Update on the happenings at Chez Shenoy

It's a still life water color
Of a now late afternoon
As the sun shines through the curtain lace
And shadows wash the room
And we're toiling in the kitchen
Cast in our ignorance
About stuff that can be ate
Not in cans but off a plate
Lost in Tarla's recipe books
And how this cheese to grate.

And he reads his Sanjeev kapoor
And I that Jaffrey dame
As he wipes his brow with grated cheese
And roasts his pinkie in the flame

I'm on the floor with laughter
This better than a Mr Bean
Funnier than a clown
A Chaplin, only brown

Lost in tarla's recipe books
And how this cheese to grate


How did you like that? Last weekend we made a risotto, that is, Naren did. I assisted, chopping the vegetables and laying out the ingredients, comprising primarily of butter and cheese. If the risotto is the US, butter and cheese are the African-American and the White Caucasian populations respectively. Onions are the Hispanic community and garlic would be the Asians. The high-in-fibre ingredients would be represented by, let me see, the Inuit population? I kept reminding Naren about his triglycerides number which, unlike the Dow-Jones, is going up-up-up. Don't nag me, he snarled back. Nag? Me? But I did not take issue because he had managed to roast his little finger in the gas flame just then, a circumstance that always brings out the beast in man. Let it blow over, I decided and bided my time. Nag, did you say buster? Let's see! That's all. Let's see!

Anyway, the risotto was eventually done. The rice, like the walls of the kitchen and the hair on my husband's head, was evenly covered with butter, cheese, onions, mushrooms, tomatoes, garlic, pepper and several finely chopped unidentified vegetables. It tasted wonderful. Maybe I'll forgive him for calling me a nag, after all!