The Sunday Haul

We aren’t even fully into February and I’ve already bought more than thirty books so far. Only the previous day I had bought ten books at the Best Books sale at YMCA and the next day, being Sunday, I went to Abids out of sheer habit. It was a complete haul of cookbooks. I bought them out of my habit of buying any good book I see and also because I am gradually moving towards beginning to actually cooking on my own. I had made two attempts a few weeks ago and had succeeded in preparing a dish that everyone at home ate without any problem. This experience has emboldened me to read more cookbooks and try to attempt some complicated dishes.

The first book I found was ‘The Foolproof Cookbook’ by Rohini Singh, which, as the covers says is for ‘brides, bachelors, and for those who hate cooking.’ It was a hardcover title and had a lot of recipes along with some wonderful advice. I loved the book. The next find was yet another glossy cookbook titled ‘Simple Cooking for Smart Men’ that seemed just the sort of book I needed though I am not exactly a smart man. I got this book for only thirty rupees.

Just a few minutes later I found another cookbook, a glossy, slim title by the roly poly and popular tv performer- Kunal Vijaykar titled ‘Made in India’ that I got for just twenty rupees. This had a recipe for bottle masala at the end that I want to try my hand at making, if the wife allows it, that is. The photographs of the dishes in this book were something worth looking at though I don’t know if they would look so good when I try my hand at preparing them.

I have no idea why I bought the next book that I saw but it could be that it was the subject- Bread- that got me. I really do not like to eat bread but when I saw the book and the terrific photographs of the various types of breads around the world I decided it would add to my knowledge knowing about the history of bread making, and also the various methods of baking different types of breads though it seems very unlikely that I would try my hand at baking bread. I am happier making chapatis. By the way this book cost me only a hundred rupees. It was a thick tome with gloss pages and some superb color photographs.

Apart from these four cookbooks I found another book that I simply felt I had to buy. This was ‘Of Hemlock I Drank’ by Manubhai Pancholi Darshak, who I read at the book is a giant in Gujarati literature. I read that he was awarded the Jnanpith and so it was enough for me to buy it without a second thought. However, this title is the first in a trilogy and I don’t know if I would be able to find the next two titles.