Gastronomic Fest @ ESADE Who said cooking ai´nt fun?

I have always admired Pari and Dharini for their unending zeal for cooking and the food fest at ESADE, called the 'Gastronomic Festival' was the culmination of their efforts. This fest was held on the 24th of November and the MBA students were given an opportunity to display their culinary skills that they inherited from their native lands. Dharini, Lagan(a full time student at ESADE) ,Pari, Rohit and I decided to show-case the Indian ´stuff´ with Tarun and Saurabh being the cheer-leaders. What followed later was simply the Indian magic at work.

The menu we decided was Roti (the quintessencial Indian Bread), Paneer (Cottage Cheese) curry, Chana Masala (Chick-pea) and Rice-Kheer (Rice pudding - the great Indian dessert). Since this was a food-fest, people were expected to taste the food rather than eat it, but the expected tasters were around 80-10; which meant that the proportionate quantity we had to cook was for atleast 25-30 people.

Since all of us are late-to-bed and late-to-rise, we started the marathon effort at around 12-30 in the noon on the day of the fest. Pari and Dharini were out with the shopping list and did most of it as well and we were all set. Rohit has this uncanny knack of making the dough so soft and well-kneaded that any baby can roll it (believe me, am not exaggerating!). So he got into the task of making dough for Rotis and in a short time we had enough dough for around 70 mid-sized rotis. At the same time, Dharini and Pari were busy stewing the curries and making the Kheer. We could all smell the aroma that emanated from the kitchen as things were being doled out. You might be wondering as to where did I fit into all of these. Well, my contribution was cutting the vegetables and aiding the main chefs in ancillary works and baking some Rotis as well.

At 6-30 in the evening, with half-an-hour left for the fest, we were still baking the Rotis, taking turns. Nevertheless, we reached the venue of the fest a trifle late and laid out the great Indian table. Lagan had ordered some Samosas as well, which added to the spice and we slowly had the visitors coming down.

There were tables laid out to represent good lot of countries. Central America, Columbia, Mexico, Spain, USA, Australia et al were serving their native delicacies and some exotic drinks. As people started to come down to our table, we explained them the dishes they were about to eat, its ingredients and its spice content. It was good fun explaining what goes into these different dishes and reminding folks to come back for the Indian dessert after they are done with all the other tables. We also roamed around the hall, tasting the food from other tables. A mocktail/cocktail was brewing in all our stomachs.

We had proof that our food was well-accepted. All of it being consumed in less than 2 hours was a testimonial to this. (Economists argue that artificial scarcity also leads to the same result..but we ignore it for now!) More concrete proofs were to follow.

At the end of the fest, we had the poll for the best food being served. Guess what, we made it to the third place! Mexico (second place) and Holland (first place) were the teams ahead of us. Nonetheless, it was a very ´satiating´ experience. Some of these memories go a long way with us!

For those few memorable ones, click here.  ¶ Monday, November 27, 2006