Wasabi In The Air

A light smell of fish hung in the air. On Friday morning,the Hotel Management section of Tilak Maharashtra Vidyapeeth (TMV) in Mukundnagar,was bustling with activity. Some students dressed in white aprons and a few Japanese teachers feverishly shifted from one table to another,soaking,frying,marinating and plating trays full of ingredients. If this workshop’s intention was to acquaint students of the college with Japanese cooking,it did a great job of it. “We wanted the students to come and taste Japanese home food. We all have heard of and had fancy Japanese dishes,but we wanted them to see how simple,flavour-some everyday food is made in Japanese households,” says Suvarna Sathe,head of department of hotel management at TMV.

One key trait of Japanese food is it’s deft topping of sauces of deep pungency with often wholesome,bland dishes. The workshop made a conventional transition of courses,starting with a soup,some salads,appetisers,main course and then a dessert. The venue was a good place to learn up names and get to know of the standard ingredients. The salads on offer were lightly tossed up dishes featuring fresh cabbage and stout spring onions doused in wasabi sauce (horseradish paste) and miso sauce (a high-on-salt paste made from soya bean). A sprinkling of crushed sesame seeds added a light crunch to them.

The blanched potato and beans splits may make you raise your eyebrows in concern,but when dipped in the ultra salty soya plus wasabi sauce,they make for a crackling starter. The Onigiri rice balls stole all hearts with their sheer simplicity. There were the plain ones,made from sticky Japanese rice (okeme) and plum pickle at the centre; the Furikake variety had small pieced of salmon and nori (seaweed) embedded in them,while the third type came half-wrapped in nori sheets.

Home-maker Satoko Damle and Noriko Kurosawa,a TMV teacher,were the experienced hands who steered the whole session. The participants happily dipped into Saba Misoni ,made with mackerel fish; tofu salad; Kushi Dango (rice flour balls on skewers); vegetable tempuras; and Anmitsu,a jelly and fruit dessert.