Saturday, January 19, 2008

Banglitalian Food

As only a handful of the international students are on campus this weekend, we thought it might be fun to try a little cooking of our own (ordinarily our meals are provided by the campus chefs). I volunteered to make a little pasta. I wasn't feeling especially ambitious, so when I was in Dhaka I bought some linguine and tomato puree so that I could make a quick marinara.

I arranged to make lunch today, and was escorted to the kitchen by one of our extremely friendly cooks, and found myself in the middle of a VERY large space full of Bangladeshi men who spoke very limited English. So that in and of itself was an adventure. I managed to explain that I needed onions, garlic, salt, pepper, and herbs if they had them (they didn't). In the end, everyone was so excited to assist that I didn't really do anything but stir the pasta and taste-test. The end result was a sort of Bangladeshi-Italian fusion dish, with a sauce made of the above ingredients, some soybean oil, and the local variety of squash (very large green "pumpkins").

It's very hard to re-create a recipe you're used to in an environment that's so foreign--the only similarities between my kitchen at home and the kitchen here were the knife and cutting board, which made for a very different cooking experience. It was also extremely fun to watch all of the chefs come and examine the pasta (imported from Italy) and the tomato puree--clearly neither ingredient had ever been seen in that kitchen before. They were passed around, and pieces of dry pasta were sampled (as I feebly tried to explain that it's only good when cooked). Almost everyone was convinced that my sauce was going to turn into some kind of curry, and I was offered soy sauce, fish sauce, turmeric, eggs, and chicken as possible ingredients, all of which I had to turn down (the squash was my compromise).

Quite fun, all in all. And I got pasta for lunch, which was another nice break from the rice routine.

3 comments:

Anne said...

This is a wonderful story! And now Myles and I can't stop saying the word Banglitalian. Banglitalian, banglitalian...

Renee said...

YAY! favorite story so far! get pictures of all the cooks for me. just tell them your friend wants to see them or something.

perhaps banglitalian?

you are so clever

Anonymous said...

I also think Banglitalian is a great new word! I can just see you in the kitchen explaining that pasta is not to be eaten raw and figuring out how to add squash to your pasta dish. That is something you will never forget!