On other days, getting a seat is difficult.
But on Sunday mornings, Delhiites wake up late. As the two of them sit down, Arka’s phone rings. Taking it out of his pocket, eyes widening, he says to Riya, “Ajitav! He was supposed to have returned to Bangalore by now. Since when did he learn the courtesy of informing after reaching!”
Sliding his finger across the screen, Arka answers, “Good morning, Ajitav! Have you reached? No? What do you mean? You missed the flight? Couldn’t wake up? Oh, great! So what’s the plan for today then? Going somewhere? Riya and I are on the way, I mean, in the metro, heading to a place called Bhuli Bhatiyari ka Mahal. Will you come? Yes, come along! It’ll be fun. Let’s meet under Jhandewalan Metro Station then. Okay, okay, start now. We’ll have lunch somewhere here today. Come.”
Putting the phone back in his pocket, Arka tells Riya that Ajitav is coming. He’ll meet them at the metro station. Apparently, he had gone to visit Jama Masjid early in the morning, so he’s not very far.
“Is he nearby? But wasn’t he supposed to return today?”
“He was! But the flight got cancelled. These days, there are too many technical issues with flights. They were offering a night flight, but he managed to get a ticket for the same flight tomorrow morning. He had already started for the airport when he found out it was cancelled. We’ll hear the rest when we meet him. And you’ll surely gain some more chemistry knowledge today. Nothing can stop you from becoming a scientist now!”
“You know, we should come to Bhuli Bhatiyari Mahal at night,” Ajitav says excitedly when they meet. “I searched on Google, apparently it’s haunted!”
“Oh please! Ghosts and all that are nonsense. Actually, Sultan Firoz Shah Tughlaq built this place as a small resting shelter during hunting trips. There are many theories about how it got its name. Some say a woman lost her way and ended up here, and since she couldn’t return, she died here. People believe her spirit still roams around this place,” Riya explains, pouring out her historical knowledge.
“Wow, with the amount of history you know, you could’ve studied history instead of science,” Arka laughs.
Ajitav rubs his stomach and says, “I’m starving. Before we run into ghosts, let’s eat something. Look, there’s a Chinese food stall ahead. Let’s see if they have chowmein.”
Seeing Ajitav head towards the stall, Riya and Arka follow.
The young vendor takes their order and quickly starts cooking. He places a wok on the gas stove, adds a little oil, and tosses in onions, spring onions, capsicum, and carrot slices. Stirring rapidly, he adds boiled noodles and fries everything together. At the very end, he sprinkles a handful of white powder from a large container.
Seeing this, Ajitav shouts, “Hey! Careful! Don’t add so much Ajinomoto! It won’t sit well in the stomach.”
The young cook, not understanding, frowns and says, “Kya hua, sahab? Why are you shouting?”
“I’m shouting because you added too much Ajinomoto!”
Without saying anything, the cook serves chowmein onto three plates. Smelling the steaming noodles, Ajitav says, “Ah, smells great. Seems like he has a good hand.”
Arka takes a bite and says, “The way you shouted, it felt like a ghost came out of the wok with the steam!”
“No, no, nothing is good in excess. Too much monosodium glutamate can upset the stomach and make you miss flights,” Ajitav jokes.
Riya objects gently, “You said Ajinomoto, and now monosodium…”
“It’s the same thing! It’s a salt, the sodium salt of glutamic acid. Remember, different salts can change the taste and aroma of food. Cooking is basically chemistry. If you want to satisfy your taste buds, you need to understand the chemistry behind it,” Ajitav explains while eating.
Arka stuffs his mouth with noodles and says, “Does everything lead back to chemistry for you? Are you going to say that this skinny guy who cooked the chowmein is also a chemist?”
“Through practice, even unknowingly, he has learned chemistry. He may not be called a scientist, but he knows exactly when and how much salt or spice to add for the best taste. In big hotels, chefs do learn some science, but ordinary people learn through experience. Cooking techniques didn’t develop in a day, they’ve evolved over thousands of years. That knowledge can even rival scientific expertise. Still, educated people like us should approach cooking with scientific awareness. Anyway, I’ve heard Riya makes excellent chowmein,” Ajitav says, turning to her.
Riya, absent mindedly picking up a few noodles with her spoon, says, “We don’t keep Ajinomoto at home. My mother says it causes cancer. I use ready-made chowmein masala from the market. Is it true that Ajinomoto causes cancer, Ajitav?”
Arka replies before Ajitav can, “That’s just knowledge from watching reels. Who has proven that eating too much Ajinomoto causes cancer? In China, they use a lot of it in food, do they all die of cancer?”
Ajitav stops him. “Don’t scold her. Many people believe that too much Ajinomoto causes cancer, but the evidence is quite weak. As long as it’s not consumed excessively, it’s fine. The Ajinomoto sold in the market is just crystals of monosodium glutamate, and it’s not artificially harmful. In small amounts, it’s unlikely to cause harm. It gives the fifth taste, besides sour, spicy, salty, and sweet, there’s another taste called umami. The word comes from Japanese, meaning a kind of savoury, meaty flavour. It’s hard to explain.”
“So the taste we just experienced, that’s it? Should we order another plate to understand better?” Arka jumps in.
Shaking his head, Ajitav explains, “The taste you get from mushrooms, that’s umami. Mushrooms naturally contain a lot of monosodium glutamate. Tomatoes and cheese also have it. There’s an interesting story behind how Ajinomoto was made on a large scale.”
After paying via UPI, Ajitav begins the story.
“Once, a Japanese biotech company executive tasted a delicious soup made by his wife and asked what ingredients she used. She said she had boiled a kind of seaweed. The man was a scientist. He took the seaweed to his lab, extracted and crystallized a substance, it turned out to be glutamic acid. To neutralize it, he used sodium hydroxide. The reaction between acid and base produced monosodium glutamate. He quickly patented it. And that’s how a company called the Ajinomoto Group was established, now famous worldwide. He also named the taste umai, meaning delicious, which later became known as umami.”
As Ajitav finishes, Arka remarks, “If we don’t go inside now, it’ll be evening and Firoz Shah’s ghost will come out and twist Riya’s neck!”
Riya gets annoyed. “The ghost will twist your neck, Arka da! And bringing up ghosts at the end of such a nice story isn’t good. It’s still far from evening.”
Looking around, Arka lowers his voice. “Don’t you feel the eerie atmosphere? Do you think ghosts wait till evening? After hearing Ajitav’s story, they might just twist your neck now and say, ‘Ah, what umami blood!’ They won’t even need Ajinomoto!”
Ajitav twists Arka’s ear. “Stop talking nonsense. Do you know that monosodium glutamate exists in all our bodies? You study economics and know nothing! Let her learn.”
Riya glares at Arka and asks, “Okay, Ajitav, how is glutamic acid produced on a large scale in industries?”
“Similar to fermentation, like making alcohol. Sugar extracted from corn or sugarcane is fermented using yeast. The microorganisms consume the sugar and produce glutamic acid. The process isn’t very complicated.”
“So we should buy Ajinomoto today and make chowmein at home, right?”
“Absolutely. But unfortunately, I won’t be able to taste your chowmein this time, I have my flight tomorrow,” Ajitav says.
The three of them then enter Bhuli Bhatiyari ka Mahal.
(To be continued)
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