Reflections on Things at Hand: Eating in India

Every so often, even at crazy times like this, I'm hoping to delve back into earlier trips - ones that preceded the travel blog or even my travel journal. So, I want to include little glimpses here and there of earlier travel adventures, especially those relating to India. All of my four trips to India happened before the blog or the journal. It especially pains me how much of the memories of that amazing time I spent teaching at our Mumbai campus (the summer of 2004 - can't believe it's been almost six years) have begun to fade away. It would be impossible to discuss all the amazing meals I ate in India so I won't even try - I ate like a prince, and usually for next to nothing, and still lost weight. Part of the weight loss related to the fact that the food, for the most part, had very little fat in it. Most everything is vegetarian - so much so that when you go to a restaurant there is a little section at the bottom called "Non Veg." And even if it's not "Non Veg" it usually just means that they waved a piece of meat over the skillet while cooking. Anyway, I'm not going to try and recount all my meals, at least not here, so let me talk about a couple cool places right around my apartment. There was an ice cream shop about five minutes away and they served fresh coconut ice cream, which I ate every night. They would just see me coming, smile and wave, and start piling ice cream. The other interesting place was a guy right down the street (and I mean down the street, because he just sat in the street) from my apartment who served corn - remarkably simple, but delicious. He cooked the corn over an open flame, and then took a half-lime, dipped in a mixture of salt and chili powder, and rubbed it over the corn. Amazing. I miss India so much, even today.