Swining in Minneapolis - Gasthof

Gasthof zur gemutlichkeit, which roughly means the inn of coziness or comfort, is a Bavarian restaurant on the University Ave NE in Minneapolis. From our many visits to Bavarian restaurants in Munich last year, I noticed a few similarities & dissimilarities

Bavarian food is earthy, chunky, & goes down like knife through butter, in Munich & in Minneapolis. It makes you give up pretenses of any higher purpose in your life. If only Hitler had unleashed chefs on Europe instead of soldiers, he probably would have had more success.

The restaurants, in Munich as in Minneapolis, have chequered tableclothes.The waitresses typically wear the Bavarian peasant dress for women which more or less amounts to an apron over a white blouse; beer is always sold by half or one liter mugs of bonhomie. The Hefeweizen, in Gasthof was served with two cuts of lemon. I can't remember if this was the case in Bavaria or even at Gordon Biersch in Washington DC. Lemon or no lemon, a yellow cloudy wheat beer is always exactly the right thing to be seen with.

In Gasthof, as in Munich, the menu did not have chicken. Perhaps eating fowl is considered bad form. Of course, there is ample beef, pork, fish (the local Minnesota walleye), bratwurst, & even venison available at the Gasthof. The schintzel is the speciality. Of course! And Gasthof also prides itself on a meter-long bratwurst - & if you eat it, you get a certificate!

Strangely, or may be its my abysmal memory, I was give a delectable salad in Gasthof as part of my order. And a chunk of bread & ample butter. The bread resembled a shot-put - only it was fluffy & bready in colour. This humongous bread was served with about 8 sachets of butter of which I ate two - half the shot-put. The bread took a while coming as it was being baked as I ordered, & I think that while I'm drooling & writing odes on German food, I just cannot emphasize how good this bread generally was & the breads generally were in Munich. Hitler could have gotten the Poland etc on bread alone!

The quantity, I'm sorry to say, was enormous. I was typically able to finish my plate in Munich. With half that shot-put & the all the salad inside of me, I could not eat even a quarter of what looked like a portion of the happiest, fattest swine to have ever said whatever pigs say to each other on bright Sunday Minneapolis mornings. That roasted porcine thing was the anti-thesis of any semblance of civilization & moderation, a throw-back to our lives in the woods & farms when the sight of a pig waddling through the marshes would light up our eyes & set our saliva production to overdrive.

In Gasthof, there were a couple of accordion players who sang ballad like songs in English for anybody who'd care to listen. I recognized "Happy Birthday" & the perennial favorite from "The Sound of Music" - Doe, a deer....

And here is the parody of of Doe a deer that they sang as well... (I've put in my own words for the bits I've forgotten)

Doe - a beer, a mexican beer
Ray - the guy standing by the bar
Me - I drink in the name of God
Far - a good long way to the bar

so - so I think I'll have some more beer
la - la, la, la, la, la
tea - no thanks, I'll have some beer
Do.....

Prost!

Being Purushottam

As far as I know, Lord Ram had a rather trying training as a child - living in jungles & reading deep, fat books when other children his age were playing cricket. He had the abysmal bad luck of running into Parashuram once as well. And then he gets himself exiled, has to start living in the woods, gets his wife kidnapped by some weirdo, uncool king & manages to befriend a few apes for conversation & tea in the evening.

I mean, that's not so great.

And yet, as far as I know, notwithstanding his treatment of his wife later in the epic, he was a rather nice chap. In his time, there were actually just wars - which he fought & won, & reinstated the right rulers for the kingdom. He ruled his kingdom well & apparently people could go to the nightclubs without locking their houses. He was the original proponent of the 'no-first-strike' policy & there was no collateral damage in the wars he fought. Rather a sophisticated bloke, I am not sure that he ever said even so much as "oh shit!" once.

And we forget all this & forget that the Ram Setu was built on perseverance & strife, that Lord Ram was more about building bridges, forging friendships & getting things done right.

What are you doing about Purushottam's legacy?

Indian food in Minneapolis

Well, this post could also be called "how not to have a life". Yes, it is incredibly cold in Minneapolis & I do not want to know exactly how cold it is for the fear of slipping into depression, & I do not have a whole lot to do - except work - & assorted & repetitive disillusionments on the treadmill.

Minneapolis has a thriving cultural scene including great music, theater & opera. I'll probably go to all of them in time. Right now, the only non-professional reason to get out of my hotel room is the animal desire to eat. Ghastly, right?

And though I like to believe that I belch with equal appreciation be it a Biriyani or a burger with fries, lately I've been stuck to the Taste of India. I've heard from many people here that it is the best Indian restaurant in these parts. That may indeed be so; in fact, the daal is not bad at all, though the mutton & chicken curries are bathed in fats a lot more than I'd like.

You can imagine my lifelessness when I say that I usually pack myself a carry out; however, I like to wait at the restaurant while they prepare my food & never call in advance. What do I have to do with my time anyway (except writing nonsensical posts like this)? In the process, I look at the waiters & the flood of Caucasian & homesick brownies like me at the restaurant. And I read & re-read the menu.

It turns that the menu boasts of 'Kashmiri scallops'. Hullo! Scallops in Kashmir? And Banarasi Biriyani - yes, that may be close to Lukhnow (erstwhile oudh ) but isn't Varanasi more about the Kachauri gali as you listen to the bells in the Vishwanaath temple & the cows burping? What in the world is a Chicken Josh - Rogan Josh made with chicken - as you might have guessed. And Madrasi mutton - if ever there was an oxymoron...While Chennai provides ample delectable & mouth-watering recipes, I have never quite thought that mutton was one of them.

While these sharp & rather parochial differences melt away in spite of the snow in chilly Minneapolis, food-in-general is complete banana oil. No two chutneys are alike, & nobody quite makes khichdi like you do.

S!