Dinnertime, perhaps Sunday. Just as I get up to rinse my
empty plate.
“This young student of mine, she brought me a packet of
dried mushrooms from Kashmir/Himachal.”
I stare.
Nani repeats herself. Tells me it’s in her purse.
I continue to stare. Predictably, she stares back.
Finally, yours truly, “Wow. Okay. That’s really nice of her.
So you’ve been hauling these mushrooms in your purse all day?”
“Yes. Get me my purse. Let’s see what we can do with them.”
I did well not to laugh. Certain expectations would be
awesome to have met.
“But I don’t know if there’s some specific way of cooking
these, they look different. I’ll look it up
online. See if you can think of something.”
Consider it done, Nani.
- - -
While I
usually can put together a decent meal, I was recently required to respond to “No
seriously, have you ever made
anything good?” Fair question, since the asker is invariably on the receiving
end of worst-case-scenario versions of my impromptu jugaad-heavy dishes (apologies, heartfelt as always), but really not
one you want to consider in all seriousness.
Come Tuesday,
it’s way past breakfast hours. Since I’m hungry and it isn’t noon yet, let’s think
breakfast hours anyway. I decide to cook; mushrooms on my mind. I genuinely
thought fixing breakfast might help recover from the affront to my skills. No
room for performance anxiety and/or bad omens since I’d only be cooking for
myself. More importantly, I could leisurely discover whether those “different” looking
mushrooms were any fun at all.
I’ll spare you
the cheap suspense. The mushrooms did
look different. The packet contained thin longitudinal slices that eventually browned
and shrivelled up into small, dull, twisted scraps. Shades of brown and black. Some even had a rind-like outline. Interesting
enough to look at, I suppose. Cooking some with eggs took all of fifteen
minutes, and that suited me just fine. The first spoonful was funny, not quite what I expected. A few more confirmed that these scraps were nothing like
regular mushrooms! Elaborate rambling recipe below.
You will
need:
- Eggs, 2, whisked with about 2 tbsp milk, and as much chilli powder, salt and pepper as you fancy. Whisking with a fork will work out better than with a spoon.
- Tomato, 1 small, cut however you like.*
- Mushrooms! As many scraps as you like, more the merrier and such. I’m pretty sure I was close to a dozen.
- Cheese, 1 slice. Because it’s available. Don’t be weird bothering with a knife now.
- Green chilli, 1 diced, if you want. Yeah of course this was an impromptu jugaad-heavy dish. Getting inspired by the bare minimum you can find in your fridge is key.
- Oil, enough to sauté your tomatoes in.
The
cooking part of things:
- Heat the oil, medium flame, add tomatoes. Feel like a fancy chef as you move them around. Add mushroom, move things around some more. Now’s also the time to add those green chillies and any other stir-fry-able things you have lying around. Please don’t wait for your tomatoes to get mushy or for other things to blacken.
- Once the scraps of mushrooms have softened, pour in the soupy egg mix. It’ll taste better than it looks.
- The translucent eggy bits will begin to turn opaque, that’s when you tear your slice of cheese into pieces and space them out all over the eggs and veggies. See, no knife required.
- To turn your snack into a chunky omelette, reduce flame and cover with a lid, perhaps leaving some room for steam to let out. Check every now and then, I really doubt there’s a defined timeframe for this kind of thing. Consider flipping over your omelette once the base comes together and the top isn’t all runny. Once done, cheer or curse as is appropriate.
For a scrambled eggs version, something I approve of, you really just keep scrambling. Lid off, obviously. Don’t allow chunks of egg to stick to the bottom forever. Have patience; let things cook. - Now is a good time to realise you’d like some buttered toast to go with this. You could just finish cooking this stuff and risk having it cool down a bit while you fix the toast – or you could let it simmer while you put the toaster to use. I’m sorry the butter is all hard, you should’ve thought of this sooner.
- Shut out any new ideas. Load everything on a plate, fix yourself a glass of water/juice/whatever if you like, pick up your fork (please at least rinse the one with which you whisked the eggs) and evenly spear mushroom, tomato and egg.
- Grin as the fork moves from plate to mouth. Picture the most hilarious things that could happen with funny mushrooms from the Himalayas.
- Tell me if those cooked mushrooms taste odd, kinda sweet. Like apples from a healthy orchard.
Mine did.
