Rui Lau Exotica

For last few days I have been packing and packing only and still there is so much yet to pack. I tell you, you should not waste money after buying clothes. They are useless. They don't have any resale value and after few years, they lie abandoned, buried under piles of other clothes. If you are to shift houses or places, the big headache apart from furniture are the clothes. Just buy clothes as per your need and wear them out before spending money on new ones. 

I was a bit shopaholic by nature, specially immediately after my marriage, the way I went into a shopping frenzy often, the money spent would have bought me another new car. Last time when we packed our stuff and shifted to Bangalore, I left behind at my home two big trunks full of clothes. I received tongue-lashing from my mother but since I have always been an unruly child, I hardly paid any heed to her years of wisdom. As they say few people learn by peeing on the electric fence, same goes for me. I don't take any lesson to my heart until I make mistakes and forcefully learn.

Now that am again shifting, packing clothes and segregating them - for use, for dumping at home and for donating to an NGO are a herculean task. I wish I would have known that shopping under the influence of madness entails a side effect of this measure :(

 

Ingredients:                                     Cooking time: 3o-40 minutes ü  5 pieces of rohu, preferably from the back side ü  1 bottle gourd or lau (chopped) ü  2 medium sized potatoes (cubed into medium size) ü  1 tsp turmeric powder ü  2 tsp cumin powder ü  1 tsp coriander powder ü  1 tsp red chilli powder ü  1/2 tsp garam masala powder ü  1 tsp ginger paste ü  1 1/2 tsp sugar ü  4-5 green chillies (Slit) ü  Salt to taste ü  Mustard oil for cooking For Sauté: ü  2 bay leaves ü  1/2 tsp cumin seeds Method: 1) Rub turmeric powder and salt on the fish pieces and fry them till brown in color over medium flame. Take the fish pieces off the heat. 2) Then remove the bones and crumble the fish pieces, using your hand just as shown below: 3) Into the same oil, add the ingredients for sauté and wait for them to sputter. Then add the cubed potatoes and shallow fry them till they turn golden brown in color. 4) Toss in the chopped lau or bottle gourd. Sprinkle salt and turmeric powder. Cook covered on medium flame till the water content in bottle gourd dries up a bit. 5) Add cumin powder, coriander powder, red chilli powder, ginger paste and green chillies. 6) When bottle gourd becomes completely dry and turns soft, add sugar, crumbled fish pieces and just a dash of water. Cook covered till the ingredients blend well. 7) Finally sprinkle garam masala powder and mix in. Turn the heat off. 8) Serve hot with steaming rice. Ah bliss!