Dear Mamta ji,

I really want to thank you sooooooo much.I am 31 yrs old and have just got married.I have been living in New Delhi all my life.After marriage I have shifted to the US.I had very limited knowledge of cooking Indian food.Both me and my husband love North Indian ghar ka khana.Having eaten it most of our lives.

I tried out a recipe from your site and it came out great.Now I make dinner everyday with your recipes and there hasn't been a single day when the food wasn't fabulous.Today I am going to try the fried salmon.

You are such a brilliant cook and communicator.

I am a yoga teacher and artist by profession.Therefore am quite particular about eating the right foods and I have to say your way of putting things together is really healthy.

Thank you so much once again.Please publish a book titled NORTH INDIAN GHAR KA KHANA .I will be your first buyer :)

Wishing you lots of success.

Warm Regards,

Rajika

Thank you Rajika :-)

Being a north Indian, my main food is north Indian, though I have picked a million other recipes over a life time. The purpose of this site is to help young people like yourself, to learn and love to cook and to have access to easy to follow recipes. It is such a shame that young girls, and boys, from well-to-do families in India are not taught to cook these days. There is too much reliance on others to cook for them and to do their everyday chores for them.

Food is a basic need and everyone needs to feed themselves. When I was young and when my mum started teaching us to cook simple things, the basics, I used to tell her that I didn't need to learn ;-)! I would be a doctor and would probably marry one too. We will have loads of money and I will have servants, so I won't need to cook. Little did I know that I will end up in UK and will have to do everything for myself!! Her reply was always that even if I got rich and had cooks/servants to do it for me, I would still need to know how to do it myself first, in order to teach them what I wanted, how I wanted, wise woman that she is! My father loved eating food from all over India, and the world, unusual in India of 50 years ago. He also encouraged us to try everything, at least once, "you never know what you will like". He too always pottered around in the kitchen, giving my brothers an interest in cooking too. There was no ?they are boys, they don?t need to learn cooking/housework?, in our home. He ate our primitive attempts, often not very nice or 'burnt', with great relish and praise.

I never thought of moving to UK then, there was no plan or desire, but here I am living and loving my life for the last 40 years. I am so grateful to my parents for not only teaching me the basics, but also giving me the love to learn new things from all over the world, which I still do, all the time. I am sorry, I didn't mean to write my life story here!

I would love to write a cookery book of 'everyday Indian food', but I don't know any publishers and who would be interested in a book by an 'unknown'. Even cookery books are written by famous people these days ;-)! But thanks for the thought anyway :-).

Lots of love

Mamta

Dear Mamta ji,

Thank you for the quick response.You are right about the phenomena of young people not knowing how to cook in India due to dependency on servants.However I feel very lucky and indepandant (thanks to you!) that I've got started on my own.

I like your Dad's advice on trying everything once.Sounds like a bold man.

In case I get in touch with a good publisher I will let you know.However, I feel if you just put a book together and meet up with a good publisher there is a very high chance of it getting published.

I was a banker and became a yoga teacher even tho everyone told me not to.I love what I do now and also earn from it.I am an artist and about to have my first solo show of paintings in Triveni Kala Sangam in Delhi.Again everyone suggested that art in not a very stable profession and showing my work will be tough till I'm not well known.However I jut gave in an application to Triveni(one of the best in Delhi) and they accepted it!!!

So what I'm trying to say is that if you have a passion sometimes all you need is the audacity to go up there and say "I want this"!

Your cooking is unique because it is traditional and already very well documented.A need for young Indians like myself.

I got the encouragment to do my art and yoga thanks to a book titled Artist's Way by Author Julia Cameron.It's a 12 week course that you do with yourself.

I hope I don't sound like I am preaching but I think you're so talented and I would love to see your work acknowleged by the world :)

Lots of Love,

Rajika

Rajika

It's an extremely huge task indeed to just put together a book without already having a publishing deal, in the mere hope that some publisher might take it onboard!

I looked into this a little some years ago. Firstly, I was already aware of the trend for celebrity chef cookbooks. It is even more so now that books by unknown authors simply don't compete on a commercial level.

Those few authors that manage to have their proposal for a new cookery book accepted and backed by a publisher are all-too-often disappointed to find their book stocks relegated to a warehouse outlet store or charity store when it simply doesn't make enough sales in regular commercial bookstores.

For every non-celebrity cookbook that is a success there are many, many more that fail.

This site has never been about making money for us, it's something we do for enjoyment, so such a book would be a huge amount of work, whereas we can already share recipes here so easily!

:)

Never say never but an MK cookery book is not on the cards at the moment!

Kavita

Dear Kavita,

I agree it should never be for the money.

Congrats on all your efforts so far.

All the best!

Love,

Rajika

A book would be a fabulous addition but this site expands and develops so quickly and the wealth of knowledge that can be drawn on from it would be stagnated if put into printed form !

Besides if you want any recipe they have a printer friendly version and coming on the site means you can ask questions about it, clear up anything you are unsure of, tell the person who wrote it when something seems wrong and do you really use that much cinnamon in stamna ?... and then come back and tell us all how it went, even send in some pictures !

Steve