Sugar Talk Diaries

I grew up with an insatiable sweet tooth, something that demanded some relief post every meal of the day. And while on most days I would settle for chocolates or as a last resort a piece of jaggery, Mom for the most part did her best to put up something new every few days.

You see, my Mum happens to be a bit of a wizard when it comes to the kitchen, and especially with desserts. Something that the entire family (including cousins, near and far), have come to love and look forward to. And am sure it must’ve come as quite a disappointment to her, when I refused to even enter the kitchen, let alone show any signs of her sweet inclinations near the oven. She would take classes for strangers, and I would refuse to learn.

And now, when I’m sitting far away, in another city, I find myself sometimes (still rather rarely) inclined to make something sweet. Of course it never ever turns out the way her’s did, but my experiments till now have at least not been disappointing (except for one bad episode with Custard. Warning to readers, NEVER follow the instructions on the box!).

In fact, I had been looking forward to this weekend, after a rather tiring month, to do nothing but sleep, a lot. And that I did, all of Saturday morning, then afternoon. Suffice to say my day pretty much began at 5PM. And then I was wide awake. And hungry. And craving.

So I decided to bake some apple crumble (thanks to some old apples lying untouched in the fridge, which had been bought on the pretext of eating healthy)

And then baked some fruit cake.

And then some more.

Yes, it was all edible.

Yes, it didn’t taste bad at all.

No, it didn’t taste like Mum’s.

But it was good.

And chopping up apples to no end actually helped relieve a pretty bad mood I had woken up with. Stress buster identified.

So I figured I should finally take up what my Mum’s been trying to get me to do forever. Learn her recipes. Except sadly now instead of an in-kitchen live session, it’ll have to be an over-the-phone lesson and memories of how that dessert was supposed to be. Serves me right for being such an adamant kid.

But I’m kinda looking forward to it, you know? It’s like my very own “Julie & Julia”, except, my Mum is so much more than Julia Child :)