Lifespan of a Chennette

Things I miss from my old flat…

I am making Hyderabadi biryani from Nabeela’s recipe at Trial And Error. Of course, by the time I post about this, I won’t be calling it Hyderabadi biryani, since the recipe will have undergone some possibly key modifications, some by choice, others by circumstance…but more about that later!

I am all settled into my new flat now, and am enjoying the different arrangement of space and rooms, not to mention no longer being on the ground floor and having a porch. And neighbours! I missed living near or with people who would lime with you over a cup of coffee, or shared meals. Or just ole talk. And of course my kitchen now actually gets natural light. But there are things that I miss about the old place…

Things I Miss:

Pots

A complete set of Le Creuset cookware. A bit banged up by some clearly undeserving previous tenants (but since they may have been left behind by a previous tenant I won’t complain too much) but so good for everything. Pelau, sawine, takari, Irish Soda Bread…sigh…I could have used that big one for the biryani. Really. This was the first time I ever used this classic, stove to oven, heavy duty, efficient cookware, and they made up for the itty bitty stove. Mostly. Now that I don’t have them, I realise that, apart from my tawah, small takari pot and the various skillets, I don’t have a lot of pots. I had to use my pressure cooker to make pelau the other day. Sigh.

My Spice Shelf

The wooden beam that ran along one side of my kitchen wall, made for a great long spice shelf. In addition to normal spices and seasonings, I had salt, sugar (for tea and coffee) and cooking spray and sesame oil etc all lined up there in plain sight and easy reach for cooking. Of course, you had to be at least 5′6″ or so to actually reach the shelf…and my first guest was significantly shorter and never even saw the shelf until I pointed it out, but it was convenient. And freed up cubpoard and counter space. Speaking of which…

Counter Space

I miss my main prep counter that was there and long and tiled and at the optimum level of kitchen organising, was unencumbered by appliances and even counter-space-saving implements. It was also a good base from which to unpack groceries, serve food (as it abutted the open space between the kitchen and dining area) and talk to guests, while cooking.

Storage Space

Looking at it, it wouldn’t appear that my old flat had more kitchen storage, since the number of cupboard wasn’t more than what I have now…but it was smarter. It had shelves on the lower cupboards so I could actually fit all my baking sheets and pans and skillets etc IN the cupboards, rather than the temporary storage now in my oven. When you have to yank out tawah and bailna and chowki and all the bread and cake tins, and baking sheets…baking is less likely (although the biryani is in there right now while the aforementioned objects lime on the couch - limited counter space remember?). Good thing the stove/oven is BIG. Family sized. Like the fridge. YAY.

Big Washing Machine

I could fit a tonne of stuff into the old one. It was big. Of course, it also took long pauses with voltage fluctuations. And I didn’t have a drier…but it was big and it didn’t sound like it had convulsions during the spin cycle. Ok, I have a dryer now, so I don’t really regret the loss of the bigger machine, but I do miss its capacity!

Mosquito-lessness

At my old flat, I was fortunate to live in an area of Georgetown that was not replete with big fat blood sucking whining mosquitoes. And still I got bitten. Mosquitoes always find me. Sigh.

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Things I DON’T Miss

- not having a view

- the gardener always outside my windows (nothing sinister, my flat was just on the edge of the garden)

- not having natural light and air in the kitchen

- tiny, non frost-free fridge/freezer

- tiny stove

- awful tv reception

- awful cellphone reception (although, that was handy when work was calling…)

- no dryer

- narrowness of everything

- inadequate guest spaces

So, it’s not bad this new place. But it’s Sunday and I appparently have time to muse. Although, as far as kitchen go, my flat in Barbados earlier this year was incomparable to any other in terms of counter space, storage and general design. I miss that. One day I’ll have the opportunity to design my own kitchen. I’m storing up the pros and cons.