell me that Mom made this really cool dish and it was really yummy. And I'd call and ask her, "Dad said you made this really cool dish and it was really yummy! Gimme the recipe!" She'd give me the recipe over the phone, with a gentle warning "Share it only with Apa (my sis) and no one else, okie? My recipes are only to be passed down within the family."

"Okie."

Then there was the oft-used panic call.

"Mom, haaaaaaalpppp!!! The sabzi is too salty!!! My hungry friends are gonna be here in 15 minutes!"

"Okay, don't panic. Make a ball of dough, and add it to the boiling sabzi. It will absorb all the extra salt."

Bingo!

After graduating, when I had my housewarming party, my housemates and I cooked for the 30-odd invitees. So I called and proudly told Mom about my accomplishment.

"You cooked for 30 people??? You mean one-three or three-zero???"

"Three-zero, Mom."

"Achha? What did you make?"

"Papdi chaat, zeera chaawal, rajma, salad, alu ki sabzi..."

"How did you make them?"

"Huh? You want me to tell you how I made each of the dishes?"

"Okay, only the main ones..."

"What is this? A test?" I asked suspiciously.

"Arre tell me na, I will tell you where you went wrong..."

"I did not go wrong, Mom. Everything was perfect. Believe me."

Actually, it wasn't. But I wanted to get some things right on my own. Also, her asking me questions like that made me really nervous!

Whenever I tried out a recipe and called her to tell her about it, she'd wanna make sure I'd made the perfect version of it. And because I like to experiment, often skipping conventional cooking rules, I'd be unwilling to tell her the exact steps I followed. I just can't help it, it's a compulsive habit to make my own little changes to any recipe I try out. And I'm not sure she'd understand exactly why I had to go and make changes to a recipe she had tried and tested. She was the pro, wasn't she? In fact, even when I gave her recipes I had come up with myself, I often doubted if she really tried them.

"So tell me na... how you made it." She'd urge.

"Errr... Okay..." I'd say grudgingly and proceed to relate her own recipe back to her.

"Wait wait... garlic? You forgot the garlic??"

"I didn't forget, Mom. I left it out on purpose."

"But why???"

"Errr... Because I don't like garlic! You don't have to add garlic to everything na..?"

"But beta, when I gave you the recipe, I told you to add garlic. It would have been much tastier with garlic."

Heavy silence from me.

How do you argue with something like that?

So yesterday, Dad sends me an sms. "Your Mom made alu gobhi ki sabzi with pav bhaji masala. It was great!"

"WHAT?? Really??" was my response.

Wow. Mom actually tried something that did not follow conventional cooking rules!

So I called her.

"Dad says you made alu gobhi ki sabzi with pav bhaji masala?"

"Oh yes, I did."

"So how did you make it?"

She started telling me the recipe, when I interrupted her.

"Wait wait... tomatoes? You added tomatoes???"

"Errr... yes, I did."

"But why??"

"Errr.. You have to add tomatoes to a sabzi like that na..?"

"But Mom, when I gave you the recipe, I told you not to add tomatoes. It would have been much tastier without tomatoes!"

Heavy silence from her.

What goes around, comes around, eh? :)