Under Pressure

I've been attempting South Indian cooking, which is very different from North Indian cooking, and no wheres near American cooking.  I would venture to say that I'm a fairly good cook at home; I know some good recipes and can improvise, etc.  Those skills are useless here.  At home, one has a certain amount of culinary autonomy.  In Chennai, either it's made the right way, or the wrong way.  Certain spices dont mix with certain vegetables, certain vegetables dont mix with other vegetables, and dont even ATTEMPT to put potatoes in your Sambar!

At work everyone eats lunch together and shares everything.  Its like a potluck everyday, it's fun.  But that means that whatever you bring to work is going to be scrutinized.  The first time I cooked food from scratch for work I was pretty excited and confident about it, until Mani opened the lid and laughed.  He didn't even need to taste it, he could tell it was wrong just by looking.  Despite hearing the same simple recipe (Moong Dal) from almost everyone at the office, I managed to F it up!  No worries, they said, Geetha (our office tea lady) would fix it.  And once she did, everyone enjoyed my creation.

The office felt my cooking would benefit from a pressure cooker, yes, I should definitely get one if I'm going to continue to cook here.  But then they went on to tell me nightmare stories about how pressure cookers can explode and people can get hurt or burned.  Oh, but not to worry, you'll be fine, you just have to put in the exact correct amount of water and cook it the correct amount of time and then wait a while before opening it.  How do you know the correct amount?  Well, that depends on what you're cooking.

So the next day, Ramki, my boss, gave me one of his many pressure cookers (why does he have so many pressure cookers???).  I wanted to cook chick peas, which are mainly sold dried here.  Pressure cooker magically allows you to skip the overnight soaking and still get soft beans, rice, or lentils in a short amount of time.  Despite my fears, and all the warning stickers on the box, I followed the instructions and put one vessel peas to 2.5 vessels water into the pressure cooker.  I sealed the lid and put it on the flame.  I went about the rest of my business, all the while keeping a watchful eye on the cooker. 

After a few minutes the pressure cooker started making some pretty scary hissing noises.  As the noises got louder, all those stories of explosions filled my thoughts and I immediately left the kitchen and called Jacob (think Elf calling his dad 'cause the radiator was making hissing noises).  He said it was normal, but I was still scared.  I stood by the door and awaited the whistle.  When the pressure builds up inside to a certain point, the steam lifts the weight on top of the cooker and the whole thing whistles.  I thought it was going to be like a tea kettle whiste, but this was more like a cartoon train whistle, complete with a big release of steam.  Every time the pot whistled, I jumped; it scared the shit out of me and I couldn't wait for this anxiety to end! 

After the sixth whistle, I ran into the kitchen, turned off the stove and ran back out.  But just 'cause the stove is off, does not mean the danger is over, most pressure cooker accidents happen upon opening.  I think I must have waited an hour before opening it, not because I was scared, but more because I actually forgot I was still cooking!  The peas came out nice, and at work I was happy to see some people even took second helpings.

Im getting used to the pressure cooker, and it's definitely a time saver, allowing me to cook complete meals after my morning run and before I go to work, but the whistle still scares me!  This morning when I was cooking, I heard the familiar whistle sound, but it didn't come from my cooker.  Suddenly I realized that all my neighbors around me were also using their pressure cookers to cook their meals for the day.  What a wonderful place to live, I thought.