LASOON, Atina’s Garlic Nut Crumble, continues to build its followers slowly and steadily ever since we introduce it as a roasted crumbly, cooking and topping medium. Heat up your roasting pan, add a half a tea spoon of cooking oil and two tablespoons of Lasoon, saute the mixture in low fire till you get the combined smell of Garlic, coconut, sesame and peanuts. To this, add a pound of your favorite vegetable, meat, fish or cheese, cut in small sizes and cook in low fire as you like.
LASOON adds a unique dimension to your food by giving the combined tastes of Garlic and three oil nuts; coconut, sesame and peanut all in crunchy crumbly form with a slight hotness of chili pepper and salt to your main food. If you want to increase the base of the dish, roast 1 or 2 finely sliced onions along with LASOON ‘til the mixture become brown and then add your main ingredient and cook in low fire.
Carrie likes to sprinkle on a half cut butternut squash and bake in the oven, with shitake mushrooms, a little maple syrup and garnished after with fresh parsley, as well just a simple saute with mushrooms. Our customers suggest putting it on popcorn, and toasting it to sprinkle on ice cream, as there is a natural sweetness of the coconut makes the combination awesome. Some customers say they cook everything with LASOON!
The story of LASOON
During the last week of December 1983, at the age of 19, I came to live in the big city of Bombay, now Mumbai, Western India, from my little home town, Thiruvananthapuram, capital of the state of Kerala, South India. The city of Bombay was a shocking experience for a small town boy like me who arrived at Dadar railway station after several days of ticket less travel in the Indian railway trains, with no money, no contacts, no place to stay. After three months of struggle of living through the streets of Bombay, finally I got “a decent job” as a medical representative to sell modern medicine in a pharmaceutical company. Since then, I returned to the city many times in various incarnations or living experiments and I always love the madness of the city, which provides living opportunities for countless millions of poor and underprivileged people from all over India, while helping the rich ones to become even more rich, by every second.
If somebody asks me what is my favorite food from the city, without second thought, I would answer, Vada Pavu, a sandwich snack. It is the king of all street foods in the city, known for its incredible varieties of such fast foods. It is the most preferred breakfast snack of poor people. It is cheap, filling and nourishing. Like any new migrant to the city, it was the first food that I ever ate by the kindness of a road side vendor who later become one of my best friend in the city. Vada Pavu is sold by countless street vendors or families through their little make shift food stands all over the city and suburbs, and is what really keeps the life of the city alive. It was told by some city historians that Vada Pavu was initially crafted to serve the millions of Marathi speaking people who formed the majority of mill workers employed in the once sprawling textile manufacturing industry, now extinct, leaving Vada Pavu for the city.
The snack has two components, first Vada which is a mashed potato ball dipped in chickpea batter, Besan, and deep fried in oil. Secondly Pav, is a square shaped baked bread made mostly from refined wheat flour. It is so easy to make this, by slicing the Pav, square bread into two halves, and apply a thin layer of a dark brown crunchy powder called Lasoon, on both layers, place the fried the potato ball in the middle, close it, press down, your Vada Pavu sandwich is ready to eat. Though each vendor has their own special variations of Vada Pavu, making by adding more spice combinations like red pepper powder, mint chutney, fried green peppers, tamarind chutney, slice of onion, tomato, garam masala etc., my favorite still is the one made exclusively sprinkled with Lasoon. Layers of taste from softness of bread and potato to the crunchiness of oil nuts and pungent hit of Garlic at the end with little peppery hot and salty. This taste is everlasting, and with me since the moment I first tasted it.
Whenever I happened to be in the city, I tried to learn to make Lasoon from experts. It happened many years after I first tasted it, when I met Bobby’s mother. Bobby was one of my dear friends in the city then and he used to live in his joint family house with his wife in a posh area of the city. Their house was a traditional matriarchal family where Bobby’s mother was the boss. She was a loving and kind person deeply rooted in her cultural traditions. Her knowledge of food was deep, particularly her Kathiyavadi recipes of Gujarat. I was so fortunate to meet her, it was she taught me how to make Lasoon. I salute that great mother who left this world a while back and I continue to seek her love and blessings.
She agreed to teach me the making of Lasoon, if Bobby and me would do all the roasting, grinding, mixing, which is an elaborate and time consuming task. She put conditions; no alcohol drinking or smoking while cooking, which was a hard task for us to achieve at that point in our young lives. Finally after many months, one day that happened and Bobby and me were ready to cook Lasoon. It was a kind of miracle, and it became an exciting news for the whole extended family and friends. Suddenly we were in the middle of a big crowd of people watching us making Lasoon.
Bobby’s mother made the kitchen ready. We all sat around with bowls of Garlic cloves to peel, slicing fresh round copra, the sun dried coconut kernel into tiny pieces, sifting through sesame seeds, peanuts and whole dried red pepper for any impurities. When all ingredients were cleaned and ready, Bobby and me were given the task of roasting. We were given to separate fire burners and steel voks to work and Mother reminded us that the success of perfect roasting is in the control of fire, not to burn any parts of any ingredients. Each ingredient has different roasting time to achieve perfection. Perfect roasting time is just when the dry ingredient turns near dark brown, just before it turns into black and burns. Burnt food must NOT be consumed as it is dry burned carbon, and the body has no capacity to digest. Once the burnt carbon enters the body, it is difficult to get rid of it because our digestive system is not designed for it. The burnt carbon can create a number of diseases or imbalances during its stay in the body and she said, cancer is of one such disorders caused by eating burnt food or carbon.
We started roasting first garlic and coconut together because the cooking time of garlic matches with the roasting time of dry coconut, but not with other ingredients. The garlic cloves must cook well Until they become soft. It was a slow process which demanded total attention. We were totally banned from talking to each other while roasting. Bobby’s mother kept an eye on us, while doing countless other things in the family. Fortunately, we succeeded in achieving the dark brownish color without burning a single piece and the air was filled with Garlic and coconut. I learned that the success of perfect roasting is in the agitating of the mixture continuously, no stops at all. I liked the rhythm of the hand movements. Then we roasted sesame, peanuts, red peppers separately, which was pretty easy, compared to Garlic Coconut. All the roasted ingredients were mixed together in a large bowl and kept ready for the next stage of Lasoon making - the grinding.
Mother and family members became happy about our achievement of perfect roasting and a celebration broke out. Bobby and me were given ceremonial alcohol by the oldest man in the family. The Kitchen was elaborate with different kinds of cooking systems, tools and facilities to cook food for the large extended family, many servants and their families, friends and helpers and was established by Bobby’s mother. The kitchen had a good collection of food processing machines with different shapes of blades running at different speeds to grind the roasted mixture. But we were not allowed to use any of these, instead we were given stone grinders kept at the far end of the kitchen near the door which opens to their big balcony terrace, merging with the vast expanse of the city where Bobby and me normally sit and enjoy the nights.
The stone grinders are one of my favorite cooking tools especially non electrical one. All over India, the size and shape of the grinders vary according what people choose to grind. Like an ordinary mortar pistol, most of the stone grinders are made of two pieces. I was given a flat stone grinder, a kind of one I was familiar back home. We call it as AMMI KALLU (AMMI- MOTHER-CHILD, KALLU- STONE). The flat stone is called Mother stone and the round cylindrical roller one, child.
I always loved the movement of hands when I do this kind of grinding. Holding it with both hands, the cylindrical roller stone needs to run over the dry mixture with force to grind the mixture into small crumbles without a drop of water. It is a kind of skill which I still love to perfect. Holding the mixture within the rectangular space of the mother stone and hitting it with roller stone can be tricky as one should not allowed the mixture to spill over the ground. I started with small batches of mixture and slowly and steadily learned the trick of grinding it properly. Mother was watching over me to make sure that everything is done totally clean. Hands must not touch any unclean surfaces, one must be vigilant until work is done and grounded mixture is transferred to a bowl for further mixing and heating.
The stone grinders are perfectly cleaned and chiseled periodically by stone masons who visit their family regularly. The stone mason sellers, who live in far away places, regularly travel as families to the city and provide services to clean and chisel these grinding stones. They also bring new stone grinders to sell. I remember the visits of stone masons to our home. It was happy occasion for us children, we sat around the mason family and watching them chiseling stone with their naked hands using sharp metal tools and hammers. They usually carry different kinds of stone grinders, some of them were with elaborate carvings.
Bobby’s mother said why she prefer stone grinders over electric food processors, because the electrical food processors generate excess heat because of the fast rotation of the blade and motor, which over cook the roasted ingredients. It is nearly impossible to get the perfect consistency in form and taste with electric machines. Where as in stone grinders, roasted ingredients are made into crunchy form without adding any excess heat, which help to retain its consistency in form and taste.
Patting my shoulder, she said, “you will develop good muscles, if you stone grind your food”.
Soon, many others joined and finally we finish grinding the entire roasted material into fine crunchy crumble. The grounded mixture was transferred to the vok again, added salt and mix it thoroughly, Fire was lit again and the mixture was further roasted in the low fire ‘til it become a perfect mixture.
Finally Bobby’s Mother took a pinch of Lasoon from the vok and happily nodded her head and said, “perfect”. Looking at me she said, “you passed the test”. I felt very very happy.
She said, I can use Lasoon to cook anything. Just heat a table spoon of Lasoon with a little oil on a hot pan in low fire and add vegetable, meat or fish and cook in low fire. The hot Lasoon was packed in glass jars and tightly closed with lids. It will stay fresh for long time. Just like we make it today, in Catskill, New York.
I followed her words and experimented Lasoon with many vegetables, meat and fish. The finest of all my discoveries was adding Lasoon to my favorite American snack, Bagel and Cream Cheese. Every time I add Lasoon on top of the cream cheese layer, my Bagel tastes entirely different and reminds me of the Vada Pavu, the street food of Mumbai. There are many parallels in food cultures about developing nutritional staple fast food.
