Food Fun at Dhamayanthi Household

It's amazing when one thinks of the food served everyday in this large household. As already mentioned, the dining hall was a bright, airy space, well ventilated and had two massive square tables, plain red formica sheet topped.

Before breakfast, the table would be free of all paraphernalia, but come dining time and all kinds of goodies came out and spread themselves on the table. The salt cellar was the first.Then came the ghee container. Slowly, the table center would fill up with platters of hot, steaming, soft idlies. These would be followed by the idli kolambu and chutney. The idli kolambu would have an appetising red or creamy colour and would have the softest potatoes in them. My abiding memory is of the kolambu doing the rounds, immediately followed by the ghee container. The ghee, incidentally, is something I've never seen since. Thick, granular and smelling of roasted drumstick leaves and garlic,mmmm...that was the elixir of heavens. Not to forget, I remember all the chithis, invariably, helping themselves to a karandi ( ladle)  of kolambu and two spoonsful of ghee. The two would be mixed in discreet measures on the banana leaf or plate and over endless gosspis and laughter, justice would be done to the three items - idli, kolambu and chutney. 

Lunch was a table-full affair. There'd be white, hot steaming rice. There'd be some greens, either with onions and lots of coconut shavings or in a beautiful emerald green fragrant paste filled with the smells of jeeragam, mustard seeds and green chillies. Topped with ghee, this was an amazing dish. There'd also be a porial, an avial, a kootu, rasam and thick, creamy curd. Lunch ususally lasted for an hour if all were served together. Those who finished fast, stood up to pass the containers around. I loved this part, especially. Then came the clearing of the vessels, which were taken to the mid-yard wash stand near the bathrooms. Under copious flow of water heated by the sun, the vessels would be cleaned by willing and unwilling volunteers and would lie sparkling clean in the mid-day sun. 

Post lunch, some fruits would be set out. Thaatha was always the favourite person at this time, because he'd have the best helpings and if we were around, we always got a share of it. It would be red bananas, nungu sprinkled with elaichi powder and chilled in the fridge, some cooked kuchi kilangu with generous allowances of sugar, or panankilangu, or papaya and pineapple slices. Hot bhajjis or sundal or sprouts were offered with the tea, coffee or milk. I remember, especially, the duty of little ones to go around and find out how many cups of tea, coffee or milk were to be prepared. Woe betide the one who forgot the numbers. A tongue lashing about the ineptitude of a lass who would have to manage a household not being able to remember a simple thing was enough to force one to be careful about it. Not to forget, the chithis and maamas returning the cups saying that was not what they wanted. To avoid the endless trips from the kitchen to the hall, courtyard, backyard, upstairs and the other rooms, we would do it carefully. All tumblers would have to be collected and put into the sink in the mid yard.  

Dinner was also a spread for the taste buds. From evening, preparations would begin if there was iddiappam with coconut milk, aappam with coconut milk, and  pooris with potato masala.

Come to think of it, there was hardly any fried food, except Ilaveni maami's special potato fries, homemade butter murukkus and ribbon murukkus.

On some days, when a lot of food remained, aaya would boil all leftovers together into a fantastic mixture, mix it with rice, make huge palmsized balls and toss them into out stretched out hands and in addition, tell us a tale under the moonshine. I particularly remember the pickle pressed onto the ball at the top, like some cherry topping on an icecream. Huge vessels of leftover food thus became memories of moonlit nights and raucous shouts of children gathered around their aaya. 

The magic of sustenance and nutrition happened in the most practical way here. Love was central to all of the food served here. Perhaps, that is why, I respect food and enjoy every morsel, however well or badly prepared. But then, my chithis and maamas would disagree..for them, food was meant to taste like it did at home and anything less was given the disapproval and dislike that it deserved. They are all culinary experts, none to be debated with or argued against. After all, they were central to all that happened at the Dhamayanthi household, breakfast, lunch, dinner et all.

Rainy days at the house

The cyclone is moving towards the south west of TamilNadu and gales with lashing winds and heavy rains are forecast for TamilNadu in the next few days.

Rain at the Dhamayanthi household was a spectacle to be enjoyed.

One could sit at the dining tables and watch the rains wash the godown's sloping roof in torrents. The walls would turn damp and cool.

The dash to the toilets right at the end of the house used to make aaya mad at us. We would love to get wet in the rain, but usually at the cost of a tongue lashing from aaya.

The other beautiful thing used to be the long clotheslines extending across the long courtyard. The moment, clouds gathered in the horizon, we all had to rush and collect the clothes. I remember burying my face in the sundried clothes and inhaling the scent of the sun on the clothes. They would have to be taken to aaya's small cot, where many hands would willingly fold them. In fact, I learnt the art of folding clothes there, as I cuddled near aaya and was shown how to make the folds - with the edges touching just so and the sleeves parallel to one another and the folding of the dhothis - ah, that privilege was given to just a few. We would hold the edges and carefully come closer bringing the edges together in geometrical precision. They would have to look as if they had been ironed out.

During some unusually long and dry summers, buckets were put out to collect the rain water. Plop...plop...they fell in a musical rhythm.

The ice katti malai was another happy natural phenomenon. The patter of hailstones, as they fell on the tinsheets of the adjoining godown which housed thaatha's textile mill bundles and bales, somehwere to the middle of the roof from the ground, would cause excitement. That was when I heard the old housewives tale that hailstones are good for scorpion bites.

The coolness of the courtyard was enjoyed during the nights by those who vied for aaya's small cot in the tiny hall that opened out to the courtyard.

Were there hot vadais or pakoras or anything like that? I don't particularly remember them on rainy days, because they were inevitably made for the evening tiffin and I guess the luxury of a pakora could not have been possible in that very large household that had set dining times.

The Ancestral House at North Eswaran Koil Street

Can houses be as memorable as people or events in one's memories? Certainly. For me, aaya's house at North Eswaran Koil Street is so much a part of my childhood that I must share my memories of it with all.

I've never been in such a large house ...it seemed to stretch for a mile deep inside. It was a long house, and the breadth of it was dwarfed by the length. 


The house was separated from the Eswaran Koil prahara wall by just a narrow road. There were four or five long steps framed by concrete elephants' heads with long trunks forming the little frame for the steps worn smooth by an endless number of little bottoms sliding on these trunks. Later, they were removed and ordinary concrete frames replaced them. Not as much fun as the elphants' heads though. 


If one sat on the steps, one could see the Siva Bootha guarding the North corner of the temple across the road. I always used to think that was a lion, till years later, I knew it to be a guardian of Lord Shiva.

One climbed the steps to get into a large cool hall with a wooden staircase winding upstairs and a huge wall to ceiling glass shelf. There were two pomeranian dolls with beady eyes, silky coats and a smile on their faces. I used to press my nose against the glass and be scolded by 'Bombai maama' as Chandra maama was fondly called by me. The shelves were filled with awards, trophies, cups and mementoes. There were also odd handicraft items, like small chairs and tables made of plastic wires. I guess one of the chithis made them.

A narrow passageway took us to a horizontally long hall set with huge wooden cupboards on the right. They used to store aaya's snowy white towels, her soft blouses, thick cotton sarees, medicine kits and thaatha's incredibly , brilliantly white vestis, vests and towels. The large pooja room flanked one side of it. There was always a fragrance wafting from that room. A large glass encased Iyyappan decprated with sequins and a huge garland of what looked to me like huge nellikai seeds...now I guess they were rudhrakshas. There were small framed pictures of gods and goddesses and my favourite was an incredibly beautiful Saraswathi who had a lovely smile on her face. Later, thaatha added a picture of Jesus as a shepherd, done in 3D, which is another favourite picture of mine.

On the other side was the store room of beds and mattresses stacked celing high, a cupboard or too. It used to be a dark dark room full of fears and ghosts in a little child's imagination. Later, thaatha made it into a bright office for the industry he was running. Then, it got filled up with awards, framed certificates and some crystal objects on the table. It then became forbidden territory for children.

Opposite that was another room which stored of all things, banana stems full of ripe, unripe fruits with the most wonderful smell of fruits, a smell as endearing today as it was then. It also had a small sewing machine, a cupboard to store sewing materials and a radio that used to play songs softly.

Next to the hall, was an L-shaped space with a granary on the right and a massive dining space with iron rafters on the ceiling, where sparrows chirped and nested freely. The best part of the dining hall was there was a floor to ceiling open wall with just iron bars, no windows letting in plenty of heat, sunlight and brezze. There was also a small space in the arm that had just enough space for a small, low stringed cot on which aaya used to sit and chop vegetables and sort out household chores.

In the dining hall was a meshed cupboard with pickle jars, candies, bottles of spices etc.

The kitchen was a smooth walled huge space with a cooking space with a chimney stack large enough to have two people stand one beside the other comfortably. There were large storage shelves always filled with vessels. In one corner was a large sink, a kind of cornered space. Vessels were rarely washed there, so we used to use the space to hide in when no elders were around.

The courtyard was atleast as big as a tennis court, well, maybe, just a shade smaller. There was a raised platform at the end of it, which housed a king size motor rice grinder and a hand mortar as deep as a pond. The single wooden pillar had the rope operated butter churner.

The two bathrooms, one of which was adjacent to the meshed in well, had a water logged mirror, a Cinthol soap, a Lifebuoy soap and a sandalwood soap banned from being touched by small grubby hands. I never knew who used them in that large household. A mill sized water boiler always had water kept hot and fed with coal and wood from the wood stock room in the back yard. There were three taps set into a deep recess in the wall in which we could wash hands.

A thin wooden door opened from there into the backyard where one found a long cow yard and a massive cattle yard with a deep water hole and feeding tub at one end, another small room housing all the wood needed and two tall nathinyavattai trees overflowing with thousands of white delicate petalled flowers that thaatha always plucked in the mornings for atleast an hour to worship his gods and goddesses with.

The toilets were at first long raised concrete steps and were manually cleaned. They later gave way to more modern toilets. The last door opened into the backyards of several houses and was forbidden from being opened except when the scavenger came in.

Hundreds of memories flash in my mind as I write these lines. It was not just a house. It was home to so many of us, our lives and memories are inextricably linked to it. I had the best and the worst of times there...but good or bad, these memories are what I am today. Dhamayanthi household was one of pleasure, joy, sorrow, fun, festivals and moon light stories. More of that later.

Dhamayanthi Memories - An Introduction

Memories are fragile...short, fragmentary, gossamer like, intangible; yet, they are also some of the precious belongings one can boast of. I know that all of us have memories of our childhood locked safe and secure in our hearts. We share them with others if we include them in the circle of our love and joy.

Dhamayanthi clan is a large one and almost all our early memories of childhood are linked to our grandparents, especially Dhamayanthi aaya. 

Our childhoods were special, because they were spent in the large ancestral home of NMR thaatha and Dhamayanthi aaya with what seemed like a huge population of cousins, aunts, uncles, grandmas and grandpas. 

For me personally there are so many moments that can be recalled that I thought I would put them down and share them with the whole Dhamayanthi clan, which is now constantly expanding, constantly welcoming newborns, new daughters and sons - in- law, not to show what they have missed, but to show them that they are part of this family and that the past can become a part of our present.

NMR is the patriarchal head of the family of seven daughters and two sons and Dhamayanthi is the matriarchal head of the family.

The sons and daughters

• Chandran
• Manohari
• Jaya
• Nalayani
• Kumudhini
• Bharathi
• Kala
• Sivakumar
• Sathyavathi

I've tried to produce a family tree. I feel that the younger generation needs to get in touch with the past of the older generation if they have to feel included. Times are rather difficult for us...we all live in different corners and pursue different careers, but what binds us is all the feeling of oneness that is there, inspite of distances and places.

I feel this is more for my own pleasure too...as I try to recapture my childhood memories with Dhamayanthi aaya...and the large household in which I was but a part, a part that is unique by itself...just as every one's of the clan is.