tamarind lollipop
A friend offers me shapeless sticky tamarind, beaded with sugar crystals in a tamarind jar. My fingers pull out a chunk of it and I pop it into my mouth. As the tanginess pierced my taste buds, memories crowd my thoughts.
...I head into the kitchen in my school uniform and assemble the salt and chilly powder jars with the seriousness of a chef. I carefully de-seed the tamarind into a small bowl. I mix the salt-chilly mixture into the tamarind and knead it, before I make small round balls out of it. I fetch the eerkili (the rib of the coconut leaflet) from our backyard (I guess I had pulled out one of those eerkilis from our broom! :O)Soon, the tamarind lollipops were assembled on a nice plate :)
The tanginess stayed in my mouth for a couple of days. The biriyani and the chicken curry which we had the next day tasted weird to me for the overdose of tamarind wrecked havoc on my taste buds.
My enthusiasm for tamarind balls reappeared years later on an AirIndia flight where nano sized tamarind balls were offered along with the meal. I enjoyed it heartily! It was a sweeter version of my mega large tamarind lollipops, and of course it didn't leave an aftertaste in my mouth...
Tamarind is one of those things I can't replace anything with. Tamarind has to be tamarind. "ta ma rind" Doesn't it sound unique too? Unlike the sound of salt or sugar ?
My first tryst with the tamarind might have ended up sour, but my mouth still waters at the sight of tamarind balls.
I ask my friend to keep the tamarind jar away from my sight.
To write about the tamarind, visually detached.
The tanginess stayed in my mouth for a couple of days. The biriyani and the chicken curry which we had the next day tasted weird to me for the overdose of tamarind wrecked havoc on my taste buds.
My enthusiasm for tamarind balls reappeared years later on an AirIndia flight where nano sized tamarind balls were offered along with the meal. I enjoyed it heartily! It was a sweeter version of my mega large tamarind lollipops, and of course it didn't leave an aftertaste in my mouth...
Tamarind is one of those things I can't replace anything with. Tamarind has to be tamarind. "ta ma rind" Doesn't it sound unique too? Unlike the sound of salt or sugar ?
My first tryst with the tamarind might have ended up sour, but my mouth still waters at the sight of tamarind balls.
I ask my friend to keep the tamarind jar away from my sight.
To write about the tamarind, visually detached.
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