Life before kitchens......

Life before kitchens......

My name is Tanish Thulsidharan Kesavan,

However the kitchens baptised me with various names like buddy, chefe,bobo,champ,Mario ect.

Food has always been something that I could easily relate to. It all began when I was just 6 years old I cooked my first dish, a packet of Maggie noodles, 2 minutes with the help of my maid, such that Maggie ended up sending an appreciation on the newspaper.

I loved cooking since then, and would look for every opportunity to cook, as simple as my own breakfast. I never realized how close I was getting to cooking. My Mother and Grand mother used to hunt me out of the kitchen and ask get back to studies.My Mother had concerns;everyday evening, after a hectic day of teaching at school, the first question she used to ask my maid,"Did Tanish, enter the kitchen today?"I had a wired habit since my childhood of studying the menu first and then ordering the most wired stuff on the menu in any restaurant I went.So I was never afraid of experimenting and tasting. Cooking was more than an hobby by then.

Cooking was rather hereditary as well I must say,My grand father Mr. Patrick Mendes was a well known cook ,though he never accepted it as a prime profession, being a school clerk. He was well known for creating elaborate banquets in the church during various occasions. His flair for using continental dynamics in to cooking during those early times is highly appreciable.However, for him cooking was something divine, personally choosing the best of the best ingredients,cooking with great love and compassion.He never made cooking a business, and hence never charged or looked for monetary gains. My Grand mother too was equally supportive to him and ended up developing the same flair of cooking with more traditional techniques.I still wonder even in her old age, she used to personally go the market with a big black resin bag, that used to end up being full, and heavy. She preferred walking all the way home.  Grand ma used to run a school canteen, the same taste and the legacy continued for time. The most appreciable part of this journey is that I learnt the love and flair for cooking, the art of choosing the freshest ingredients among the best of the best and putting in efforts and time to attain perfection.

Apart from cooking the best thing I did was dreaming, day dreaming that actually was a high concern to my parents and teachers alike. Looking outside the window, appreciating the blue skies, the birds near the window, people walking are few of the things that could easily distract me. The last page of my notebook, was one of my best friends, with whom I could share anything, any time, any moment.It had few drawings of my imaginations and few lines of my thoughts, when put in a rhyme, called poems.