Just finished watching Julie/Julia...a beautiful movie, I must say. It makes me feel very close to my own passion...cooking...but somehow I am not one of those people who would cook their way out of a cookbook like Julie Powell did. But rather cook from my heart. Being a Punjabi has its perks, we love food..and with loads of butter on it!! Thankfully, my parents are major foodies, both love to cook..mom makes punjabi traditional recipes for us..she hates experimenting though..wonder why...but dad loves experimenting with food.

A typical Sunday at our house would normally start with dad cooking "tari wale aloo" before the maid servant arrives, since my mom never liked her standing in the kitchen while dad cooks. After a superr breakfast of dad's "tariwale aloo" and mom's parathas...all of us would assemble infront of the tv..right on time for sanjeev kapoor's cookery show and would see if he was making anything vegetarian for us to try next sunday. We love simple food..our fav haunts in Bombay would be the places that offer the most simplest yet delicious food..and it would most likely be the "idli-dosa" joints.

My mom never taught me cooking..so after coming to US, I had a hard time learning how to cook. But I realized that I was going the wrong way since I was too busy trying to please my friends or roommates with my cooking. After a few bad experiences with cooking and getting frustrated with the life in US, I started venting out my anger by cooking...no..not bad food..but trying to excel at cooking and drowning out the bad grades and experiences.

I learnt to cook, not for others but for myself and forcing a good friend of mine to taste my experiments. Poor he, gave an approval to all the dishes I made, but I must thank him, because if he wasn't there, I would have lost hope in my cooking skills and the confidence in life, I so badly needed at that time. Thank you Rahul.

I must also thank my roomies, especially Sneha, who a better cook than me, supported all my crazy experiments and even offered to eat the pathetic atta halwa I made one time. Yes, Sneha, I won't be making that halwa, ever again.Reman, for calling me her "food angel" and eating whatever I make and giving me the confidence that i'm a good cook. And last but not the least, my parents, who taught me that cooking comes from the heart.