SOME think monsoon weather is the dreary pits but some, my dears, think it’s balmy weather. Nothing can stop them from celebrating! Not Margao’s Dr. Carmo Gracias and wife Fernanda for whom it was a double celebration on July 18, 2010, at Kesarval Gardens. I should say Rachel Faleiro’s Kesarval Gardens for she’s the brains, hard work and spirit behind the smooth running of this refurbished rest and recreation place idyllically located close to the Nuvem Industrial Estate on the highway to Margao. The celebration marked 70 years of Dr. Carmo Gracias’ popular Gracias Nursing Home & Pro-life Centre (Margao) which has seen many a Margao baby born. Plus, it was the dotor’s birthday, so add on one more reason to celebrate.

Most of the aristocratic Shastikars of Margao were present and if Rachel is in charge one may expect a perfect menu to die for, or live for (depending on how negative or positive you want to be!)…and I’m never wrong. The monsoon’s some dire season of course when one’s supposed to be more vegetarian than non-vegetarian. But not when it’s Rachel’s do and this was a family-cum-extended family and friends party. The Gracias and Faleiro families are kinsfolk with Faleiros’ son Lenin married to Gracias’ daughter Shaheen… and both fathers-in-laws Luizinho Faleiro and Dr. Carmo Gracias like holding court. A good thing wives Rachel and Fernanda, respectively, are such practical, down-to-earth women, they’re two Shastikar women down south whose husbands listen to them!

In a sense it was a political bash with South Goa who’s who paying homage to the Gracias and Faleiro families. Chief Minister Digambar-bab walked in without Asha Kamat and left soon after some affable chit chatting with everyone wanting to listen in. There were a couple of politicians but I’m skipping them here because at this point of time there’s nothing to recommend any of Goa’s politicians! In Goa, my dears, it’s no longer a case of which politician is corrupt but which politician is more corrupt than the other. But "Potpourri" is for social chit chatter and not political chatter! Funny, how one meets up with some folk only at birthday bashes and one finds oneself exchanging sweet nothings or sweet somethings depending on who catches one’s fancy.

I confess I still have to get to know a whole lot of Shashtikars. But I spied Margarida Tavora e Costa of Fernando’s Nostalgia and caught up with her. Nostalgia in Raia in case you don’t know is a place where one may always find genuine Goan food, and although the lively Fernando’s gone with the wind, wife Margarida keeps his culinary heritage alive with some sterling staff. She tells me she’s doing well with South Indian staff trained by Fernando and they cook better Goan food than many a Goan chef! Well, I know Nostalgia still delivers the most scrumptious bol sans rival (cake without rival) when few of today’s cake shops (with the exception of Clifford Rosario’s A Pastaleria) have even heard of this vintage Portuguese-styled cake, the only cake worth eating in Goa!

South Goa SP Allan D’Sa was around but I’m not spilling beans on police confidences, my dears! Mine owner Prashant Timblo, Hubert Gomes (who’s running in the next assembly elections in Benaulimand if he wins I hope he won’t turn into one of today’s politicians!), the evergreen Dr Francisco Colaco, former Justice Euric D’Silva and family, my friends Yogita and Pravin Gosalia (Yogita tells me the Big G in Panjim is coming up well and the nearest thing to shopping in Mumbai or Bangalore malls, check out the Panjim Big G one of these days). Indefatigable and engaging entrepreneur Anil Counto told me he’s just returned from Finland, he had some interesting stories to tell about how in these Scandivian countries one may see the Prime Minister cycling down the street for the cause of the environment! Finland is so up north close to the Arctic Circle that it sees six months of total darkness and six months of total sunshine and yet they manage to make the most of solar energy to stay lit up around the clock…for a few days, Anil-bab confided, he didn’t know when to go off to sleep and when to wake up, it was hard to tune in his body clock. Amazing country, Finland.

Soon enough it was time to cut the cake and tuck in to some superlative xitt-coddi and coddi need not automatically mean fish curry. Rachel tells me during the monsoon it’s succulent prawn curry which is the piece de resistance for the prawns come from Goa’s khazan land monsoon catch…Rachel’s the only one I know who can come with superb "rogan ghosh". Of course, all the other Goan favourites were there and thankfully Rachel thinks of vegetarians too for come the monsoon season quite a few Goans turn vegetarian. Although I continue to rue how vegetarians are never taken seriously in Goa - not even Hindu Goans who love their zitt-coddi be it fish coddi or prawn coddi.

OKAY, I’m in the mood to make this into a foodie "Potpourri"! If you’re a Malabar cuisine lover try to catch the "Malabar on a Platter" monsoon dinner offering on at the Cidade de Goa’s Café Azul. Veteran Chef Prasad Paul and invitee Chef Rupesh Dinakaran from Kerala have lined up a live appam and hot crinkly paratha station to go with spicy, tangy curries from Malabar’s distinctive "Mappila" or "Moplah" cuisine. A lot of meaty dishes but I went for the sake of the very vegetarian appam, my dears. Even in Kerala one may not get to eat such genuine toddy-fermented appam! Toddy as you must know, my dears, is the liquor of the tadgola palm and in Kerala there’re any number of registered toddy shops around the corner …in Goa too finicky sannam makers will hunt for toddy to ferment the rice batter.

But never compare Goa’s sannam with Kerala’s appam! Sannam is rich steamed rice cake while appam is as delicate as white lace and Chef Prasad tells me it’s the Syrian Christian community (wealthy Mallus who converted) who took the basic rice pancake of Kerala and turned it into a thing of sublime beauty. It’s a pity lazy chefs in Kerala and Goa — and homemakers (what you call housewives nowadays to be polite!) - use yeast instead of toddy to ferment sannam or appam batter. It makes a big difference to the taste of the final product! Only toddy-fermented rice batter offers up the heady sweetish warm aroma of appam with a central sponge so delicious that one could be eating manna from heaven …yeast appam tastes like shoddy bread in comparison!

This is to say they’re serving traditional appam at the Malabar food festival at Café Azul and one may get high on them (not in the alcoholic sense, stupid, but as in the original, traditional taste of something not to be found easily!). I was too busy eating you know what to bother about the hot Malabari paratha…but to complement both appam and paratha there’re the curries of Kerala e.g. Malabar Kozhi Curry (chicken stewed with coconut milk and southern spices), Mutton Ishtew (boneless tender lamb cubes stewed with potatoes in coconut milk), Kozhi Karuvepilai Varuthathu (crisp chicken stir-fried with curry leaves), Nadam Meen Curry (fierce, tangy fish curry stewed in an earthern pot), Mappilla Biryani (do you know that mutton biryani is the choice biryani always served to the son-in-law of the family in Malabar Muslim homes)…not to forget Nai Meen Pollichathu (spiced kingfish slices baked in banana leaf). Two recipes I fell for i.e. Ulli Thiyal (tangy shallot curry, using the little maroon coloured baby onions — such a headache to peel but which make a sambar or curry come alive with flavour), and Kai Mezhukku Peratti (stir-fried plantain). After that you may round off your meal with Kuthu Arri Chorru or steamed organic unpolished rice, coconut rice, lemon rice, curd-rice and any number of cooling curd-laced pachadi of cucumber, carrot, beetroot, cabbage… etcetera.

After eating four or was it five appam soaked in vegetable stew I wasn’t going to eat anything else. But you may take your pick from Kozhikode Halva, Semiya Payasam, Banana Basundi, Madakku Pola, Achappam, Sugiyan, fruit salad, ice-cream and so on… after a long time I was looking at Dilkush (basically a soft sweet pie encrusted with chopped dry fruit). Another time, I told Chef Prasad Paul, and he should seriously think of putting their toddy appam on the regular menu. I will always step in not just to eat them but take away home packs! On that note, au revoir, ciao, poitavera, my dears.

– Mme Butterfly