Parotta

I slept well last night and after breakfasting on my usual Poori and coffee in the nearby restaurant I headed into school. I spent a fair amount of time talking with the physio as she was working with the pupils. She seems very switched on and focused. There are a couple of children in whom I can see real progress.
The classroom has a photo, celebrating my 10 years of involvement with the class which has been on the wall since 2017. She tells me that one of the senior boys points to it every time he comes into the room and says "Sally Mair, comes in an aeroplane from Scotland" and makes aeroplane noises with his arms extended like wings! I can't be sure it would still be on the wall if our positions were reversed! She says she was glad to meet me at last!
Today's blip is of part of the cooking area behind the school dining room. This man is a Parotta master. Parotta are one of my favourites of the local breads. The dough is worked on over an extensively long period, several hours. It's kneaded then made into small rolls, there are some in the large basin. Next these are kneaded again and spread into a very thin flexible sheet, all with the hands, more oil is worked in constantly. The thin sheet is folded, at the speed of light, into one of the balls at the back of the table. This is done repeatedly, then, when deemed ready, it's pulled and whirled again into a thin sheet, folded and twisted again and cooked on an oiled(of course) griddle. The end result is a doughy flat cake/bread, eaten hot with a curry/gravy. It is pulled apart to be eaten and is a stringy consistency as a result of all the folding and twisting. All food here is eaten with the fingers so it's a messy business. A good Parotta master can make or break a restaurant.
He was at school today as a donor had paid for lunch for the pupils. This is done regularly when people have something to celebrate. They pay for a meal for the pupils and staff which is either cooked in the school kitchen or brought in from a local restaurant. On the day they come as a whole family and serve the food, then eat with the children. Lunch was a chicken curry, chicken 65,yum!, parotta then, curd rice, which is yogurty rice, served at the end of the savoury meal as a digestive. It has fresh fruit and spices in it. It can be hot or cold.
Next came a dessert, payasam, today made with a stringy noodle type of.. thing... can't think of a word. It's basically a runny milk pudding, made with rice, noodles or tapioca type grains, very sweet often with jaggery (which is palm sugar), cardamon, sultanas and cashews. It's delicious, and although it used to be eaten with the fingers it's now served in paper cups usually and almost drunk. It's a lot less messy eaten that way. Have a go at eating runny tapioca with your fingers some time!
This evening I'm meeting up with Carrie again and unexpectedly, her younger son who is home for a few days. Cyrus, who I think of as maybe 16 or 17, tells me he's in his late 20s! Aargh, not so little Cyrus! I've known him since he was 4