After all the gourmet meals have been sampled and savoured, all the wines tasted and talked about, all the food-capitals visited and vanquished, comes a time when every foodie turns to the simple, un-dressed-up charms of comfort food. It’s like stepping out of a pair of stilettos and into the undemanding reassurance of flip-flops. Or like getting out of a business suit and pulling on that soft, unironed pair of track-pants and tee.
While the dictionary defines comfort food as “Food that is simply prepared and associated with a sense of home or contentment,” a far cosier definition is: “Food that hugs you from the inside.” That’s what comfort food does. It reaches out to you, at times across the world, cutting through all the sophistication that you may have imbibed, and soothingly engulfs you with a “There, there” or an “Ugi, ugi” or equivalent in your mother tongue. And suddenly, your current situation, whatever it may be – weary traveler, overstretched home-maker, student-away-from home, troubled teenage – just blurs and vanishes, and the first mouthful takes your straight back to the familiar, the good, the soul-nourishing; to a time when all was well.
Comfort food is not to be confused, by the way, with favourite foods. Favourite foods are usually fancy. To have their favourite foods, people often dress up, throw a party or visit their favourite restaurant. As for comfort food, it is usually had with simply no frills. It is never fussy or difficult or tricky to eat. It may involve tools and implements in the making, but never does it involve fancy crockery or cutlery or devices when it comes to eating it up. You are more than likely to be having it sitting up in bed wearing your most comfy clothes, and eating it out of your most familiar and easy dinner-wear – a homey steel dish, a big old bowl or soup plate left over from your granny’s dinner set, a thali, a massive mug painted by your kids, or sometimes simply a takeaway box!
If one wants to really get into the technicalities of how comfort food works, well it works on many levels: texture, temperature, taste, even the look of food – all come together. The snowy-white mound of cool curd-rice that has been well mixed (by hand of course) works for many an Indian on a scorching summer evening, when you come home after doing battle with the world. The velvety caress of rajma-chawal, as well as its reassuring sober red colour, has soothed many a homesick Indian in the heart of Paris!
While there are as many different comfort foods as there are people – to each his own – there are a few universal favourites, depending on which part of the world you come from, or even which gender you belong to. Here in India, kadhi-khichadi, curd-rice, rajma-chawal, last night’s kheema with some pav are some of the top care-giver foods that people list. In the west, it could be chicken soup or stew, or fluffy mashed potatoes with a touch of gravy-sauce, fish-n-chips, or simply a burger and fries.
For men, it’s often very basic dal-chawal or simply steaks that provide comfort and familiar warmth. For women it often tends to the sweet and sticky (chocolates, chikki, candy floss, ice-cream with lashings of syrup). Of course women, equally, would kill for the comfort of a well-made wada pav with a piece of fried chilly thrown in, or for that lick of fiery Andhra pickle too.
As for pregnant women…it’s amazing how the definition of comfort food gets positively bizarre during those nine months. Pickles-and-ice cream is an often-mentioned favourite combo by women in the west; it’s shrikhand with a dab of kairi pickle in our parts. And during this time, women are known to take deep dislikes to something that they usually love to eat. Discomfort food, one could call it. Suddenly, they’ll gag and flee the spot when a whiff of once-loved bhajias hits them. Or they could ban onions from the house, totally, and take comfort in an unending supply of dahi-idli or simply chappati with jam. One suspects this is a throw back to what they ate in their school-days ‘tiffins’…After all, every pregnant woman, at least once during her journey, wishes she could simply push the clock back and be a kid with no worries again!
Another superb thing about comfort food is that it is never-ever calorie and diet driven. It has this magic quality to simply bypass the conscience and all those boring adult cognitive centres in your brain that know all about calories and cholesterol and fat deposits and whatnot. That way, one can sink one’s teeth into a buttery shrewsbury biscuit (with some extra butter slathered on, for that extra warm internal hug) without a single pang of guilt. And even better, some are known to dip the whole thing into a cup of very sweet, very milky tea, and watch little globules of butter swimming around. At such times, you simply do not have to think about how you’re going to work all that stuff out of your system. Comfort food doesn’t allow you to look at the ‘larger’ picture at all – it’s all about feeling right, right now. And the devil take tomorrow.
While the dictionary defines comfort food as “Food that is simply prepared and associated with a sense of home or contentment,” a far cosier definition is: “Food that hugs you from the inside.” That’s what comfort food does. It reaches out to you, at times across the world, cutting through all the sophistication that you may have imbibed, and soothingly engulfs you with a “There, there” or an “Ugi, ugi” or equivalent in your mother tongue. And suddenly, your current situation, whatever it may be – weary traveler, overstretched home-maker, student-away-from home, troubled teenage – just blurs and vanishes, and the first mouthful takes your straight back to the familiar, the good, the soul-nourishing; to a time when all was well.
Comfort food is not to be confused, by the way, with favourite foods. Favourite foods are usually fancy. To have their favourite foods, people often dress up, throw a party or visit their favourite restaurant. As for comfort food, it is usually had with simply no frills. It is never fussy or difficult or tricky to eat. It may involve tools and implements in the making, but never does it involve fancy crockery or cutlery or devices when it comes to eating it up. You are more than likely to be having it sitting up in bed wearing your most comfy clothes, and eating it out of your most familiar and easy dinner-wear – a homey steel dish, a big old bowl or soup plate left over from your granny’s dinner set, a thali, a massive mug painted by your kids, or sometimes simply a takeaway box!
If one wants to really get into the technicalities of how comfort food works, well it works on many levels: texture, temperature, taste, even the look of food – all come together. The snowy-white mound of cool curd-rice that has been well mixed (by hand of course) works for many an Indian on a scorching summer evening, when you come home after doing battle with the world. The velvety caress of rajma-chawal, as well as its reassuring sober red colour, has soothed many a homesick Indian in the heart of Paris!
While there are as many different comfort foods as there are people – to each his own – there are a few universal favourites, depending on which part of the world you come from, or even which gender you belong to. Here in India, kadhi-khichadi, curd-rice, rajma-chawal, last night’s kheema with some pav are some of the top care-giver foods that people list. In the west, it could be chicken soup or stew, or fluffy mashed potatoes with a touch of gravy-sauce, fish-n-chips, or simply a burger and fries.
For men, it’s often very basic dal-chawal or simply steaks that provide comfort and familiar warmth. For women it often tends to the sweet and sticky (chocolates, chikki, candy floss, ice-cream with lashings of syrup). Of course women, equally, would kill for the comfort of a well-made wada pav with a piece of fried chilly thrown in, or for that lick of fiery Andhra pickle too.
As for pregnant women…it’s amazing how the definition of comfort food gets positively bizarre during those nine months. Pickles-and-ice cream is an often-mentioned favourite combo by women in the west; it’s shrikhand with a dab of kairi pickle in our parts. And during this time, women are known to take deep dislikes to something that they usually love to eat. Discomfort food, one could call it. Suddenly, they’ll gag and flee the spot when a whiff of once-loved bhajias hits them. Or they could ban onions from the house, totally, and take comfort in an unending supply of dahi-idli or simply chappati with jam. One suspects this is a throw back to what they ate in their school-days ‘tiffins’…After all, every pregnant woman, at least once during her journey, wishes she could simply push the clock back and be a kid with no worries again!
Another superb thing about comfort food is that it is never-ever calorie and diet driven. It has this magic quality to simply bypass the conscience and all those boring adult cognitive centres in your brain that know all about calories and cholesterol and fat deposits and whatnot. That way, one can sink one’s teeth into a buttery shrewsbury biscuit (with some extra butter slathered on, for that extra warm internal hug) without a single pang of guilt. And even better, some are known to dip the whole thing into a cup of very sweet, very milky tea, and watch little globules of butter swimming around. At such times, you simply do not have to think about how you’re going to work all that stuff out of your system. Comfort food doesn’t allow you to look at the ‘larger’ picture at all – it’s all about feeling right, right now. And the devil take tomorrow.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment