After getting up early in the morning at 4 am, I got a craving for cooking a curry-less vegetable (sookhi sabji). After the bath, I cut a lot of carrots and potatoes. I put some water in the cooker and kept it on the flame. Simultaneously I kept on adding the cut vegetable. Half way through I put salt, green chillies and turmeric. Then I added some more water and continued with the cutting and adding part. Lastly I cut a few tomatoes and added a little ginger. Then I closed the cooker. Little did I realise that something can go wrong when the fluid in the cooker is less. As soon as I got some burning odour I put the flame off. I remembered when my mother used to be extra careful about this. It is called 'Sabji da thalle lag jana'. It means the bottom layer of the vegetable has turned into carbon and has got struck with the cooker. At the same time I realised that I had not put any oil in the dish. So I chopped some onions, fried them in oil. I put a little more turmeric also as I thought it was less when it was added earlier. I opened the cooker and added the fried stuff into the vegetable. Before the better half woke up kitchen was made tidy as if nothing much had happened.
The vegetable was, no doubt, very tasty. But the tough part remained to be done. After the lady of the house went to her school and I was free from my coaching work, I emptied the cooker and put the "Sabji" in a serving utensil. The lower part of the cooker was all black with carbon. I cleaned and cleaned but it refused to go. Then I sat in the courtyard and carried on wrestling with the cooker in the soothing sunshine of the winter season. Still it did not show much improvement. Then again I remembered why my mother was always careful that the vegetable should never get burnt at the bottom. Then I came back in the kitchen and took a wired mesh. I sat on a Patadi (a tiny wooden seat) held the cooker between my feet and went on rubbing its bottom with my hand. I cleaned it for about half a dozen times. Atlast it became somewhat as before although not fully.
I became thoroughly exhausted. I placed the cooker back on the shelf to exhibit as though nothing much had happened.The lesson that I have learnt is that one must go about making a 'Sookhi Sabji' (dry vegetable) in such a way that the bottom layer should never get burnt. There should always be sufficient water in the cooker when it is closed for whistling.
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