The End of Part One

My final week in India was spent in the Kerala midlands, quite off the tourist trail, at a place called The Pimenta. I planned the time here with the intention of learning how to cook delicious vegetarian Keralan food, which I definitely feel like I did, though having not been back in my own kitchen yet I haven’t tested out whether any of my new skills have been retained. It was a busy week, with mornings out exploring the local area, visiting food markets and buying ingredients, and afternoons cooking up a feast for the evening meal.

Morning excursions were often fascinating, getting to see local life that I never would have even known about if I had just passed through on my way to one of the more popular destinations either direction of where I was staying. Wholesale banana and pineapple markets, snack making establishments making banana chips on wood stoves, and a truck painting warehouse were just some of the things I had an insight into. Actually writing this down and reading it back they all sound quite dull and/or nerdy… but really they were so interesting! Truck painting possibly wins on sounding the most obscure, but there is a long tradition in certain places in Kerala of having extremely intricate hand painted designs on lorries and trucks, and very few places in which this painting takes place. The winner for me though was seeing the products of the numerous rubber plantations I have seen so many of since starting my travels in Kerala. Seeing rubber gloves and a rainbow of rubber bands out to dry in the sun was quite a peculiar but brilliant sight. One morning I also took a trip to the government-run elephant training camp, and got to see the gorgeous baby elephants taking their bath and playing in the river.This trip happened to be on my birthday so it was a very memorable birthday treat!

One of many fried snacks being made over a wood fire

Hands up who wants a pair of marigolds!

But back to my main objective – cooking. Each day I made about 5 different dishes, under the watchful eye of Jacob who runs the Pimenta and has lived in the area his whole life, so knows a thing or two about what tastes good and where to get the best quality ingredients, though he grows most of the spices himself in the large jungle-like garden on-site. Most days there was a lot of coconut involved in a variety of formats, then lots of types of dhal and a huge range of vegetables, masses of curry leaves and few other spices. Rice is a big part of the diet too, and I learned that you can tell the quality of basmati rice by how long the grain is (value stuff at the supermarket just isn’t long enough apparently!) I was pleased to have a go at making my all-time favourite South Indian dish, masala dosa, though I haven’t quite refined my dosa batter spreading technique so more practice needed before any dinner party appearances of that dish.

Making masala dosa during a power cut

The end of the week came round quickly and before I knew it I was heading back to Cochin to get an early morning flight to the UK, feeling a mix of sadness to be leaving India after 4 incredible, challenging at times, but enjoyable months, and excitement for a whirlwind trip back for some very important bridesmaid duties, seeing family and friends, and as an added bonus the chance to show my clothes a washing machine which they hadn't seen in a while. So the next stop was home turf, for a brief intermission before part two of the travelling adventures began!