Dinner is Served!

Sept 27th Dinner is Served!

Note: this entry was written by an American friend of mine who does not have a blog of her own, but wanted to reach an English speaking audience. Please give her your feedback and I’ll pass it on.

To spice or not to spice: That is the question. If you are serving Pakistanis, heavy spices and lots of oil are de riguer. But to my American palate certain foods should be eaten as they were meant to be: salt, pepper, garlic and onion, maybe some paprika or basil. I’ve already made concessions by adding a hunk of fresh ginger to my vegetable soup! Very good, by the way. The answer to the dilemma of muliticultural palates lies in making accommodations, or setting aside my own separate mashed potatoes, and soup sans masala, (Indian spice mix). Then I let Zaynab, our house keeper, tamper with the rest of my creations to suit everyone else’s palate.

This vegetable soup is a story in itself. I have been trying to think of ways to be thrifty in the kitchen by making something out of whatever I might find, like kitchen sink eggs. Hence, the mashed potatoes, which were the main course two night’s back.

All Ramadan, I’d been fasting and thinking of food, certainly not the objective of fasting, but it happens. Around here, I have to be careful about what I ask for. When I first arrived, I made fruit salad with yogurt and mentioned we liked to eat it at home during Ramadan. Now, every day, without fail, Zaynab presents me with a big bowl of it and we end up having to eat it until it turns too brown to be palatable!

Back to the veggie soup. On Saturday, I woke up and asked my husband if he had any money. He said,” zero.” I said, “Oh, I’m asking because I want to make vegetable soup and a meat bone and some veggies in small quantities would be nice.” Since the means were not readily available, I looked in the kitchen and found tomatoes, onions, garlic, and two old carrots. Thrifty homemaker that I am, I had saved the water from the boiled potatoes the day before. Full of minerals and flavor, its a good base for vegetable soup.

Everything I had went into the pot, skin and all for color and flavor. I added a big hunk of ginger and some large garlic cloves for flavor, salt, pepper, bay leaf and some zeera seeds I found with the bay leaf. They ended up adding a nice flavor. I boiled the whole thing and then left it to simmer for some hours, about 4-5. The end result was some sharply flavored consommé. My plan was to add the vegetables when I got them, hopefully next day.

Saturday proceeded uneventfully until my dear husband informed me we’d be having guests in about 15 minutes! I wasn’t even dressed and was worried about what to serve them. I prayed asr and hid out in my room till Zaynab ironed my clothes. Thank God for small favors!

The friend who came brought his wife and their five month old baby, a very cute, alert little girl who kept us entertained for hours. Her mom, a young woman, had lived in the States with her mother and brother while going to high school. We had quite a good conversation in English. Always a plus for me. I served her some crackers and the ever present fruit salad, using the same to break my fast.

Meanwhile, my dear husband walks in with a big bag of fresh fish. This had been bought exclusively for me. He and Zaynab both have a strong aversion to it, but he knows I like it and it is relatively cheap here. I also recalled that the man who was visiting also liked fish and fortunately his wife did too. She even gave Zaynab and I a tip on how to spice it with ready-made fish masala. Zaynab trotted off dutifully to the market to get some. Still no veggies, mind you.

I washed and cleaned the fish. Hubby translated the masala package directions which called for ½ hour marinating. No time for that. Zaynab came bustling back from a second trip to the market and I graciously let her take over, opting to hold the baby instead. Then my husband came in to ask what we’d eat with the fish and how about the soup! I gave him a doleful look and told him it wasn’t fit for company. He said, “We can’t just have fish” and told Z. to go back to the market for two plates of ready-made curry. What a night for her!

Dinner was served. The male guest and I ate the bony fish with zest. Some lemon cut the spice of the masala for me. His wife picked delicately at her plate and Zaynab and my husband ate curry. The baby gummed tiny bits of bread with delight. Everyone was happy and relatively well fed.

This morning, before I got up, Zaynab was sent to Abpara Market for vegetables! She came home with quite a variety of squash, peas, beans, potatoes and other stuff for future meals. I was happy and proud of her. The way the market works here, is seller chooses and packs the bag, so he wants to give you a large quantity and always seems to throw in some stuff of poor quality along with the rest. If you try to choose the produce yourself, he’ll get annoyed.

So, I happily cut and chopped, boiled and simmered the veggies and then added the consommé, which had improved in flavor overnight. Since I was fasting, I had to wait to taste the results. I was very pleased. A perfect American vegetable soup using no meat at all, even for flavor. The fresh veggies, ginger, onions and coriander had melded into a beautiful mixture of flavors. Trouble is, American vegetable soup is not popular in Pakistan, unless you developed a liking for it at British boarding school, as my husband seems to have done.

So, I’ve greedily set aside at least two days worth of soup for myself and the rest will be spiced and served to our guests tonight, who happen to be all male. In fact, as I write this, the chauffeur of one of these men is in the our kitchen, cooking up a chicken! Will wonders never cease?