Cooking by the book
Popular cookbook Handmade features traditional dishes from Sri Lanka. Vani Gunabalasubramaniam decided to host a cooking party highlighting its fare
Vani Gunabalasubramaniam has long been nostalgic for the dishes her mother made when she was a girl growing up in Sri Lanka.
But her mother only cooks Sri Lankan fare on special occasions these days, and Gunabalasubramaniam’s attempts to recreate those dishes or try recipes off the internet always seemed to be missing something.
So when Handmade, a popular Sri Lankan cookbook published by Sri Lankan-Australian non-profit Palmera, became available in Canada in November, she immediately placed an order for it.
She wasn’t alone. Many of her second generation Sri Lankan friends had heard glowing reviews and picked up copies, too.
On its website, Palmera recommends using it to host an event.
Gunabalasubramaniam, 39, did just that, and invited a group of friends to each make a favourite recipe from the book.
“The recipes in this book felt familiar,” she said. “The book just looks so beautiful. You look at it, and it inspired you try the recipes.”
Her cooking party/potluck lunch for about 20 friends took place in December.
It started on a Sunday morning, in the kitchen of her North York home with Gunabalasubramaniam and her sister-in-law, Kavitha Shanmugurajah, poring over the recipe for Koli Kari (chicken curry), while Gunabalasubramaniam’s husband, Gajen Pararajalingam, kept a steady rhythm with a meat cleaver, chopping up half a kilo of boneless chicken required to make the fourserving dish.
Gunabalasubramaniam had already arranged the other ingredients for the Koli Kari, as well as for a second dish, Iraal Kari (prawn curry), on a plate. Onion, garlic, chilies, fenugreek seeds, fennel seeds, ginger, curry leaves, coconut milk, lime and curry powder, ready to be measured and added to the dishes as needed.
The quantity of the last ingredient — curry powder — was about to be debated when the doorbell rang and more people joined the kitchen party.
Sukaneya Moorthy arrived first, with a batch of Milk Toffee.
“I was up till 1:30 this morning making this,” Moorthy told the women as she made herself at home and opened the lid of a large takeout container. She went over the steps of the tricky recipe for the sticky, fudgelike treat that tastes like Mackintosh toffee. “Just twist it a little bit,” she said, as the women tried to break off a square.
Kasthurie Sugumar was next to arrive, with the remaining ingredients for the Iraal Kari — fresh prawns and homemade coconut milk. “It tastes way better than canned coconut milk. You can smell it the minute it hits the pan. Although my mum has now started to use cans — sometimes,” she added.
As Shanmugurajah pounded the ginger, garlic and green chilies mixture in a mortar and pestle, Gunabalasubramaniam dry-roasted the spices Moorthy handed to her and Sugumar waited her turn on the stovetop, each woman consulted their personal copy of Handmade, which they all brought with them.
“Don’t worry, I’ve written my name down in my copy,” said Sugumar, when her turn came to take to the stove, and she flipped through her book.
The conversation turned from one component of the recipe they were making to the next. They wondered about some of the measurements of the spice and salt level, which seemed a little mild to them.
“The book was put together in Australia. Maybe they toned it down a little,” Gunabalasubramaniam said.
“Well, I guess we’ll see when we taste it,” Sugumar said. “Smells right though.”
Handmade features recipes from Sri Lanka’s northern regions interspersed with stories of struggle, hope and survival of 34 women rebuilding their lives after the 26-year civil war ended in 2009.
It was first published in 2015 by Palmera. An NPR feature on the cookbook a year later was widely shared on Facebook, creating a buzz. The book became available here in November through Comdu.it, a Toronto not-for-profit with a mission to carry out sustainable development in Sri Lanka.
The cookbook details traditional ways of cooking Sri Lankan fare and methods still followed in rural areas. A “Basics” section includes “utensils” such as mortar and pestle ( ural), a rice winnowing tray ( soolahu) and coconut shell spoon ( siratte aheppe) — items not commonly found in modern Sri Lankan kitchens.
“Are you sure you want to keep on using that?” Gunabalasubramaniam asked Shanmugurajah, pointing to the mortar and pestle she was using to grind the chilies, ginger and garlic. “I have a blender.”
“I’m following the recipe,” Shanmugurajah replied. “It says pound, so I’m pounding.”
“It would be easier with the ammi,” said Sugumar, referring to the traditional grindstone used in Sri Lankan cooking, which is not listed in the book. “Remember those? I think these days you only see them as part of the wedding ceremony,” she said, referring to one of the rituals of the Sri Lankan Hindu tradition. “When the groom puts on the metti (toe ring) and touches the bride’s foot to the ammi.”
The other women smiled and nodded.
The women soon returned to the curry powder — or lack thereof — in the recipes they were following. The women questioned the quantity called for and debated whether to add more to the simmering Koli Kari and Iraal Kari.
Moorthy worried the dishes would be too hot and spicy to handle.
“What exactly is this curry powder?” she asked, pointing to the spice as Gunabalasubramaniam was about to add another spoon to the Koli Kari.
“It’s not what you get in the regular grocery store,” Gunabalasubramaniam said. “They’re talking about Sri Lankan curry powder, what we also call Jaffna powder. You can find it in a Spiceland,” she said, referring to a popular Sri Lankan grocery store in Scarborough.
The conversation moved to rediscovering recipes that second generation Sri Lankan Canadians may have forgotten. These women were keen on passing down recipes from the Handmade cookbook to their own kids.
“There really aren’t that many (Sri Lankan cookbooks) out there at all,” Gunabalasubramaniam said. “I have seen others that are not very comprehensive. There are some things online, some bloggers trying out recipes. But it just doesn’t taste the same as what I grew up eating at home.”
When Gunabalasubramaniam arrived in Toronto when she was 10 years old, the ingredients to make authentic Sri Lankan food were not readily available.
“(You didn’t find) things like long beans or seeds of jackfruit. You didn’t have so many options of ethnic grocery stores,” she said. Besides, parents were often too busy juggling jobs and adjusting to life in a new country to cook elaborate meals such as kool (soup or porridge).
Now, even though Sri Lankan cooking ingredients are readily available and their lives are more settled, these recipes have been relegated to special occasions.
“Every time my brother comes to visit from California, my mother will make a big vat of odiyal kool — it’s like a bouillabaisse, with a thick texture, like a seafood chowder,” Gunabalasubramaniam said. “It’s become like a special treat.”
The doorbell rang again, and two more families arrived with containers of food. As Esa Thurairajah got out of her coat and sat down, she jumped into the conversation about cooking from Handmade.
“It’s also good to get the husbands cooking,” she said, bringing out her container of Murungakkai Kari (drumstick curry), while her husband Valavan Manohararajah added his contribution to the potluck — Keerai Vadai, a savoury spinach-lentil doughnut-like snack.
“The recipes were simple, easy to follow. I liked that,” Thurairajah said.
As more friends started to arrive, Gunabalasubramaniam directed them to the dining table that was quickly filling up with an elaborate spread of dishes from the cookbook.
“After lunch, we’ll have some masala tea,” she said, referring to another recipe from Handmade. “We tried some earlier today. It’s quite good.” Tamil Worlds Initiative along with the Culinaria Research Centreis hosting a public discussion around the book at the Toronto Public Library Malvern Branch on Jan. 27 at 2 p.m. Check out their Facebook events page. For more information on Handmade, and upcoming related events, visit comdu.it/handmade/