So let us get to basic ingredients first. Get some Besan ( Gram Flour ) and Rice flour. These things are commonly available in convenient packs. Put equal quantities of rice flour and besan in a pan. Add a little bit of water and mix it well. If you have a blender use that to mix it well. It should become a smooth mixture. Add a little bit of salt and chilli powder to the mixture.

Take 1-2 onions and chop it in fine pieces. Add that to the besan and rice flour mixture. Now let us discuss creative variations for this.

Spicy Version: You can add chopped green chillies to make it spicy. Pepper powder is another nice way to add spice. Freshly crushed pepper also makes a useful addition to this.

More vegie Version: You can make things more interesting by adding cauliflower to this mixture. It needs to be broken into small pieces. You can do that by using a grater or I prefer to do it just by crushing it using hands. Capsicum is another interesting addition. You need to chop it fine though. Finely chopped coriander or spinach/palak are also good additions to this.

So now you have a smooth mixture ready which has lot of vegies and spices based on the options you have chosen. Heat a non-stick tawa and spread the mixture on it. Shallow fry it from both sides using oil. If you want to use less oil, you can also cover it with a lid on the tawa so that steam cooks the vegies nicely. Serve it hot with green chutney or tomato sauce. You can also serve it with toasts if you are serving it as breakfast.

1. People who throw/give the leftovers immediately.

2.People who throw/give leftovers after keeping it in fridge for few days

3. People who become creative with leftovers and really eat them.

So here is a small effort to put you in type 3.

You can make some really delicious stuff with leftover Dal. Don’t blame me if you start enjoying the leftover dishes more than the regular dal.

The first easy thing to make is Dal Paranthas. Just knead them into the aata and make some yummy paranthas in your regular way. You might want to dry the dal a little bit. It usually becomes dry if you keep it open in fridge or you can just heat it a little to do that. This is a great way for making sure your kids eat dal. It is easier to convince your kids to eat stuffed paranthas ( don’t call them dal paranthas ) than healthy dal.

Now coming to the 2nd dish which will require a little bit more effort but you will feel happy with what you get back. Take a little bit of besan and put it in a kadhai. Roast it for 5 minutes. Besan will turn brown in color and you will also get a strong smell of roasted besan. Add all the leftover dal you have to the besan after you remove it from the gas. Now you can add some chopped onions and ginger to it. One or two wet bread pieces ( brown corners removed ) will also be an interesting addition. Make the resultant mixture into a aata like consistency. Taste the salt to ensure that it is fine. You can also add chopped green chillies if you want it spicy. Roll them to small balls and shallow fry them on a tava. The trick is to fry for some time, flatten it a little bit on tava and fry it again. You are going to enjoy this for sure in your breakfast or evening snacks along with some tomato sauce or green chutney.

The temptation to commit the crime was really big. We were senior most class in our small school and we thought of ourselves as kings and the idea was simple, to assert our authority and probably impress few girls also in the process. The plan was perfect – a small semi broken chair in the classroom pleading to our violent instincts to take it all the way. The idea was to simply break it into small enough pieces and throw it out of the window in our classroom. So the escape plan was also perfect as there was no signs of humanity beyond the lonely window in our 2nd floor classroom.

So what could go wrong here. But then you know, Mr Murphy did not become my friend recently. I have had a childhood relationship with Mr Murphy. We broke the chair into tiny pieces and threw each small piece out one by one. What a pleasure it was to break it and throw it. This was our way to declare freedom against the teachers we were so scared off. But to our misfortune somebody who had a small home probably half a kilometre away from our school saw some UFOs coming out of a small window. He did something which I have no idea why any sane human being who has a job will do. He collected all the wooden pieces and brought it to the principal of our school. He also figured out the class from where these UFOs originated. We were caught red handed.

The punishment was swift and embarrassing. We were made to stand in the sun and since the principal could not figure out who did the crime, he punished the entire class. We representing the senior most class standing in the sun and all the small kids around asking us why we were standing like that. Only if earth could break up, I would have gone underground and hid my face.

But then after some time fairer sex was getting too concerned about loosing fairness in the bright and hard hitting sun. So they stuck a deal. The girls in our class told the principal all the people who were involved in the act and they escaped the punishment. Four of us were named by them and I was also part of the list. Others who were also listed were Samrendra, Dalbir and Vikas( I am not sure of all the names although). Our punishment continued and we spent the entire day enjoying the sun.

So girls of my school, if you happen to read this now, I just wanted to let you know that I have forgiven you for this. I can understand the fascination for fair skin. Fair and Lovely was not so popular during 1980s. Anyways if we end up meeting, I am sure you can at least buy lunch for a non-alcoholic and vegetarian me to make up for the calories lost.

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The session started with usual fight about what to make first. Everybody had a different starting point. We adopted a democratic approach to break the deadlock. The dark chocolate won the battle to my surprise. I never thought that kids will be fond of slightly bitter tasting chocolate. We decided to mix some apples to the chocolates. Small diced pieces. We melted the chocolate in microwave and mixed the apples once it was molten. Then we just put them on a steel plate which was greased a little bit with ghee to ensure that that chocos don’t stick. And here they go to deep freezer or at least that is what I thought. Everybody was so keen on opening it after every few seconds that it tested the Samsung quick freeze technology to it’s limits. As soon as I took the chocos, I was just ambushed by all the kids. An empty plate is all I was left with within a span of 30 seconds. The scene repeated multiple times when we made white chcolate with corn flakes, milk chocolate with cashews and coffee.

Besides the chocos we managed to make some cheesy potatoes on our grill. Thinly sliced potatoes grilled to make them crispy and the a little bit of cheese over them before serving.

This was the last day of the session and my initial nervousness had transformed to sheer joy. It was fun to work with so many enthusiastic kids and get them interested in creative art of cooking.

Lot of pushing and pulling. Somebody wanted a combo of Mirinda and Thums Up while some other kid wanted just ice cream. When there is so much of ice cream and soft drink around, some of it got to go to the floor also. Anyway we came back to Bhel Puri after that. We moved on to doing some yummy Papdi Chaat after that. The next thing was Aloo Chaat made using green chutney. The chutney was a little bit spicy and all the kids found an excuse to have more soft drinks. Chaat Masala and Kala Namak added amazing twist to all the chaats.

The next thing on the agenda was Mint Julep. Let me accept it that it was my first time making it. I was pretty nervous on how it will taste. But it came out really well and the best part was kids also loved it and multiple refills. The only problem with all these juices was that enough got spilled on the floor. I also loved the taste and planning to add this to my restaurant menu.

The end of the day discussions included revision of all the items and also a little bit of home work. I asked all the kids to ask their parents their favorite dish so that I can teach them how to make it.

PS:

1. These cooking lessons were part of the summer camp organized by Noah’s Show.

2. The cleaning lady needs my apologies again.

That is when tragedy stuck us. No power and electric grill can not work. You have noisy kids in front of you and you got to act first. We soon moved our action upstairs where we had access to a gas. Now the next challenge was to make sure that we keep kids away from gas and hot tawas. I had to resort to a little bit of shouting to ensure that kids maintain safe distance from gas and hot tawa. We changed our plans and instead of making Panner Tikka and grilled Baby corn, we decided to make Vegetable Kababs on tawa. The kids were waiting for it to get them and they were putting so much pressure on me to cook it quickly. The chaos started as soon as the first round of kabas came out. They were finishes within a minute and everybody was shouting to get more. I had to use two burners to do it faster.

By the time we were done with Kababs, the power came back and we resumed the action on the grill. The problem was again to ensure that kids kept a safe distance. We did layout the Paneer on satay sticks and placed it on the grill along with baby corn.  We took lot of photos of the grill. Kids loved Paneer and we had to make another extra round. Some parents had also come around by that time and we shared food items with them also. We could not make some of the items like grilled cheese potatoes because of power cut but we had enough fun making all the stuff.

One interesting aspect I have started noticing in kids now is that they are asking me lot more questions related to ingredients, decoration and also stories of their cooking experience. I did hear from some parents that some of them went back and cooked some stuff at home.

Looks like it is working!

The next one on my agenda was a fruit salad not made using cream or ice cream but using lime juice and chat masala along with some Boora (powder sugar). Kids loved cutting all the fruits and usual fights erupted in an effort to cut more fruits. We also made an interesting version of fruit salad by covering it with wet bread and spreading some curd over it. This approach to salad completely transforms it to look like something else and tastes great. I also taught them how to make a quick shahi toast by spreading home made malai and sugar over a piece of bread.

Then came the storm, the chuski or ice gola. Simple crushed ice with Rose and Kesar syrup on a stick. The kids just got too excited and soon everybody was ready with the most innovative reason why he/she should be the one to get it first. The worst part was that crushing the ice was a manual process and took us some time to get it. The pressure was mounting and the demand was much more than supply. The entire room resembled a chaotic ice gola shop with a very sticky floor. Some kids wanted only rose and some other wanted to mix it and check out the color. Adults also got bitten by the chuski bug and we also enjoyed it.

We had few minutes left before parents would come to pick up the kids so I just started chatting up with kids. All of them were telling me how they will decorate or make a dish in a different way. Some of them started telling me jokes and one naughty girl put a ice cube inside my shirt. Overall lot of fun and one thing which I was certainly happy about was that kids were not just thinking about standard way of making a recipe but also were thinking through variations of the dish both in terms of ingredients and looks.

We also discussed last days home work and I told about the lot of recipes which can be made with left over food. A satisfying day indeed. Kids have become very friendly with me and they are also understanding overall picture of cooking.

Next day’s home work was ask all the kids to find from their parents if they had ever invented a dish. Let us see what they come back with.

PS:

1. These cooking lessons were part of the summer camp organized by Noah’s Show.

2. My apologies to the lady who came to clean up the room after the mayhem.

And the last stumbling block was that the stuff I was trying to teach was a little bit new to me. The first day syllabus was three varieties of salad – Coleslaw, French Dressing, and Russian Salad. Since we were primarily teaching no fire cooking, we chose dishes which are safe enough for kids to make.

We started with a small introduction with all the kids and then I introduced myself. The nerves were still not relaxed. I asked all the kids to wash hands and also tie their hairs ( I also had a rubber band on my hairs ). Now we started cutting some vegies for our salads. It was so tough to ensure that kids cut vegetables without hurting themselves. Then there were some fight between kids to cut vegetables. We also did a little bit of grating and struggled to ensure that kids keep their fingers away from grater. By this time I was getting a little bit more comfortable. I realize that kids were enjoying their cooking a lot and they were keen to learn. The coleslaw came out pretty good and then their was a small fight to taste it. Next item was French Dressing and followed pretty much the same sequence. For russian salad we got the vegies boiled under adult supervision and mixed all the stuff in front of the kids. All the salads were kept in the fridge so that we can have them in the end.

We had a langar type of setup in the end and all of us enjoyed the salads. Some of the questions which stumped me were

- Why does not mayonnaise go bad if it has eggs in it?

- Why are you putting so much Mayonnaise?

- How can it become so creamy when you mix oil and vinegar?

- French Dressing is from France, Russian Salad from Russia but what about Coleslaw?

I don’t even want to write what my answers were. The day ended with home work for all the kids. The home work was to ask their parents what they do with left overs at home. The idea was to help them understand all the great things they can make with left overs.

I was certainly feeling more comfortable by end of day with kids as well as my teaching skills.

PS: These cooking lessons were part of the summer camp organized by Noah’s Show.