An unprepossessing exterior tucked away at the corner of Clark and Roscoe, you can almost miss it if you arent looking for it. It is hard to find some truly unique cuisine after a while, but this was a real surprise.

My first impression was not very favorable. The interior is quite ill-lit and the seating was a little too closely packed. But the staff are very friendly and helpful with making decisions. The menu, however, changed my first impression. They had a whole slew of exotic items on it : fried plantains, yams and even fufu (now you get the Poisonwood Bible connection!) just to name a few.

We ordered fried yams for appetizers and I ordered PH(fruity vodka), but N was brave enough to try the Palm wine. Unfortunately the latter had a little too much of vodka mixed in it, we couldnt really taste the palm wine, but mine was awesome. The yams came with a fantastic red sauce that was the exact right level of spicy. We were able to identify garlic and green chillies in it for sure. Dont know what else it had, but it was a perfect blend. Next for entree I had bean casserole with fried plantain. I know, I know… but N made up for it with Egusi and Efo. Which is pounded yam and watermelon seeds cooked with spinach and spices! See what I mean when I say exotic?

The bean casserole, is not cheesy. It is black-eyed peas and pinto cooked in tomato sauce. It is more dry, well cooked than watery-stew type. If you like chundal, this is your dish! But the highlight, in exotic scale, was the pounded yam. It is white, odorless and tasteless and has more of a well kneaded dough consistency. (Very much like Kingsolver’s fufu!) The Egusi that it came with was the saving grace.It was spicy, tangy and had a little of crunch to it too! And I know it doesnt seem like it, but the two of them go together and it turned out to be a really tasty dish!

The entire experience was refreshingly pleasant. We got to eat something we have never tasted and managed to stay within our tight budget. So if you are tired of the same old, thai-chinese-mexican-ethiopian routine (or even if you are not), try this out. A note of warning though, they take a while to get your food to the table. However, they do warn you of it even in the menu!

For someone who has a strong sense of moral/ethical and social ideals, envisioning them shouldn’t be hard. And yet there are so many grey areas that one is forced to settle for the lesser evil. This may be reality but it certainly leaves a bitter taste in the mouth.

Take for example, the recent Martha Stewart show that I happened to catch. She had a segment where she interviewed this guy who handcrafted beautiful bowls from different types of wood. It really was a work of art, as he mainly chipped away at the wood (using power tools however!) until the wood itself seemed to give up a design. But some of the woods he used where from trees that grew in Africa and in the South American rain-forests*. Interestingly, they never covered where he got these woods from. There was a fleeting visual of him shaving off the bark before cutting the wood to size, which gave the impression that it was from a cut down tree (rather than a fallen down one)**. The end result was, as I mentioned earlier, these beautifully shaped wooden bowls and cutting boards, that were, without doubt a work of art. But throughout the interview I could not help feeling that it was an indulgence. How can we cry ourselves hoarse about conservation and at the same time admire and encourage something that involves cutting down these very trees we want to conserve. But on the other hand, how can we curtail a work of art? Isn’t that another form of censorship? Maybe if he is just one person indulging in this form of art it doent cause a great dent. Then again, maybe he sponsors the planting of seedlings at a regular basis. So does one “just say no” to these bowls? But what if others want to learn the art? Does one say no to that too?

A similar example, more closer to home, is the silk hand-loom industry. Apart from the bonded-labour issue ***, there is the whole issue of cruelty to the silk worm. Especially to the B.muri species, which are boiled while still in the cuccoon (thus killing them) to extract the silk . It is this method that gives the silk its shine and the weave its smoothness. It also lends itself to the weaving of the typical South Indian patterns. Earlier, I had given up buying silk sarees as I couldn’t stomach the idea of killing all those worms just to own a beautiful fabric. Later, I went on a class trip to Kancheepuram to see the silk weaving done. Talking informally to some of the weavers, I realised that the art of hand-loom weaving was slowly making its way towards extinction. The competition with big companies with power-looms, poor government subsidies to hand-loom weaving, bad health care plan was all driving the younger generation to look towards other career options. Even if all these socio-economic problems were to be solved, is it still right to encourage this art form that perpetrates cruelty?

Eventually it boils down to individual choice. What choice can you live with? Easier said than done, I feel.

* Interestingly this segment was immediately followed by one about animals that were facing extinction due to loss of their natural (rain forest) habitats. Irony, or just political correctness on MS’s part?

**Preliminary Google search revealed other establishments that used fallen down trees and the pattern of moss that grew on them for making similar kind of kitchenware. I am not saying that he doesnt do the same. It is just interesting that given the above point, they didn’t make a point of saying so. Which leads me to suspect he doesn’t use fallen trees.

***This is in no way meant to belittle the importance of the bonded-labour issue. It is just not relevant to this post.

You know it is when your brain connects two random things! Like today, while I was listening to Joni Mitchell’s A Case of You and was reminded of “Pachpan Khamben Lal Deewaren”

WTH??

By my favorite author. It is a crazy world out there folks and the war is quite real. If you dont believe it, just ask around. Listen to the righteous anger of the PC-ers or the condescending scorn of the Mac-ers. Read this for more insight

http://www.themodernword.com/eco/eco_mac_vs_pc.html

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/335/7633/1299

Who said science is boring? This article in the British Medical Journal is all about identifying the gene for magic traits. A study solely based on the Harry Potter books. I especially like the magical enhancer protein with its special shiny blue colour! Even better, however, is the fact that given this study, there is hope for us muggles. All we need is to overexpress the enhancer elements and we can expelliarms people’s ass off!!!

Very lucrative Ph.D project up for grabs, this…any takers?

isnt he pretty?! wonder what an ocelot is? One would think I ought to know, he being my soul and all…