Kozhukkatta lessons

This happened a couple of years ago.

I was just out of college, working in Pune then, and staying with a friend. One Sunday, I woke up quite early and sipping my morning tea was lazily surfing the web. My browser homepage was set to amritapuri.org and the “Thought for the moment” was something to the effect of “Even to lift a finger, one needs God’s grace”. “So I see”, I thought carelessly and went on..

Being a Sunday, I thought I’d prepare some kaara kozhukkataa ( savoury steamed rice balls had as a breakfast / snack in Tamil Nadu ).It would be a nice surprise for my friend who was still sleeping. It would also serve to flaunt my culinary skills, I thought!  I googled up some cookery sites and found out the “authentic way” to prepare kozhukattais. Luckily, all the ingredients were at home, so I was all set to go.

Enthusiastically, I went on to Step1 – Prepare the dough.

With even more enthusiasm, Step 2 – Chop onions and chillies and fry them

Step 3 – Mix them into the kneaded dough –  that I did.

By now, my friend had woken up to the tempting aroma of rice flour and fried onions and was all praises for me. And I felt rather elated.

Step 4 – Make small balls. They looked so deliciously cute.

Now, I suddenly had a naughty idea… to test the “Thought for the moment” I read earlier. Does Amma’s grace really need to be there to do this last step of steaming these balls? I have nothing to do here now. I will drop them into the pressure cooker to gently steam them and there they would be !

Step 5 – Steam the balls – I arranged them neatly into the steamer plate and placed them inside the cooker. I had checked the amount of water. Everything seemed perfect.

I closed the cooker with confidence and went on to switch on the TV to catch up with the latest box office hits. I will now have to wait for 5 minutes for my little kozhukattais to be ready to serve!!!

A shrill whistle of the cooker jolted me in a couple of minutes time… Oh no!!!!! I had forgotten to remove the stopper from the cooker lid… I sprang off the couch, dashed into the kitchen, quickly switched off the stove and desperately tried to get the pressure off by lifting the stopper… I opened the cooker to see my little to-be-kozhukkattas all in a mess of white paste..

It was disheartening, but suddenly the thought struck me. With the cooker lid still in hand, and disappointment in my face, I looked at Amma’s photograph in my kitchen – Her eyes seemed to have a naughty twinkle and I just burst out laughing…. My friend thought I was laughing at what had happened to my kozhukattaas.

A messy lesson indeed, but definitely well taught!!

– Anuradha