Cooking is not alchemy; there is no magic in the pot...

Mum’s kitchen...

We all either work or will soon work in top-notch companies, MNC’s, corporate sectors or government sectors. How many of these companies or sectors work with 6-σ strategy?? To be factual the number of companies working under 6-σ is analogous to the amount of salt we put in a whole collation. But one of the ubiquitous non-profit making firms running 24 X 7 with 6-σ precision is mum’s kitchen. Hardly ever food gets undercooked or overcooked; on just an odd occasion something goes waste and once in a blue moon the blend of spices goes out of proportion. Such well researched strategies are still arduous, onerous, strenuous to implement in firms and on the contrary it’s being done so effortlessly by our mother’s, the cordon bleus.

How many of us have tried our hands at cooking?? Hardly a few, as these culinary skills are knotty to get an expertise on and proletarian chefs like us can seldom stimulate the taste buds. With n00bs Gastronomy becomes a series of step-by-step instructions for preparing a meal whose ingredients we usually forget to buy, with instruments that seem Martian, and finally inventing something that even a dog won't eat.

We Indians can bracket together a lot with cooking. A grand wedding is often evaluated and remembered by the quality of food served there. Cooking is truly an art form, a national sport in fact, a bona fide session of chemistry, and the most rudimentary application of physical and chemical forces to natural materials. Our mother’s are exceptional cooks and their qualities are akin to those of a successful tightrope walker, an abiding passion for the task, courage to go out on a limb and an impeccable sense of balance. To me moms are artists, sportspersons, chemists and acrobats, all at the same time.

We don’t even butter our bread because to us even that is cooking, we often make faces when our mom forgets to put salt, we never even care to arrange a dinner table as we consider it low-key and we often shout when food gets overcooked. But remember if we try to cook for our mom someday, she will eat it with pleasure without making fuzz over salt, taste, overcooking or undercooking. To her the ingredient of love is the purest thing we added in and nothing satisfies her more than that. So next time we want to complain about food, just remember that we suck at cooking and we should never miss a good chance to shut up.