It's a Friday afternoon. A subliminal hankering to binge indiscriminately on chaat lies in wait of sundown. The Friday sundown. The sundown that is indicative of the culmination of an entire week of dietary policing. The monomaniacal mind rapidly checks off the items needed for the assuagement of this idée fixe. Puris - check. Soaked and frozen white peas - check. Tamarind-date chutney - check. Mint chutney - check. Onions, cilantro, barik sev - check, check, and check. As much as the mind prognosticates the ambrosial explosion of different flavors and textures in the mouth, it also looks forward to the assembly process with equal, or possibly more, eagerness. It can almost see the chef's knife effortlessly slicing through a crisp onion revealing perfectly concentric layers of successive pink gradations, hear the 400 bpm cadence effected by the swift chopping action breaking down the onion to a fine brunoise, smell the fresh and citrusy aroma of the cilantro as the knife slices through the stems, imagine the almost silent sizzle arising from the succulent ingredients perfectly soaking only the uppermost layer of crunchy half broken puris while keeping everything below still crunchy, and visualize the Euclidean space that is the final dish with delicious fractals of all taste groups that would ultimately manifest with an equal balance in every spoonful. The said mind can almost hear a 100 piece symphony orchestra playing Strauss’ Blue Danube, or Voleti garu's Surutti raga alapana with MS Gopalakrishnan on the violin, depending on taste. However, there is one little thing that is holds back the the proprietor of the said mind from forging ahead with the above plan de action.
A ridiculously blunt chef's knife!
Over the course of one's life, one picks up sundry skills from a random miscellany of vocations. These seemingly unrelated skills then uncannily come in handy at indiscriminate times, sometimes in isolation and sometimes in combinations, to not only serve to fulfil micro goals of life, but also provide some sort of gratification to one's mind. One such curious skill I picked up during my days of employment at a sandwich joint was vegetable cutting. Although not really needed on the job, the kindly African American cook in the back kitchen schooled me in many knife cuts for vegetables. In a matter of weeks, she ensured that I had gained considerable mastery over the julienne, allumette, brunoise, dice, slice, and mince cuts, albeit without knowing the names! She also did not fail to emphasize the prerequisite of having a well sharpened chef’s knife that could deliver these cuts with finesse and with minimal pressure. The knife’s weight, not the cutter’s strength, must make the cut, she would say.
Fifteen years later, cutting vegetables remains one of my chief de-stressers. There is something about the exhilaration derived from a perfect cut through a crisp bell pepper, when coupled with the knowledge that vegetable cutting has a greater contribution quotient toward running a household than other mainstream de-stressers such as watching television or scrolling down aimlessly on your Facebook feed, that greatly helps decompress guilt-free. However, I have to sheepishly admit that I never spent any time understanding the art of sharpening knives. Cutting vegetables with a blunt knife is akin to whittling on a stick with a paring knife and can ironically deliver more cuts to your finger than to the vegetable.
It’s that Friday afternoon again. As the mind vacillates between abandoning the chaat plan and subjecting my fingers to a life on the (blunt) edge, the bell rings. An Amazon package has been delivered. And lo and behold, there lies nestled inside a mantle of styrofoam - a knife sharpener!
Super!! Gripping!!!
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