For a soup starting, you might want to know two things during the due course of this write-up.One – who Kylie Kwong originally is.Well though I take the liberty of presuming you know who she is, just in case you don’t, can you set a reminder on ‘travel & living’ in your television to watch the Kylie Kwong show very next time it's featured. Two – This write-up is not on her but about my In-house Kylie Kwong.For having read In-house,it's very natural for you to have assumed that it's about either of the damsel's at my home but as a disappointing revelation, it’s my dad. Mm ...this write-up is serving me as a frying pan to sprout all that's stacked in, on my in-house Kylie Kwong.
It all started years back, like a kind gentleman who gave his sweet wife a helping hand at the kitchen during few needy hours. Be it making a simple omelet for the kids or scooping out idllis in to a hot pack. Slowly he took over the kitchen during weekends, sometimes trying his hand all three times a day. Ignorantly we began to be the victims of his stints at the kitchen table. When he was a tyro, his so called creative dishes like oil less bonda & nutty gritty upma (full of awful combinations of non bendable nuts than heaps of sooji itself) were tested on us ruthlessly.Honestly we weren't realizing what we were slipping in to.'What a wonderfully understanding man to whom you are married'have heard many say this to the deserving lady, not knowing what we all really underwent. In the hustle-and-bustle of those busy growing up years, it was great having something ready to eat, at the very mention of hunger pangs at work. He pride fully played the role of an instant chef to all three of us deriving dishes out of no where. Again years rolled by when one day I realized it's this very man behind my inability to even make a decent cup of tea. During my little leisure hours at home, whenever I look forward to try something at the kitchen, I already find him chopping and stirring something in his culinary lab. I simply joined the cookery class in my junior college when I had an optional elective, the only way that was left to kick start my culinary skill.Due to lack of opportunities and a lab space to experiment and learn during those zestful years, I cannot honestly claim myself as a good cook even today. No one might know my real story behind the forbidden kitchen. After graduation I left home, spent years as paying guest at another home & my story of denied cooking opportunities continued further.During this time, back at home there came a point when mom was advised not to strain by standing even for those continuous minutes that was required in the kitchen. Which is when the Kylie Kwong at home was literally born, I presume. So the entire kitchen came under his complete kingdom. Initially we mistakenly pitied him for having to undergo this. He received accolades from every kith n kin for juggling this extra ball in his life when he could have found easy alternatives. But slowly we all were getting the signs.
Apart from being a man of near perfectionist,his interest in following current affairs,comprehending precise reason behind every rise and fall in stock market and being a wealth of information to anyone, anytime on anything and everything, his ardent passion for Chinese kooking and the urge to possess a fully equipped gadget kitchen, surfaced evidently. The best chef's cookery shows in the television were handpicked & been watched without fail. During his preliminary stages in the kitchen it was Mallika Badrinath.A graduation happened when he was fantasizing Sanjeev Kapoor. Then suddenly in the recent years he advanced with his new found guru Kylie Kwong. You can just find joy bubbling on his face at the very mention of her name.There is no question of missing her kookery shows come what may. He makes careful observations on every cookery tip that spills out of her mouth. May be Kwong is dad's twin or master soul, it set me thinking. The remote tightly clutched signaled that nothing else could even be thought of watched at those hours. While dad virtually lives in the world of 'Kylie Kwong & her kooking' during her shows, moms eyes stay focused only on him and his expressions.Gradually off Kylie Kwong shows we saw her in him. Minutes after KK's kooking ends on TV, he energizes himself to be the KK in kitchen. He pounds garlic with the same zest, chops veggies in the same style and sprinkles spices just like her.Gradually he kick started kooking his own Kwong kind of food, half cooked, half watery, half Indian, half Chinese, half edible & the rest absolutely inedible. These days whether what he cooks is Chinese or Indian, his Chinese herbs & spices are ubiquitous. And those awful soups that he learnt from Kwong.Oh my Chinese god … I feel a puking sensation churning in my stomach at the very mention of it.
The kitchen too underwent a gradual revamp as per KK’s weekly suggestions and tips. There was this same kind of mini glass jars cloning itself in an alarming rate on the kitchen shelves. Then these puzzling Chinese herbs one after the other found their entry in those jars. Some puzzling & others awfully aromatic. From where and when he fetches them, we really don't know. Then the oil cans underwent a super rich look with pods of garlic and red chillies soaked in them. Then the spoons, some interestingly shaped vessels & most importantly, the knives. Now we have at least 10 different varieties of knives at home. One for the huge kinds like watermelon n pumpkin, the handy flat ones for meat and fish, thin one for onions & tomatoes, cross one for dicing vegetables,sleek one for slicing them and another one for chopping them finely. For years many we lived without a peeler. We now have one from US, one from Far East & one from local Chinese market. Scissors to cut & curl the corianders and curry leaves. A sharp one, a blunt one, a semi sharp and a semi blunt as if catering to the needs of a wedding kitchen. You know, anyone from abroad visiting home have no confusion on what to pick for dad. It will be some latest kitchen gadget or an accessory. The gift unwrapping moment will definitely be his moment of ecstasy. He still gets international additions in the kitchen this way.He decided that our kitchen too, had the essential of essentials as per Kwong by exactly replicating what he saw in her Kitchen. Following that the kitchen obtained a face lift with newly bought microwave, instant juice blender, silent coffee blender, feather touch hand mixer, egg poacher, egg beater, variety of ladles in new shapes n sizes, colorful frying pans, zodiac coffee mugs, trendy glass bowls, airtight containers, vodka martini glasses(though we are all purely nonvodka folks), variety of strainers, handy lemon squeezer, elegant measuring jars, the handy mortar & it’s complementary pestle, auto ignition stove and this list goes endless.Then the must have stocks in the kitchen – again as per Kwong, I presume, like the colorful Chinese sauces, mashed potato powder, multiple flavors of brown & green teas, handy herbs,nourishing nuts and plenty of super secret spices half of which I bet has nothing to do in an otherwise bland cooking south Indian home like mine.
ooff....nobody at home is spared of his kooking. Come weekends still he continues with his signature dishes. Needless to say, these days its tailor made Chinese for some pitiable Indians at home. For many weekends now, it's been the same huge thick soupy vegetable stocks in which soaked, all left over veggies in fridge, stirred in to the biggest bowl at home, for some of which mom who would have had plans in the coming week. Keeping which crowd he prepares in such huge quantity week after week, god only knows. When it’s aromatically Indian, the taste definitely will have his Chinese touch. And during weekends when it’s aromatically Chinese, we can’t blindly bet on an Indian taste. We are left with no choice but to aid finishing it by the end of every weekend. Otherwise, the signature dish will be secretly refrigerated in its upper deck and will show up the following weekend for the kind of rich ingredients and flavors that had gone in.Mom lost her say longtime back when it comes to her now forbidden kitchen. And so did I. Only during those rare occurrences when he isn’t home during weekends, mom makes some authentic south Indian delicacy for me. Hands down she deserves a place in heaven just for this. When her man returns home on such days, his tempting hands try tarnishing such authentic food with his KK recommended spices to leave them inauthentic, in his new found style. Interesting to dad but insulting to mom sometimes my neighbors aware of his regular weekend signature dishes, would plan to take a portion of it to get rid of their weekend cooking plans. And the post week, they would peep in to applaud him for his effort. Mom would feel like dashing herself against one of that kitchen accessory. Since every atom in the kitchen is his favorite, he is so possessive about even a box or a cup lent to the neighbor. Here comes mom’s embarrassing moments when she has to track these missing items just for him.
Looks like i have revealed too many things about mommy's man.On her humble request, am letting the curtain down here but not without mentioning our Mango phobic memories. When I was in sixth grade, once he had a compulsive urge to make a bottle of mango pickle himself even without a tip from anyone around. His sis, a pickle expert in the family too was ignored from consulting. On a bright sunny Saturday morning, he decided to drop us all in schools and was on his mission - buying mangoes aptly for his pickle proceedings. To his delight since the mangoes were aptly ripe for pickling, he landed home with a tub full of mangoes. They were washed,sliced and pickled finally. To his disaster surprise he realized that he added salt to his generosity.Nothing could be done since the pickles were in huge portions bottled and found all over the kitchen. Mom instructed us to consume curd rice - salt + dad's disaster pickle for the whole summer vacation. At the end of vacation only ten percent of the pickle got over. We were the perfect victims of that disaster pickle until the next summer vacation. During this time, mausi visited us to stay for a fortnight. This pickle story came to her notice and she recommended adding some more mangoes, in a way by adding salt to our existing injurious mangoes. We lived with this disastrous pickle for another year. During the third summer vacation, when the pickle tasted decent enough as a pickle, mom clicked on this idea of gifting everybody who visited home, a bottle of his disaster pickle. You know we lived with this pickle for almost three full years. If you ask me, until now these ‘not so easy to forget’ pickle episode had been his best worst experiment on us.
Just in case you feel all this might be a fictitious exaggeration,you definitely got to be home for a weekend to risk your taste buds at least once. These days while dining outside with friends,I can’t get much wilder at the very mention of some one suggesting a Chinese hangout.Oops this isn't getting better ... let me sign-off but with a small suggestive note for you. After all this if you plan to drop by for a lunch or dinner at my place, specially on a weekend,u have a bravery award waiting from this house of kk, though not from kk himself.
