“I liked eggplant long before Atiya ever did,” complains Amani, my eldest. In my kitchen, eggplant fuels simmering sibling jealousy over a pot of shared taste. The rivalry started when they were young with Bengali Eggplant Bhaji. Sliced eggplant fried in a combination of spices and mixed with rice delivers a simple taste though a… Read More Bittermelons and Brownies: How to Eat Eggplant
Life boils over like daal. It is eventually, inevitable. You can put a wooden spoon across the top of the pot, add salt (risking chewy lentil soup) and do other tricks, regardless assume you will have to clean the stove after cooking a pot of lentils. Sometimes like a pot of boiling daal our lives… Read More Bittermelons and Brownies: How to Eat Lentils (Daal)
It used to be general practice for South Asian mom’s to hand-feed their children rice until they developed the dexterity to eat on their own. I continued that practice with my own kids by mixing the various curries with their rice and shaping small sized globes of rice. When they got to be three or… Read More Bittermelons and Brownies: How to eat a good bite (lokma)
Brownies represent the alter ego of bittermelons. Instead of embracing the bitter, brownies challenge us to endure the abundance of sweetness. Brownies with a hint of roasted bitterness and bittermelon bhaji with a hint of roasted sweetness operate like a dynamic gastronomic yin-yang. Most taste and encounters with others happen within this range. Sweetness and… Read More Bittermelons and Brownies: How to Eat Brownies
No taste assaults us more than bitterness. Unlike our mammalian instinctive attraction to sweetness, a love for bitter is learned. It used to be standard practice that every Bengali mid-day meal would begin with bittermelon. Bengali children learn to swallow bitterness, some eventually grow to enjoy it but at some point all have to learn… Read More Bittermelon and Brownies: How to Eat Bittermelons
To my younger daughter Atiya, adjusting to a new chopped and blended family; I suggested four specific strategies beyond the injunction to be a strong independent woman. While Amani was born as I completed my degree in architecture where strength and uniqueness were primary virtues, Atiya was born during my graduate work in philosophy. In… Read More Bittermelons and Brownies – A recipe for growing Atiya
Everyday I find myself astonished and humbled by the infinite recipes for eating and living. My experience in architecture, philosophy, yoga and food has blended into a strange kaleidoscopic lens adjusting awareness, responsibility and joy in every interaction. I see cooking as transformative, as an event that helps me to take the other in, to… Read More Bittermelons and Brownies: A recipe to grow myself
Introduction: There are no recipes for Living I begin with a disclaimer. I don’t follow recipes and nor do I expect you to. It is ironic of me to write a “cookbook.” I prefer expressed irony to hidden hypocrisy. Irony is funny, inquisitive and open to other perspectives. Hypocrisy is not. These loose “recipes” are… Read More Bittermelons and Brownies: Introduction
I wrote the first few chapters of “How to Eat Bittermelons and Brownies – Recipes from Philosopher Mom,” in anticipation of my first-born, Amani’s college graduation. As I prepare for my last-born, Atiya’s high school graduation this school year, I thought it would be therapeutic for me to add to the previous cookbook. In a… Read More How to Eat Bittermelons and Brownies – Recipes from a Philosopher Mom (Preface)
“…there was a tradition called Amani, according to which the woman of the house would, the night before, soak rice and the twig of a mango tree in a pot of water and on the morning of the new year, sprinkle it on everyone of the family. This was based on a magical belief that… Read More “…there was a…
The Hungry Philosopher 