KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 26 — I miss my childhood.
Not that being a grown-up has been any less exhilarating.
What I actually miss is the flurry of excitement that the weekend brought as we packed for two nights away at my maternal grandparent’s house in Kampung Pandan.
My mother, Renumathi, is the third of 10 children born to my grandparents — Suppiah and Visalatchi. Since everyone settled within the Klang Valley, my cousins and I spent almost every weekend and school holidays at our grandparents house.
At any one time, there were easily 15 to 25 of us cramped in a half-brick half-wooden five- bedroom single-storey house. A house my grandparents had lived in for more than 60 years. Invading my younger aunts’ closets and beauty essentials were an added joy.
My grandmother, my pathi, always wore sarees. In that six-yard wonder, she could single handedly manage the whole lot us without any help and cook up a four-course meal for lunch, have time to prep for tea and end the day with a simple dinner. But that’s a story for another day.
Coming back to the second best thing my pathi is known for — apart from her lovely cotton sarees — was her amazing skill in the kitchen.
My cousins will swear that nothing soothes the tired soul the way our pathi’s rich sambar did; that there are no parallels to her peppery crab rasam on a rainy day; and there is no better way of welcoming Fridays than with thanisar and stingray sambal on Thursdays.
For the best part, there was always food. No one went home with an empty stomach. Even at an ungodly hour, no one was turned back.
But on my pathi’s passing 13 years ago, weekly reunions became occasional monthly visits, and eventually get-togethers were down to just once a year... if someone takes the trouble to organise one.
Thankfully my amma and my aunts have inherited her graciousness and her talent.
A decade on, I figured the best way to preserve my memory of my pathi would be by indexing her recipes before everything is wiped out from my mother’s mental hard drive — which has been showing signs of overuse and age (my mother just turned 64 this year).
I am not sure if I am equally gifted but I do love to cook when I’m not too preoccupied. Instead of starting with something simple I decided to try my hand at my pathi’s famous mutton peretal — a dry stir-fried spiced meat dish.
I have a well-stocked kitchen as my amma cooks daily and I have access to a beautiful herb garden, courtesy of my dad. All I had to do was get the mutton and get cracking. How hard could it be?
I am no novice in the kitchen; my family and friends love the pastas I conjure under an hour, my poached eggs and scones are close to perfection. So, mutton peretal should be fairly easy.
I was wrong.
My amma, who makes a pretty kick ass version of the dish, decides on how much chilli or coriander powder based on her intuition. Imagine my horror when I found out there were no precise measurements.
There’s a lot at stake here, I began this endeavour to preserve the nostalgia attached to my pathi’s dishes, but how will I be able to achieve it without a precise recipe? And I was cooking for her daughter (my mother, who is the toughest to please in the whole lot).
It didn’t help that I got amma all riled up because earlier in the day I had promised her that she could kick back and relax while I slogged in the kitchen. Much to amma’s chagrin, she had to guide me throughout.
We got on with the preparation and amma had to step in whenever I needed to photograph every step of the prep and cooking. Yes, I had to take photos, I am part of Gen Y after all.
And to our pleasant surprise, it was alright. Though the meat needed more time in the pressure cooker (another awesome gadget, a prerequisite in every Indian household).
The spices came together nicely and brought back beautiful memories… the only thing missing was my path being actually there.
I had hoped for a semblance of the fuzzy and warm feeling I felt as a child with every mouthful my pathi fed us while we were seated on the floor around her listening to her stories.
I’m glad I started this project, and hopefully I will be able to compile more of her recipes soon
Mutton Peretal
Ingredients:
600g mutton, cut into small chunks, washed.
To marinade:
4 candlenuts, ground
1 tsp ground poppy seeds
1 1/2 tsp ginger paste
2 tsp garlic paste
1/2 tsp fennel powder
1/2 tsp cumin powder
3 tsp chilli powder (heaped)
1 tbsp coriander powder
1 tsp ground black pepper
1 bay leaf
salt to taste (I used about 1 tsp)
To sauté:
3 tbsps cooking oil
1/2 cinnamon stick
3 cardamoms pods
4 cloves
1 1/2 whole cumin
2 star anise
3 stalks of curry leaves
2 large onions, diced
2 mediums-sized tomatoes (optional — sweetens the dish)
To garnish:
Three stalks of coriander leaves and a handful of mint leaves, chopped
Method:
1. Combine the meat and the marinade ingredients, and let it sit at room temperature for about two hours.
2. Transfer the marinated meat to the pressure cooker, and cook on high flame till about two whistles, then reduce to medium for 15 to 20 minutes or up to about eight or nine whistles.
3. Once the mutton is done, set aside and allow the cooker to cool. NEVER open the cooker immediately as it could explode. If time is a concern, try pressing the vent or valve down to let the pressure escape.
4. When it cools, check if the meat is done. If it is tough, you can cook it for a little longer in the wok. There should be considerable amount of liquid in the cooker. Do not discard.
5. In a wok (or a large enough non-stick or heavy-bottomed pan), heat oil and saute the cinnamon stick, cardamom pods, cloves, whole cumin and star anise till fragrant.
6. Add chopped onions and curry leaves, cook till it softens, not till it browns.
7. Transfer the mutton (with the liquid) from the cooker to the wok, and stir the meat with the sauteed onions and spices.
8. Cook till the liquid in the dish reduces to the desired consistency. Taste the meat before adding more salt.
9. Garnish with chopped coriander. Serve with rice.
Note: As my grandmother had to manage a very big household, nothing went to waste. She would add cooked rice to the wok, after transferring out the dish, and fry the rice in the remnants (top it up with a little mutton peretal for added bite) — which we have come to fondly refer to as sathi sooru loosely translated as wok rice. Usually, the sathi sooru never makes it to the lunch table.
