why my mother spikes her drinks

(**First a quick note before any of you try to refer my mother to AA. Her spiking is very much under control and at a respectable and admirable level. If anything, I am the one who should adjust my behaviour.**)

One of my plans for the next few months is to learn to cook. I did cook occasionally at college, putting my flatmates through homemade and rather lumpy tomato sauces but also managing to surprising them with cakes, crumbles, and chickpea and chicken stew. However, the fact that I can remember everything I cooked while at college is not helpful when trying to put together a case that I am not completely averse to the kitchen.

I actually do love cooking. I just am not very experienced...

Yesterday prawns were on sale and so I decided that a prawn curry would be last night's chosen dish. I was advised my the in-house chef that the best recipes were to be found in Madhur Jaffrey's book. However, I could not find the book by said chef (did you know she started out as an actress and learned to cook through correspondence with her mother who was back in India?) so I pulled out the only book on the shelf which claimed to display the most thrilling Indian recipes.

"Prawn curry...page 95, ok is only about half a page long, seems simple enough. Oh it's from Goa, cool, I have never been to Goa, nice beaches, a bit touristy though, oh isn't Flora going there soon? Wonder if she'll eat prawn curry. Hmmm...ooh damn, do we have tamarind pulp? And I know we don't have a coconut, hmm, will ring up in-house chef and ask her to pick one up on her way home."

"Yes?"
"Hello Mummy, it's Emma, tonight's chef."
"Oh God, what do you want?"
"I need a coconut."
"What in general or right at this moment?"
"For tonight!"
"A whole one? Or just the milk? We have milk in the cupboard."
"No, it says here half a fresh coconut."

Impressively we had all the other ingredients-- chilis, cumin, tumeric, and yes tamarind pulp, a testiment to my mother's experience with Indian cuisine or perhaps a sign of my ignorance about what a good kitchen should contain.

Around seven o'clock in the evening, my mother gently mentioned, "I can cook dinner if you want." Horrified that the post of chef du jour was about to be stripped from my shoulders because I was too busy researching Rwandan politics for my sister, I abandoned the study and rushed into the kitchen, grabbing my trusty batik apron and gleefully rubbing my hands together in expectation, "Yeah, this should be ready in about an hour. Says here you only have to cook it for a couple of minutes. Don't worry Mummy, you'll be able to put your feet up tonight."

OK, have any of you ever been able to grind coconut, chilis, garlic, and peppercorns into a paste? Yes, a paste! Even the loosest definition of 'paste' was problematic. There we were, the clock hands slipping down from 8 o'clock and threatening to start rising all too soon, my mum with the food processor grinding up the coconut, white specks going all over the kitchen wall.

"Er, were you supposed to grind these peppercorns?"
"I don't know! It just says put it all together and then grind it to a paste. Doesn't say what to do if you use a food processor. Oh but we do have to sprinkle vinegar over the mixture."
"What kind of vinegar."
"I don't know!"
"What does it say?"
"Vinegar. Just vinegar! Use whatever vinegar they use in India."
"Is this what's-her-name's book? You know, that woman who gave me lessons in Delhi?"
"Probably, it was the only Indian book I could find."
"Oh hehe, she was funny. She would always be having us cross out parts of recipes and change amounts: 'No no, don't do that, instead you must take this and grind it with this, here Bharadwaj can you go and grind this please?' We all named our food processors Bharadwaj."
"Wait, what? She changed her recipes when you used them?"
"Yeah, that book was definitely a work in progress."
"And what, I did not even know you named your blender."

Not only was this whole conversation starting to be rather too politically incorrect for my genteel suburban family but now I knew that my plans for producing the most glorious prawn curry of all time had been doomed from the start. I hung my head, hoping overcooked rice and green beans would partly salvage my reputation. I ate one of the freshly baked chocolate cookies lying on top of the range. That's it. I am going to drown my misery in melted chocolate.

But just as I was about to pick up my suitcase and spend the night in the car, the curry sauce started to boil over and I realised that the egg timer had failed to inform me that two minutes had passed. Having too much to do to contemplate my failure, I forged ahead.
"Shit. You know, this egg timer is crap," throwing in the prawns. My mum pouted. She is rather fond of her egg timer, which is shaped like a chick popping out of its shell. She has stuck two other fluffy chicks to the side, their legs holding them to the revolving ticker.
"Don't you like my Cirque de Soleil chicks?"
How do you answer a question like that? I decided not to think about the evidence of inherited senility.

Finally, we were all seated at the table peering at my concoction. Although at first my sister said she felt like she was in Bridget Jones and about to be served blue soup and cranjelly, in the end she declared the curry to be 'very tasty' and demanded more. I had served everyone very small amounts, fearful of causing them to gag or slowly die of samonella poisoning. Luckily we are all still alive. And I am in charge of tonight's dinner (the less challenging task of heating up chicken casserole-- my mum did ask me with a worried look on her face if I could manage though).

On another level however, I am still rather suspicious. If my dinner had been met with a verdict of 'disgusting', I may not have cooked again. As it is, it is still possible to draft me in as kitchen labour. I will remain on my toes and alert to any subvert plans. Most of all, I won't rest on what may be my nonexistent laurels.