HOLY SHIT! I saw Indiana Jones last night and I loved every moment of it. Its a very different Indiana Jones, but it’s still him all right.

spoiler warning: From hereonin, there will be a lot of spoilers. Continue Reading »

In effort to pop back from the horrible horrible writer’s block I am facing now, I’m going to write on my favourite cooking utensils. No, I’m not mad, just need to get back in the habit of writing. Ugh.

So, I’ll begin a countdown.

5. The Pot
   The pot is good for cooking large amounts of liquids, such as soups. I use the pot to cook curries mostly. Because of its deep walls, you can fry things (which are mostly requisites of making curries) without them sputtering out. Also, the pot is useful when cooking large amounts of things, like rice. I’ve used the soup pot to make rice (for 10 people), curries, and soup.
4. The rice cooker
   The rice cooker does what it says - cooks rice. It cooks rice by means of steaming your rice. This also means that its an excellent steamer for those who need one. Most rice cookers come with steaming legs. You add water, lay down the steaming legs, and put your platter on top of the steaming legs, and steam your food. In my house, we have a basic rice cooker/steamer, but you can get really really fancy ones (ahem, Japan), with options like fuzzy logic (to control how moist you want your rice to be, etc).
3. The Saucepan
   The saucepan is often mistaken for a small pot. Well, basically, a saucepan is the bastard child of a pot and a normal pan/skillet. I use the saucepan a lot since I cook instant noodles quite often. But also, the saucepan is a very useful utensil to say, boil eggs, or cook small portions of liquids (like your Campbell soup). Here’s a protip: when you want to cook things quickly, put the lid down. Why? You’ll basically create a pressure system inside the pot, and while not as powerful as a proper pressure cooker, cooks things faster. I’ve used the saucepan to cook rice in it too.
2. The Non-stick Pan.
   All props go to DuPont for inventing Teflon. The non-stick pan is a life-saver. I fry my eggs, and basically anything that can be fried in it. Bacon sticks to the pan? No problems. With the teflon coating, it also means less oil is used to fry things, and also means healthier food. The non-stick pan is my second most used cookware.
1. The Wok
   Anyone who cooks would have to agree with me that the wok is amongst if not the most flexible cookware ever. It’s like a frying pan, but with a higher wall. The wall is high, but not steep, which allows a lot of breathing space for the foods in the wok, and also, because it has a high wall, oil will not sputter when you fry things. Also, the wok has many uses. Because of its large capacity, you can cook a lot in it. I’ve cooked curries with a wok, stir-fried vegetables as well as steamed things in a wok. Yes, I’ve basically described all the functionalities of the above cookware, and they can all be done using a wok. So why don’t I use it all the time? For one, there is only one wok in the house, and I don’t cook only one dish. So, go figure.

Now, tell me, whats your favourite cookware?

This article started as a review of Iron Man, but I had a writer’s block midway through, and couldn’t complete the review. So I’m gonna talk about a few things as well. Continue Reading »

Dear Readers,

This is what I think you’re made of:

Continue Reading »

I like telling stories. I can imagine telling them to my kids in the future (the wife would probably have heard most of them when I was courting her).

Here’s a retelling of a koan:

Once upon a time, there was a man, who sauntered up to a jacaranda tree. He sat underneath it, and contemplated life, the universe and everything else. He meditated on the subtle emptiness of things.

It was winter, and the scenery was dead-looking. After some time, out of a sudden, the man beneath the tree is sprinkled with a shower of purple flowers. He was surprised, as there wouldn’t be flowers at this time of the year. He looked up and saw a few gods above him, sprinkling flowers at him.

He said: Thank you!

The gods say: No, thank you, for giving us such a great lesson about emptiness! (These were polite and humble gods, unlike the typical image of an arrogant god)

He said: I said nothing. I gave no discourse on emptiness.

They said: You said nothing, we heard nothing. There was no discourse on emptiness. That was true emptiness that we experienced. That was the teaching of what experience of emptiness is. That is true emptiness. For that we thank you.

And the gods zoomed back into their heavens, leaving the man amused and in a rain of flowers.

And thus ends the story. BRB. I’m going to sit under the jacaranda trees in front of my house. See you guys later!