My cousin Damodaran has been searching high and low in New Bombay as well as the old Bombay for a dish that he was very fond of when he was in school / college which was readily available in restaurants in the South of India. It is called Mysore Bonda. I had vague memories of the same and whenever the topic comes up of food, the two of us inevitably end up with the resolve to find a place to have that old favourite.
The same happened three days ago when we were talking to each other on the phone on a proposed trip for me to his place. At the end of that phone call I hunted for a recipe online for the Mysore Bonda and having found one which sounded quite simple, I decided to try my hand at making it.
So today in the morning I got the dough prepared and let it stand for a couple of hours before Mangal came to work and with her taking over the frying of the bondas, the whole thing became quite a simple affair and the outcome surprised me for its sheer beauty of looks and the taste took me back to the Chennai of the early sixties of the last century.
The proof of the bonda is in eating it and the whole lot of them in the open casserole got polished off by the four of us during lunch and the coconut chutney that you see in the other open vessel too was licked clean.
Which brings me to my young friend Bubul who many decades ago bought a Hero Honda motorcycle to commute between his bachelor pad and place of work but would not cut quite the swathe that the ads for the motorcycle those days hinted at. No fair maidens swooned when he rode past on his steed and in sheer desperation he had named the bike Zero Bonda. I shall be sending a link to this post to him and his lovely bride Anindita to bring back those memories alive as well. It has been decades since he graduated to cars and his son is now old enough to venture into two wheeler adventures.
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