katmacan's Blog

Frozen batteries and a Salty Conundrum A mid-life crisis is not the ideal time to deal with a pandemic. No….. That’s so not fair. News for you buddies…. That’s life hitting you below the belt!!! Yes, you have taken one right in the batteries, caught your breath, or whatever is left of it, and taxied you way here. Now you are dealing with a midlife thingy plus a pandemic apparently. This is way far from anything you call normal. So now what? That’s the big question. The lockdown didn’t mean shit to me. You see, I had lots of practice. I was sitting at home doing nothing anyway for the past year or so toying with the idea of starting my own restaurant. This has been my passion. But the distance from passion to possibility and from there to reality is as I found out, a freaking big hike. So here I was, hiking down that road of apprehensions with dwindling finances at one end, domestic responsibilities at the other, and trying to balance the two. But this unique phenomenon calle

A few days back, Old College Friends came calling. Among other things, Rajesh mentioned a simple way to make some broccoli soup. That was inspirational. So, Yesterday, I went out and bought a small broccoli to try out a cream of Broccoli soup. The results have been very encouraging.  I say this because I have never done anything with broccoli before. So going forward Broccoli is going to be a regular buy. Only issue is that getting good Broccoli is a challenge here in Chennai. Here is what I did Cut out the florets of the broccoli. Wash and Drain Finely Chop a small onion and one green chilly Dunk all this in a big steel bowl, add some salt and water to cover the florets and boil till florets are tender Cool this, and puree the whole thing in a blender bring back to a boil, add a little black pepper powder and some milk (yes, you heard it, milk). This gives it a cheesy taste. Once you add the milk, cut the flame.  Serve garnished with grated Cheese and bread sticks on t

"The shortest distance between any 2 points is a straight line" : Anonymous This article is about a device that will teach you that there is more to that statement than what meets the eye. A normal city dwelling human being has to commute daily to somewhere, else his day is not complete. Actually it starts with commute and ends with commute. This small write up is about how a major portion of the above said variety does that in Madras. They use a contraption called a shareauto. Now, you can share an auto.....wait a minute. let me take a small detour here to explain to the uninitiated what a shareauto is. This is a 3 wheeled vehicle which is certified to transport among other things, city dwelling humans. Rajanikant is allowed by law to transport pregnant women in it by virtue of his superstar status. The capacity of this vehicle is 3 passengers and a driver. Elsewhere in the world that would be true. Coming back to the discussion, Like I was saying, you can share spa

I used work in - what is called in corporate parlance, a 24/7 Company. I used to feel perfectly normal. My friends and wife thought I was a zombie. This I had dismissed as a subjective observation but lately, I have been thinking that there might have been some truth in that observation. Let me explain why I feel that way I used to drive to my office on a motorbike. Its a 20 kms drive one way. So very complex rocket science math will tell the cautious reader that I drive 40 kms at the least everyday (tadaaa). I used to do night shifts or again in Corporate parlance; "the graveyard shift". My wife asks me one day if I remember anything that I saw on the roads that was worth mentioning when driving. I thought she had gone crazy. Why would I remember anything that i saw and what was the poin........Hey, hold on, wait a minute. jees, I don't actually remember anything nor can I recall which way I came. 'Holy Pulsar' what is happening ? I drove on auto-pilot for 2

After many years of working for the great Indian IT industry, I was also send to the US for training . I was to fly from Chennai to Frankfurt and from there to Chicago, My US entry point. The flight to Frankfurt was OK. I had an aisle seat and was able to sleep once the aircraft went into cruise mode. From Frankfurt I was stuffed into an united airlines Boeing 747. Trust me, this is one hell of a big airplane. But sadly my seat was in the middle of the middle row and had aged people sitting on both sides. to add to my woes, they were not serving alcohol on this flight. Okay, no probs, I am a master at the art of doing nothing. So I sit. This flight dint have personal in flight entertainment either. They were playing some movies on a big screen up front which i was not interested in. Well I made it to Chicago in one piece. From this point things got real interesting. Before i check into immigration, I check into the restroom. and guess what, some idiot has left a soft toy in the rest

Here is a simple recipe to make stew. Any meat of your choice. cinamon and cloves, pepper, onion, green chillies, oil to sautte the onion, spices and chillies and salt to taste Heat oil, throw in the cinamon and cloves ( how much cinnamon and cloves you need is something you will have to figure out after a few attempts. there is no fun in telling you that you need 10 grms of cinamon andf 10 florets of cloves. ) when the aroma fills the room, throw in the onions, green chillies and sautte for some more time. when the onions become pale , throw in the meat and pepper an salt. Do all this in a pressure cooker if the meat is a bit tough. when its cooking, make a cup of coconut milk. there are diffrent ways of doing this. the easiest way is to run to the nearest supermarket and get a packet of coconut milk powder. follow instructions on the packet and you should get some coconuit milk without too much hassles. after the meat is cooked, open the pressure cooker and turn the heat to low/sim