I have met women with a manner exuding an ease that is so attractive, it could only belong on a runway.
In the tiniest of towns in Rajasthan, the one thing that blinds more than the desert Sun and a luminous Moon is an effortless femininity that is feisty, fervent and certainly, fun.
Just duets or groups of women huddled together, deep in conversation about love, life, annoying mothers-in-law, awkward husbands, dreams unrealized - dreams that they are sure someday will, colours and clothes and jewellery, children they wish they had, children they wish they hadn't, the food they prepare every hour of every day, and finally, places they would run away to if the familiar, monotonous and dare they say, fulfilling lives they led didn't keep them back.
A few minutes had passed since I began eavesdropping on a conversation between two stunning women, when one of them turned around, eyebrow-raised and head tilted, to give me the look. Clad in regalia that veiled and revealed all the right parts, wearing that questioning look of revulsion, this woman was a photographer's dream - a vision that could stop you dead in your tracks, turning you part-intoxicated and part-intimated by such beauty.
I saved the vision for later and meekly walked away, like anybody should when women, deep in conversation, don't look like they want to be disturbed.
But in the minutes before the eyebrow was raised on me, I did mark what was on her menu the previous night.
Making what she did definitely makes me look back at this moment with far more ease than I felt when she did the same, nevertheless, giving me a vision of womanhood that was striking, strong and quite sultry, to say the least.
BAJRA KHICHDI
Bajra or Pearl Millet is a cereal coarsely crushed to prepare a porridge that is served piping hot, on cold desert nights in many homes of the Marwar region.
You would need:
A third of a cup of whole bajra (Pearl Millet)
Three tablespoons of yellow moong daal (split yellow gram)
One teaspoon of jeera (cumin seeds)
Half a teaspoon of hing (asafoetida)
Two tablespoons of ghee (clarified butter)
Salt to taste.
Begin with cleaning and grinding the bajra to a coarse powder in a blender.
Wash the ground bajra and moong daal together.
Adding salt and two cups of water to the washed mixture, pressure cook it until 4 whistles have blown.
The millet together with the daal is likely to be cooked by this time. If not, wait another whistle.
Heat the ghee in a pan, adding the jeera and hing.
When the seeds begin to crackle, pour the contents cooking in the pan over the cooked cereal and daal in the cooker and mix it all well.
You may have to adjust the consistency of the khichdi right before serving it by adding half a cup of hot water.
And then, go ahead and serve this simple but delicious bowl of warm goodness with a dollop of hot ghee or cold curd.
