The ‘Just Married, Please Excuse’ Contest

This is the first time that I’m taking part in a blogging contest ( yay!). Most times I see these contests happening but I am really too lazy to actually sit down and write an entry. But of course with the over enthu bunch of friends that I have, I somehow found myself getting dragged into this one. So here goes my entry. To know more about this contest, you can go here: http://www.yashodharalal.com/2012/08/the-just-married-please-excuse-contest.html

It was the first day after M and I got married. To give you a brief background, our wedding was full of tamasha. My parents didn’t want us to get married. My dad walked out of the wedding. We were hellbent and we went ahead and signed the marriage forms in my own house in front of happy drunk cousins and friends and delirious with grief elderly relatives. By the time we came back to our own apartment, with a close gang of friends in tow, ( yes, we moved to a rented apartment all by ourselves the first night itself), we were high and happy and didn’t know what was happening. M fell asleep on the chair and I had to drag my “suhaag” into bed literally, giving an entirely new meaning to “suhaag raat.”

Anyway as the next morning dawned nice and bright, it was M’s first day at a new job. Yes, we were penniless and we could not afford a honeymoon or a reception. I woke up, the giddy headed new wife, eager to make the husband a hot steaming breakfast. We were foolish, we were young…whatever. As I entered the kitchen I suddenly realized we had one gas oven and a cylinder, some utensils and some basic groceries which my mum in law had very kindly bought and stocked up the day before. Wow, an equipped kitchen but no clue what to do with it. I had only learnt how to make tea and some basic stuff growing up and here I was all alone, trying to be a good wife and make breakfast. Of course the charm came into play and I sent the husband off with a kiss and some money tucked into his shirt pocket to buy us tea and puris from the local tea shop in the area. Breakfast over and the husband on his way to work, I made up my mind to cook lunch/dinner, no matter what. My mum-in-law sent her trusted maid across to help me out in the house and I decided to show off my culinary skills to her. She offered to help but of course “I” wanted to cook for my husband and so I told her to “chill”. So the menu was decided- rice, alu-dum and raita it would be. The husband was called and asked to come home for lunch and I got down to cooking, merrily.

The potatoes peeled ( not boiled, mind you), the masalas found, the oil poured into the kadhai, I kept going like I was the best chef in the world. Dutifully everything was added one by one- the mustard oil, the raw potatoes into the cold oil, the masalas and I mixed everything thinking it was a culinary masterpiece. Of course everything started to burn and specially the spices and before long I was choking myself to death with the fumes. I had forgotten to add water, of course. How stupid could I get? So I added water- one bottle, then another till all the potato pieces and the spices floated on top. The maid tried to advise and asked me what I was doing and I sternly told her this was how my mother made it, which of course was completely untrue. In the meanwhile I took a bowl of milk and put it out in the sun. Why? To make dahi, of course. I had always seen my mum doing it, without realizing that she also added some old curd to the base of the warm milk to help it curdle and set. But I saw only milk. How was I supposed to know what was beneath it? So the water boiled and the potatoes floated and the milk stared at the blue sky above and nothing was cooked. I think it took me half an hour or a good 45 minutes to figure that it was all wrong and I sat in one corner of the kitchen and burst into tears, with the maid rolling on the floor and laughing, holding her sides. M walked in just in time to see me shoving everything into the garbage and the milk down the drain. He had this inexplicable look of horror.  He didnt know how to react- because if he laughed I would kill him and if he even tried to get angry, God help him. So he did the next best thing- called my mum in law and told her to keep lunch ready for us and off we went. I spent the next few days learning how to make sabji, dal and chawal- all put into the pressure cooker together and steamed to a pulp. Atleast we had food. M should be bloody thankful for that!!!