First Food

No, there is no mistake, you read it correctly – it is not fast food, it is ‘first food’! Food is something that we all enjoy, especially when it comes to our favourite recipes.  But if I ask you, when did you first taste a particular food item, it may be difficult to remember.  However, in the case of some food items, we would clearly remember when we had it first, with whom, where and on what occasion.  Let me recollect a few such ‘first food’ memories!

When I was in lower primary school, my uncle who was working for a bank, came to Kochi on an official visit.  He was staying at Hotel Woodlands at Ernakulam.  One evening, we visited him in the hotel, and he took us to the restaurant.  That was my first visit to the restaurant of a star hotel.  He ordered ‘chana batura’ for me.  I didn’t know what it was.  In a few minutes, when it appeared in front of me, it looked like a big poori – much bigger than a usual poori.  The hot air escaped when I poked my finger into the piping hot batura.  The delicious batura with chana tickled my taste buds.

In early 1980s, when Nestle launched Maggi in India, noodles were new to most of the Indians. Since my parents were a bit conservative in their food habits, they never tried noodles.  One day when my mother’s sister, who used to try new food items, visited us.  I asked her, ‘what is this Maggi, how does it taste?’.  She said, ‘oh you haven’t eaten it? I will make it for you’.  That evening she brought Maggi and prepared it in our kitchen.  I remember leaning over the gas stove to see how she prepared it.  In appearance, it resembled a popular Kerala breakfast item – Idiyappam, but the taste was totally different.  I am not sure about the taste, but one thing that has remained more or less the same with Maggi over the last forty years is its packing.

In January 1997 a conference on grassroot level innovation was organised by IIM Ahmedabad.  A newsletter brought out on that occasion was named ‘Undhiyu’.  When I asked someone what Undhiyu meant, he said it was a Gujarati dish prepared during Makar Sankranti (called Uttarayan in Gujarat).  Sankranti was just a few days away and I decided that I must taste Undhiyu.  On Sankranti, one of my friends offered me Undhiyu with poori.  Undhiyu goes well with poori.  I was told, traditionally Undhiyu was cooked in earthen pots kept upside down underground.  Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed the taste of Undhiyu. 

Raghunath was my student at SIT during 1999-2001.  He was an engineering graduate, who joined the MBA programme after working for a few years.  So, my relationship with him was not just that of a student and a teacher, but more of a friendship.  Once we travelled together to Bangalore.  He asked me, ‘shall we have pizza?’, I told him, ‘I have never tasted a pizza’. He said, ‘then we must have it today’.  He took me to a pizza outlet on Brigade Road. Though I enjoyed it, somehow pizza did not find a place in my favourite food list.  That is why, in spite of having a popular pizza outlet at a stone’s throw from my house at Tumkur, I never ordered one!

The good thing about such memories is that they bring back the taste in your mind, especially if you have enjoyed the ‘first food’ experience.  I am sure you too have such memories.  Relish your ‘first food’ memories – let them tickle your taste buds!