Went for a walk this evening. As I was passing a shop looked at the sign outside. It read “RG’s farm fresh salads and sandwiches! đ”. Entered the shop.
Shop Person (SP): RG’s farm fresh salads and sandwiches. What would you like to have, sir? đ Me: Two footlongs please! đ SP: What type of bread would you like? White, Wheat or Italian? Me: Not footlong bread! What is foot long, cool and chill? SP: Got you! đ You mean footlong cucumber salad, right? Me: Yep, you got that right! đ SP: What would you like with the cucumber, in the salad? Me: Tomato, parsley and basil! SP: Excellent choice. Anything else in the salad? Me: Nope, just make sure all the veggies are farm fresh đ SP: Sure, we source our veggies from The Raj Farm. Our customers think their veggies are the best! đ Me: Thank you! đ SP: Here’s something that will make you smile while I prepare the salad! đ (The shop person quickly arranged the salad veggies to form a smiley face đ) Me: That’s cool! đ
The salad was prepared quickly and handed over. One bite later I was convinced it was the most delicious salad I ever had đ
Me (in appreciation): Man, the salad is awesome! đ Thank you so much! đ SP: You are welcome đ, it’s the love that goes into growing the veggies at The Raj Farm and the care and love that goes into making each salad and sandwich at RG’s đ
Life without spice is boring. This past summer, along with other veggies and flowers, had grown some varieties of peppers too. Few days ago, I plucked couple of peppers from the backyard. They were multicolored and looked interesting, orange/saffron at the top and green at the bottom, evoking images of the Indian national flag. Placed a black peppercorn at the center (to represent the Ahoka Chakra in the flag) and took a picture đŽđŗ. Few days later the peppers had turned bright red. They were sporting a wrinkled and pocked look. Out of curiosity I cut a piece from the bottom of the red-colored pepper and popped it in my mouth. Not too hot I thought initially, for a few seconds. In the next 30 seconds my initial impression changed drastically. As the heat kicked in and burned its way, my eyes started watering, my nose was running and my hands were burning from contact with the pepper. The thought that I had lost my mojo to handle heat was very troubling to me. It’s like a body blow for a person whose job responsibilities also involve taking heat for the team. Anyways, chopped a few more pieces of the pepper, added them to the dinner dish to spice it up. The pepper must have been singing “I’m hot, hot, hot!” as it coursed through. I cleaned my hands few more times with soap before my night sleep. The morning after, my system got cleaned pretty fast. đ While taking a bath, as my fingers came in contact with my eyes the eyes started burning. I was thinking “Whoa, what was that? Is that heat from the pepper from previous night even after cleaning my hands multiple times with soap?” đĄ
To check out what pepper I had, downloaded an app only to find that the plant was generally identified as belonging to pepper family that listed cayenne, habanero etc. What the heck, I can identify a pepper myself without using an app. Even taking picture of the pepper for the app did not yield specific result. I took one pepper to work to check if any of my co-workers could identify it. Not much luck there. After googling images of peppers it seemed that my pepper came closest to Dorset Naga in appearance. That’s a super hot chili. It was somewhat comforting to my ego, if not my eyes, nose, throat and gut to learn I might have sweated over a super-hot chili pepper đ I then reached out to another co-worker from a different department who I remember mentioning about his picture on a wall of fame at a local hot wings place for finishing very spicy wings. He agreed to come to my office and have a bite of the pepper I had. I cut a piece of the pepper from the tail end for him, and I mouthed a small piece myself. His verdict: It was Trinidad Scorpion hot pepper! Another super hot chili! I was happy to hear that but not convinced, as pictures of Trinidad Scorpion peppers I had seen did not look like the pepper I had. I generally store the packet (that contain seeds I plant) or plant tags (if I buy plants) near the seeded or planted area. Next morning, braving the cold, I looked for either a packet or plant tag. Sure enough, I found a plant tag. The mystery about the identity of pepper plant was solved. It’s a ghost chili pepper (Bhut Jolokia)! Another super-hot chili pepper cultivated originally in the northeastern States of India. đ
Ghost pepper was the reigning champ from 2007 to 2011 as the spiciest chili pepper before the Trinidad Scorpions and the Carolina Reapers (and more recently Pepper X) took over the title of spiciest chili pepper. The spice level of a pepper is measured in Scoville Heat Units (SHU). For example, JalapeÃąo SHUs range from 2500-8000 SHUs. The super elite “bad boys” of the hot chili pepper world have their SHUs ranging from ~ one million SHUs or over. Ghost pepper is also a member of the “bad boys”. Man, the heat of those higher Scovilles can really be felt by every part of the body that comes in physical contact with the pepper. Talking of heat, the hottest team in Cricket World Cup currently in progress is the Indian cricket team. With 7 wins from 7 matches they are all fired up đĨand have already made it to the semis, with 2 matches still to play before the knockout stage begins. Like the ghost pepper the Indian cricket team intensity has been overwhelming other teams they have played so far. It’s as if other teams have been too stunned to respond effectively after being hit by a can of ghost pepper spray. If the Indian cricket team can maintain the form and performance enough to win it all, that will help the team exorcise the ghosts of recent World Cups where they have fallen short at the final hurdles. May the team that plays the best win. The heat is on! đĨ
Kicking off the Guilty Pleasures series with my #1 guilty pleasure: Watching food/cooking shows on TV. With the restrictions on travel in recent times I am sure everyone has sought comfort in hobbies and activities that have a comfort feel to them. In the past couple of years I have taken to watching food and cooking shows. The language of food is probably one of the most universal and nothing beats the fun of drooling over a well cooked and well presented dish đ Apart from the creativity, passion and skill of talented chefs what I like about cooking is the fact that in its own way cooking reminds of software development with the chefs bringing in different components in a way they all work well together and are presented in a eater friendly manner: in short making it a memorable user experience!
Some of the shows I have watched and enjoyed are “Beat Bobby Flay”, “Chopped”, “Diners, Drive-ins and Drives”, “Hell’s Kitchen”. Like different foods for different seasons different shows for different reasons.
“Beat Bobby Flay” features chef Bobby Flay, who is a beast in the kitchen, taking on challengers and trying to beat them at making dishes they are known best for. Majority of time Bobby emerges as a winner because he keeps it simple. Makes flavor, texture and taste as highest priority and making sure the dishes work in a cohesive manner as well as focusing on the presentation. What that calls for is time management discipline, not going in for anything overly ambitious if it increases risk. Even if it’s a dish that Bobby is not familiar with he ends up winning many a times making sure that the ingredient which is supposed to be the star of the dish does stand out while the competitors may fall into the trap of either going in for something quite ambitious or try to do too many things ending up with not enough time to present well or the star ingredient getting lost with all the other flavor profiles at work.
“Chopped” features 3 courses: Appetizer round followed by EntrÊe and finally the Dessert round. Chopped is like watching an Agile approach project at work. It’s iterative in that there are multiple courses and it’s adaptive because contestants get feedback after each round which they can use to deliver a better eating experience in subsequent rounds.
“Diners, Drive-ins and Drives” features restaurants in different parts of the country offering their own specialities. Good to see chefs that may not be very well known outside their own immediate vicinity get exposure to show their passion and creations to a wider audience. đ
“Hell’s Kitchen” and other Gordon Ramsay hosted food shows feature talented chefs offering their own creative take on different dishes with the bonus possibility of the host of throwing in some F-bombs in the show đ
What makes it a guilty pleasure for me? With the amount of food tasted by the judges not being much I always hope that no leftover food or ingredients are wasted. For the effort that goes into making the dishes and the fact that quite a few people do not have the means to afford a decent meal it would be criminal if food gets wasted. I have never experienced food insecurity but volunteering couple of times in a food pantry is enough to understand how many people may be struggling to put food on their table and the effort that goes into making food available to people who need it. It’s a humbling and learning experience đ
Hey kids, are you hungry? Raj is putting it all together, cooking something That’s been known to perk up the mood Especially when it’s cold weather He’ll kill it when it’s done, so stick around You’re gonna witness something special Encased in dough walls of round!
Say, Candy and Ronnie, have you seen it yet? Ooh, the veggies are well spaced out Oh it’s quite weird but wonderful It’s got the cheese and tomatoes It’s got the olives and bell peppers You know you saw it here first, ohh-oh R-R-R-Raj and his naan pizza creation!
– Lyrics sliced from Elton John’s “Bennie and the Jets”
đInformation for folks who have spent many a sleepless night, like me, wondering what is duck sauce made of? đ¤đ You are welcome, The Raj never ducks his responsibility đđ
As I looked out the window this morning my heart sank. The rose plant in the backyard had a trimmed look, dreams appearing to be nipped in the bud đ The culprit: Rabbit of course đĄ Tried to reason with the rabbit. This is how the conversation went.
Me: Hey rabbit, what have you done to my rose plant? Do you have an explanation for your action? Rabbit: I did what I normally do! Me: Which is? Rabbit: Doing my job! Me: And what is your job? Rabbit: What you see! Me: Eating whatever is in sight? Rabbit: Listen, you are doing your job, I am doing mine. You are trying to put food on the table, I am trying to put food into my mouth. We are both doing our jobs. Do I complain to you about how you do your job? Me: Can we work out a solution where you do your job part-time so that the plants can survive too, you still have your job and I can stay in the business of growing plants? đ The rabbit ran away before I finished what I was saying đ
I learned my lesson the hard away though. The great outdoors belong to the flora and fauna of that place. We are probably lucky to get a lease on something that doesn’t really belong to us đ
Celebrated Mother’s Day at home today with family and it was fun. To make it special and a little different we decided to go with falafel pita sandwich with the guys (me and son) actually assisting with the falafel pita sandwich making process!
The ingredients: Pita bread (whole wheat and white), hummus (store bought), avocado dip, falafel balls (home made with chickpea flour), cucumber, tomato, zucchini and onion all chopped to small pieces, cilantro cut fine, green chutney.The result: yummy!
Lest you doth protest too much saying “That ain’t no falafel pita sandwich” I say “Hey, if you can slap anything between 2 loaves of bread and can call it a sandwich why I can’t I stuff the pita bread with falafel and other sandwich wannabe ingredients and call it a falafel pita sandwich đ
P.S. It was a different day in terms of weather too. Was snowing quite hard for more than an hour. Enough for it to stick to the grass for a nice coat and force me to cover the pants or keep them inside the porch. Later when the snow had stopped it was time to unwrap the cover off the plants soon after unwrapping the lid off falafel pita sandwich đ
This morning’s breakfast turned into an Aussie revelation! Final shape of omelette looked like aerial photo of Australia after the recent bushfires. Red and black portions appeared like areas affected by bushfires covering most of the country đĻ , rest of the mainland looked yellow due to dry grass đĻ Only Tasmania seemed less affected by fire đ
Let me start with a confession: I don’t cook. Now that the confession is out of the way time to talk about what I do: I prefer to do the dishes đ Is there anything special about doing the dishes The Raj way? Yes, if you are The Raj đ Otherwise it is just a fancy way of describing a routine task đ Let’s get down to the details. Our current dishwasher has 3 racks, the top one is for cutlery, knives and other relatively flat objects used for cooking and eating. The bottom rack for the biggest dishes, pots and pans with a side basket for cutlery, the middle rack for beverage containers and room for smaller utensils. Yours truly likes to approach dishwashing as a problem solving exercise to be solved aesthetically, efficiently and completed in time before the next cooking cycle, which if it is Indian cuisine, can be quite involved. Now you know why I don’t cook đ
Talking of aesthetics I like to see symmetry and balance. If I see dishes/utensils/cutlery arranged in a haphazard way my OCD-like tendencies kick into high gear đ In the bottom rack the eating plates have to be arranged in an order of increasing or decreasing size. If there are eating plates of same size with different patterns the order in which the plates go in will be determined by # of each plate type. Also not for me dumping of cutlery in one or two of the pockets of bottom rack basket. Justice has to be done to each pocket so that they carry similar load. Objects with sharp sides like cutting knives have to go flat in the top rack to minimize chance of accidentally cutting one’s finger while setting up for wash or when removing after the wash. Spatulas and other objects that are tall and flat also have to go to the top rack.
Moving on to efficiency the idea is make proper use of all the space available in the 3 racks and the cutlery basket. What does this mean? With a 3 rack dishwasher additional rack translates into lesser height for each individual rack as the overall dimensions remain the same as 2 rack models. So, one has to recognize the possibility of the rotating fan blades below the middle rack coming in contact with taller utensils or frying pans of greater circumference. One way to minimize it by placing those in the corners where the rotating blades can’t reach. Another thing I prefer to do is to have the pointed end/sharp side of forks and eating knives facing upwards in the dish basket of bottom rack. This is to avoid gravity and sharp sides/edges carve out a nice hole at the bottom of the plastic basket đ The top rack cannot have objects bulging too much as there is a rotating fan over the top rack.
Getting dishes washed in time: In models with that are not entry level the heating coil has been replaced by a mechanism that is supposed to use the heat of the water at the bottom in a more efficient way reducing power consumption. While it makes the overall dishwashing quieter what it translates into practically is doubling up the time for entire wash cycle. What used to take 90 minutes max end to end now takes 190+ minutes of interminable wait. So, it’s better to start dishwashing prior to going to sleep.
Finally the therapeutic value of dishwashing: Doing the dishes brings its own sense of calm and relaxation. At night I can watch TV while setting them up. The process of arranging all the utensils is also akin to bringing different pieces of a solution together for one full working solution or assembling a jigsaw puzzle from pieces cluttered around. Removing the dishes the morning after the wash allows me to catch up on the weather and other news on TV briefly. Also lets me think of the tasks due at work for the day, resolution for issues in the calm of early morning after an overnight sleep. Of course before removing the clean and dry dishes they get an admiring look and yours truly self complimenting for successful project implementation đ The ultimate benefit of course is getting all the pots and pans and cutlery ready for wife to serve up piping hot, yummylicious food before leaving for work. For someone that doesn’t cook there can’t be a better reward đ
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