Nepali people eat daal bhaat 2-3 times per day. Daal bhaat is rice with lentil soup poured on top of it. It's a wonderfully balanced food that can be adapted for many different tastes. Here is my take on how you should go about learning to cook daal bhaat.
STEP 1 : Go to Nepal
... and a good way to know that you're in Nepal is to visit some of the main sights, like Kathmandu's Durbar Square. This is where the kings used to be crowned and where Kumari Devi lives. Kumari Devi is a little girl who is a reincarnation of some goddess, and she is known as the "living goddess." She's chosen when she's something like 4 years old based on things like her physical appearance, horoscope, and ability to stay calm in a dark room full of scary masks and loud noises. Once she's chosen, everyone has to treat her like a goddess (even her family) and her feet can't touch the ground (like, she can't walk). Then, when she hits puberty, she goes back to being a normal person and someone else is chosen to be the Kumari Devi.
This is a picture of me at Durbar Square. So, step 1 accomplished: I'm in Nepal and can continue the process of learning to cook daal bhaat.
STEP 2 : Go to a Temple and Pray for it to Taste Good.
This is probably not a critical step in the process, but because I'm such a bad cook I didn't want to take any chances. A good choice for a temple is one dedicated to Ganesh, such as this one. Ganesh is the elephant-headed god that brings good luck. As far as I can tell, popular things to do at temples (as part of praying) are lighting incense, ringing bells, and putting red tikka powder on the god-statue's forehead.
This is me and Maria at the Ganesh temple, hanging out with Ganesh's mouse. The story is that Ganesh rides a mouse for transport while his brother rides a peacock. I'd hate to be the sibling that ended up with a mouse instead of a peacock. Maybe that's why I'm not a god.
STEP 3 : Find People who are Hungry.
This step isn't very hard. I found lots of them. From left to right, these hungry kids are Keshav, me, Rachel, Santiago, Maria, Abby, and Julia.
STEP 4 : Find Someone who Will Teach You to Cook.
This step might be a little more tricky than the last. Even if you know someone who can teach you, you have to get to them. There are many wonderful transport options in Nepal, one of them being overflowing buses.
This time, instead of riding in one of these crazy buses, we opted to take our own van. Our van has holes in the floor and the mirrors fall off without warning, but it's been a pretty trusty ride so far. For our daal bhaat cooking lessons, we went to a town called Lamatar to visit Sulav and his family.
STEP 5 : Make a Movie
Or not. Your choice. On the way, we happened to run into a filming of a Nepali comedy movie. It was extremely over-acted and really pretty entertaining.
STEP 6 : Pray to More Gods.
We already hit up the Hindu gods at the Ganesh temple, but just to be sure that our meal wouldn't be terrible, we decided to stop at the Pharping Buddhist monastery. This is where Maria and Santiago will be volunteering. Doesn't look like they're terribly needy people to me...
We happened to stop by when the monks were reading the Tibetan scriptures. It's really cool! They sit in front of that big gold Buddha, and they chant together while blowing horns, clanging symbols, and hitting drums. It's overwhelming and amazing sound. It's the craziest kind of praying I've ever heard (in a really good way).
In reality, the reason we stopped here was to pick up another volunteer who would also come to Lamatar with us. Her name is Laurel. She's from Canada, and she's the most annoying person I've ever met. She's extremely rude and unappreciative of anything that is given to her. For example, when we got to Sulav's home in Lamatar, she looked inside our room and said "wait till you see this place - it looks like a cellar and has cardboard ceilings." That's definitely not what I'd like to hear if I invited a stranger into my home...
STEP 7 : Dance.
Some of the girls in Lamatar put on a show for us. Afterward, we all got to dance together. It was a really fun time, and a really good way to work up an appetite for dal bhaat :-)
STEP 8 : Rest.
The road to becoming a good cook can be long and hard. It's OK to take a break here and there. Nepali people are never in a hurry anyway.
This is me getting excited to rest.
STEP 9 : Pray Again.
Gods can be pretty busy, so you can never be too sure that they'll remember your prayers. We were really serious about making some good daal bhaat, so we decided to visit as many holy places as possible. The great thing about Hindu temples is that anything that reminds you of a god can be holy. If someone thinks that a rock resembles some god, then they put it into their temple and bless it with red tikka powder.
Of course, praying has to be loud and exciting, so you must ring as many bells as possible.
STEP 10 : Work up an Appetite.
The best way to do this step is by walking up mountains and through big fields of food. This is Sulav walking through the mustard fields in Lamatar. The whole time I was in Kathmandu I felt like I was suffocating in the pollution. Once we got to Lamatar, I remembered what it's like to breathe. Kathmandu is a necessary evil, but rural Nepal is a true heaven.
STEP 11 : Connect with Nepal.
Nepali people eat daal bhaat, so understanding Nepal should help us to make some good daal bhaat. According to Sulav, Nepali people like nature. This is me and Santiago feeling happy to be out of the city and connecting with Nepal's wonderful nature. The fern plant that I have on my head is called uniu. Uniu was a great plant, a great friend, a very important part of our time in Lamatar.
STEP 12 : Have a Snack.
Yes, we are going to cook daal bhaat, but there's no shame in having a quick snack along the way. This was a nice shop somewhere up the mountain where we had some noodles. At this point, I was kind of glad to have a break, because the Canadian girl kept complaining about how she hates walking and has a million medical conditions that could make her die any second.
STEP 13 : Locate the Ingrediants
Sulav is a mushroom farmer. He grows mushrooms by putting bags full of hay and wheat inside a dark and humid area. After the bags have been hanging for about 3 months, he cuts them open and mushrooms grow out of them. Then, every morning at a ridiculously early hour, he cuts them from the bags and brings them into Kathmandu to sell them.
Mushrooms weren't actually involved in our daal bhaat, although I'm sure you could put them in if you wanted to. I took a taste and let the team know that the mushrooms weren't quite ready to be picked yet.
STEP 14 : Locate the Correct Ingrediants.
One thing that we actually did use in our daal bhaat was potatoes. Here's Maria cutting up the potatoes. The method of cutting potatoes was to kneel on this metal thing with a sharp knife thing sticking in the air. You just push the potato against the knife.
This is a picture of Julia's brilliant cutting skills. She was the best potato cutter out of all of us.
STEP 15 : Play with the Kids.
If the Nepali kids don't like you, it means that you have no chance of ever understanding Nepali culture enough to make a good daal bhaat.
Luckily, Aruna and I got along wonderfully, so there's still hope that our daal bhaat will turn out alright.
STEP 16 : Fry the Potatoes.
The potatoes are fried in mustard oil with chili, fennel, and turmeric. This is just one of the many "side" things that you can put into daal bhaat. So far, it seems like other popular vegetables to put into daal bhaat are spinach and cauliflower. The kinds of vegetables they use depend on the season, though.
STEP 18 : Make Some Rice.
The "bhaat" part of daal bhaat is rice, so it is definitely necessary to cook rice for the daal bhaat. This can be a very difficult task, so it is important to have supportive friends to comfort you while stirring the rice. Sulav has a fire pit area in his barn where we boiled the rice in a metal pot. It makes a lot of sense to cook your food on a fire or with propane, since you don't get power every day at the same time.
STEP 19 : Make Some Lentil Soup.
I don't have any pictures of it, but the last thing that you have to do for daal bhaat is to make the "daal" part, which is lentil soup. Basically, you boil lentils in water and pour it onto the rice.
STEP 20 : Eat and Repeat.
I could be here my whole life trying to finish this step, and that's not really a bad thing.
Now, a final note: Tomorrow morning we are leaving for Chitwan. That's where I will start my teaching project. I have no idea when I will have internet again - it might be tomorrow, or it might be in a month. I want you all to know that my extreme culture shock is over, and I no longer hate my life. I'm very happy with where I am and what I'm doing. I'm loving the people that I'm meeting, and I'm amazed by the things I'm seeing. I feel like I'm learning a lot about myself and how to be strong in hard situations. I'm also learning about others and how life can be so dramatically different from anything I've ever known. Every minute, I realize again how unique these experiences are. Our world is developing very quickly, and I believe (or even sometimes hope) that some of these places and experiences won't exist in the near future. Anyway... I love you all, and I'll be thinking of you during my 6 hour bus ride down south and during the long days in the village.
STEP 1 : Go to Nepal
... and a good way to know that you're in Nepal is to visit some of the main sights, like Kathmandu's Durbar Square. This is where the kings used to be crowned and where Kumari Devi lives. Kumari Devi is a little girl who is a reincarnation of some goddess, and she is known as the "living goddess." She's chosen when she's something like 4 years old based on things like her physical appearance, horoscope, and ability to stay calm in a dark room full of scary masks and loud noises. Once she's chosen, everyone has to treat her like a goddess (even her family) and her feet can't touch the ground (like, she can't walk). Then, when she hits puberty, she goes back to being a normal person and someone else is chosen to be the Kumari Devi.
STEP 2 : Go to a Temple and Pray for it to Taste Good.
This is probably not a critical step in the process, but because I'm such a bad cook I didn't want to take any chances. A good choice for a temple is one dedicated to Ganesh, such as this one. Ganesh is the elephant-headed god that brings good luck. As far as I can tell, popular things to do at temples (as part of praying) are lighting incense, ringing bells, and putting red tikka powder on the god-statue's forehead.
This step isn't very hard. I found lots of them. From left to right, these hungry kids are Keshav, me, Rachel, Santiago, Maria, Abby, and Julia.
This step might be a little more tricky than the last. Even if you know someone who can teach you, you have to get to them. There are many wonderful transport options in Nepal, one of them being overflowing buses.
Or not. Your choice. On the way, we happened to run into a filming of a Nepali comedy movie. It was extremely over-acted and really pretty entertaining.
We already hit up the Hindu gods at the Ganesh temple, but just to be sure that our meal wouldn't be terrible, we decided to stop at the Pharping Buddhist monastery. This is where Maria and Santiago will be volunteering. Doesn't look like they're terribly needy people to me...
In reality, the reason we stopped here was to pick up another volunteer who would also come to Lamatar with us. Her name is Laurel. She's from Canada, and she's the most annoying person I've ever met. She's extremely rude and unappreciative of anything that is given to her. For example, when we got to Sulav's home in Lamatar, she looked inside our room and said "wait till you see this place - it looks like a cellar and has cardboard ceilings." That's definitely not what I'd like to hear if I invited a stranger into my home...
Some of the girls in Lamatar put on a show for us. Afterward, we all got to dance together. It was a really fun time, and a really good way to work up an appetite for dal bhaat :-)
The road to becoming a good cook can be long and hard. It's OK to take a break here and there. Nepali people are never in a hurry anyway.
Gods can be pretty busy, so you can never be too sure that they'll remember your prayers. We were really serious about making some good daal bhaat, so we decided to visit as many holy places as possible. The great thing about Hindu temples is that anything that reminds you of a god can be holy. If someone thinks that a rock resembles some god, then they put it into their temple and bless it with red tikka powder.
The best way to do this step is by walking up mountains and through big fields of food. This is Sulav walking through the mustard fields in Lamatar. The whole time I was in Kathmandu I felt like I was suffocating in the pollution. Once we got to Lamatar, I remembered what it's like to breathe. Kathmandu is a necessary evil, but rural Nepal is a true heaven.
Nepali people eat daal bhaat, so understanding Nepal should help us to make some good daal bhaat. According to Sulav, Nepali people like nature. This is me and Santiago feeling happy to be out of the city and connecting with Nepal's wonderful nature. The fern plant that I have on my head is called uniu. Uniu was a great plant, a great friend, a very important part of our time in Lamatar.
Yes, we are going to cook daal bhaat, but there's no shame in having a quick snack along the way. This was a nice shop somewhere up the mountain where we had some noodles. At this point, I was kind of glad to have a break, because the Canadian girl kept complaining about how she hates walking and has a million medical conditions that could make her die any second.
Sulav is a mushroom farmer. He grows mushrooms by putting bags full of hay and wheat inside a dark and humid area. After the bags have been hanging for about 3 months, he cuts them open and mushrooms grow out of them. Then, every morning at a ridiculously early hour, he cuts them from the bags and brings them into Kathmandu to sell them.
One thing that we actually did use in our daal bhaat was potatoes. Here's Maria cutting up the potatoes. The method of cutting potatoes was to kneel on this metal thing with a sharp knife thing sticking in the air. You just push the potato against the knife.
If the Nepali kids don't like you, it means that you have no chance of ever understanding Nepali culture enough to make a good daal bhaat.
The potatoes are fried in mustard oil with chili, fennel, and turmeric. This is just one of the many "side" things that you can put into daal bhaat. So far, it seems like other popular vegetables to put into daal bhaat are spinach and cauliflower. The kinds of vegetables they use depend on the season, though.
STEP 18 : Make Some Rice.
The "bhaat" part of daal bhaat is rice, so it is definitely necessary to cook rice for the daal bhaat. This can be a very difficult task, so it is important to have supportive friends to comfort you while stirring the rice. Sulav has a fire pit area in his barn where we boiled the rice in a metal pot. It makes a lot of sense to cook your food on a fire or with propane, since you don't get power every day at the same time.
STEP 19 : Make Some Lentil Soup.
I don't have any pictures of it, but the last thing that you have to do for daal bhaat is to make the "daal" part, which is lentil soup. Basically, you boil lentils in water and pour it onto the rice.
STEP 20 : Eat and Repeat.
I could be here my whole life trying to finish this step, and that's not really a bad thing.
Now, a final note: Tomorrow morning we are leaving for Chitwan. That's where I will start my teaching project. I have no idea when I will have internet again - it might be tomorrow, or it might be in a month. I want you all to know that my extreme culture shock is over, and I no longer hate my life. I'm very happy with where I am and what I'm doing. I'm loving the people that I'm meeting, and I'm amazed by the things I'm seeing. I feel like I'm learning a lot about myself and how to be strong in hard situations. I'm also learning about others and how life can be so dramatically different from anything I've ever known. Every minute, I realize again how unique these experiences are. Our world is developing very quickly, and I believe (or even sometimes hope) that some of these places and experiences won't exist in the near future. Anyway... I love you all, and I'll be thinking of you during my 6 hour bus ride down south and during the long days in the village.
0 comments:
Post a Comment