KAHIHI

I’m not a health conscious person and as such not a calorie or weight conscious. Having been able to maintain constant weight proportional to my height, I don’t have any ailments either. It happens naturally in my case. I don’t make any efforts for that. I have a sweet tooth and eat as much sweet as I feel like, without a trace of fear for diabetes. I don’t do any exercise but to walk in the evenings. I can’t get up before sunrise though I’m no more a nocturnal creature now. I read till late nights instead. There is no restriction of any kind on my eating habits. I can easily gulp couple of vada-paavs or deep fried samosas without any fear. Only thing is that I’m strictly choosy about the friers, the calorie sellers and their selection of oil pulls.

In short, I can be labelled as more of a careless fellow than carefree due to the façade of my behaviour. For all this, I am grateful to my genes. There isn’t a single case of obesity in any of our generations of the past.

Even so I thank the University of California, Davis and the National Center for Food Safety and Technology, Illinois Institute of Technology for their research that people can include potatoes in their diet and still lose weight. This research was presented at the Obesity Society’s 28th Annual Scientific Meeting held during October 8-12, 2010.

The lead researcher Dr. Britt Burton-Freeman, PhD, MS. said, ‘There is no evidence that potatoes, when prepared in a healthful manner, contribute to weight gain. In fact, we are seeing that they can be part of a weight loss program.’ Forget about the research process and the high glycemic index. You’d read it soon when it starts appearing in the newspapers.

Covered on three sides by creek and fourth by sea shore, our childhood was blessed with wholesome diet of fresh fish and red rice that infused in us rich quantities of proteins. It suffices till date, I presume. Mumbai made me vegetarian due to its stinking fish. I feel the stink because I’ve eaten fish lifted straight from a creek or sea unlike the stored frozen sea food eaters of Mumbai. My mother and her brother never ate fish in Mumbai even when it was Bombay and though Bombay duck was famous and not available in our coastal village on the Goa-Maharashtra boundary. I pity the boaster fish eaters, especially in Mumbai. The sea water is polluted everywhere far beyond Mumbai shores and fish get injected with the stink.

It can be deciphered like this – Those who haven’t seen “Lawrence of Arabia” and “The Secret of Santa Vittoria” carefully, will always think Sholay to be a great movie. Or those who have not seen Al Pacino in “Scarface” will always fancy that Amitabh Bachchan as Vijay Dinanath Chauhan in “Agneepath” is great. Such illusions have developed over years and now have taken a form of truth.

Quite similarly, it’s never possible for those who have rejoiced on ice-stored dead stuff to know the real savour of the fresh water fish.

Now what other than a potato can a vegetarian can eat? In any form – boiled, cooked or fried. I am a have been a potato bhakta since ages.

In Irani hotels I’ve eaten dishfuls of potato finger chips with ‘as-much-as-you want’ tomato sauce in college days, with a pani-kum chai after that.

In Kulkarni’s hotel, in Girgaon, I’ve gulped down plates of potato bhaji served without anything; just plain simple bhaji. It’s generally eaten with chapatti or puri. But not so with the Kulkarni’s. He served batata bhaji as a special dish like bhajji plate or batata vada, unwaveringly. Those who ridiculed him before tasting his obstinate dish gulped their words along with the batata bhaji silently. With second dish they started loving Girgaon’s Kulkarni.

And who’d forget the most loved and popular Sunday morning Maharashtrian special dish. Batata-poha. I’ve been cherishing it since I was a toddler. Miss a Sunday and I’m uneasy like an addict not getting his intoxicating dose at a certain time. But crown on this all, is my home made batatyachi kaape. It is somewhat similar to potato finger chips, except that kaape are small round slices instead of long chops, and of course tastier being fully wrapped with red chilly masala powder. I can eat one hundred slices fried like this easily at a go without anything else with, I bet, any time.

Cut the washed raw potatoes without peeling and cut them horizontally into two millimeter slices. Apply rawa (grinded rice powder) mixed with red chilly masala powder with a small sprinkle of salt. Fry both sides like a fish on tawa in a suitable dose of oil you like.