Mushroom picking

Intro: Mushrooms have become an interesting companion to meats and vegetables, breaking flavors, absorbing excesses and adding texture. They have found their way into most cuisines, from Chinese, French, Italian and even Indian. So go out, pick the perfect porcini and get cooking. Bon appetite!
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By Raunaq Roy

Those were the best of times, those were the worst of times. Those were definitely simpler times when you could walk across to a grocer you had shopped from forever and ask for a bag of mushrooms. And you hoped you got more mushrooms than dirt. Mushrooms aren't just mushrooms anymore: You've got portobello, shiitake, crimini, oyster, and even more exotic varieties showing up in supermarkets. What you don't know is how fresh they are.

With button mushrooms, lighter is better. Not only do mushrooms darken as they bruise, they dark spots are a sign of aging as well.
Look for button mushrooms that are light in color, since the mushrooms darken when they get older. Try and pick and pack that is cleanish. Properly cultivated and picked mushrooms should not be dirty. The junction where the button meets the mushroom should ideally be closed or as close to closed as possible.

Choosing specialty mushrooms, such as oysters and porcini (cépes), works in the opposite way. These should be open where the cap meets the stem. But the colouring rule stands. The gills under the cap should be light in color, not dark brown or black.

Allow all your senses to be consumed as you buys your mushrooms, from sign, you move to touch and good mushrooms are firm without being dry. Meaty, not withered. Apart from bruising also avoid mushrooms that feel slimy in any way. And last but not least, smell them. You are going to actually eat it, so do not buy 'fertilizer' as an excuse for a foul smell. Mushrooms should have a pleasant earthy whiff.

There are plenty of edible mushrooms that are cultivated worldwide. There are some varieties that are difficult to cultivate, therefore, these end up being the most prized.

Table Mushroom/Agaricus Bisporus:
Agaricus Bisporus or the Table mushroom is one of the most common types of edible mushrooms that are used in various preparations. This type of mushroom is known locally in different ways such as the Table mushroom or the Button mushroom. The problem area of this mushroom can be seen when it is sliced and exposed to air. This causes the mushrooms to turn a shade of brown.

Shiitake/Lentinula Edodes:
Also known as the Fragrant mushroom, Black mushroom or even the Black Forest mushroom. Shiitake was basically grown in China since the ancient days. Today, this mushroom is cultivated in many areas of the world and is also exported. Shiitake mushrooms also have certain medicinal properties apart from being used in different cuisines. This mushroom is widely used in Chinese cuisine as well and has also found a prominent place in Western cuisine.

Porcini/Boletus Edulis:
The Porcini is also known as the Penny bun or Cep and is a highly prized variety of mushrooms. This mushroom is basically found in Europe and areas of North America. These particular types of mushroom also have a distinct aroma and are used in various types of soups. Many claim this mushroom tastes its best when raw! It is generally sold fresh or even dried and packaged.

Giant Puffball/Calvatia Gigantea:
These round or pear shaped mushrooms are white or slightly grey in color. They grow through Summer and Fall in woods, barren areas, lawns and fields across the globe. The name has been given because this mushroom can grow to a diameter of 70 cms and can even reach 150 cms in some cases! This variety of mushroom is best eaten when it’s relatively young.

Field Mushroom/Agaricus Campestris:
This variety of mushroom is available commonly and is found in fields and grassy areas. Owing to a short shelf life is not grown for commercial purposes. The Field mushroom is also known as the Meadow mushroom and is known for its very mild taste.

Morchella:
Morchella is an edible mushroom that is considered to be amongst the prized possessions by many cooks. They belong to the genus – Morels. These mushrooms particularly grow in the same spot even after many years. These can be mildly toxic and have been blamed for some health issues, so like the puffer fish, tread with care.

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

My niece is turning three and the cake she wants is Barbie. On a horse. With a dog. And I smile when i speak to her mum. I offer to help plan the cake. I think how well exposed the kids these days are. They have a well informed view on life, a love of animals and most importantly, perspective. I don't know if I would have been so specific when I was three. The horses I was exposed to were beautiful bay geldings that were reserved for the Army Officers families to learn on. And a nice old fashioned wooden rocking horse. This, would not have been the horse I would have imagined. 

And then I think about Barbie. I dont know if its true, but i remember reading that if Barbie was a person, she would fall over from the mismatch in balance. I see the kids around me and it scares me to hear 8-year-olds discuss weight, 13 year olds starve themselves and 15 year olds discuss sex even though they don't have the guts/ maturity to explore contraception/ safe sex practice.  

I fought it. I continue to fight it. But I see that I am fighting a lost battle. In a world that is switching to organic, we turn the other way when it comes to weight loss. We condemn anoexia but diet nonetheless. We talk about preserving innocence but love the teenage models and barely legal music video divas.

In an innocent birthday cake, the future of our times flashes before me and I smile, but it scares me

India Shining?

I got an email today, asking if i was interested in a private sale of this authenticated Souza. And I don't know why it saddened me. It shouldn't really. I keep thinking if a watercolour by the masters of progressive art of a country is up for sale, it should be sold, or ready for sale, before the announcement is made. Southeby's should be fending off attempts to buy the art before it goes up for auction. And yet, I am receiving emails (two) to check if there is any interest.

I see it, my knowledge of art is pedestrian. Besides I know I cannot just add a Souza to my grocery list. So I don't reply asking for more details. But I start thinking about a conversation I am having with Parmesh Shahani on the CommonWealth Games. He agrees with Mani Shankar Aiyer, I hope against hope. He believes that "Middle class aspirations of grandeur do not make a world city. Poor Delhi suffers, us tax payers bleed, while the corrupt laugh." and I counteract his logical thought with emotional instinct, "Yes, but in the words of Scott Sir, Breathes there the man, with soul so dead ... this is my own, my native land! #faujikid." I am now thinking.... Is India Shining? Is the government helping socialist India, because I am not sure how it is helping capitalist India...?

Publishing and the Environment

I was recently invited to speak for World Magazine month - I chose the environment. Posting that here:

In a country that is still fighting to bring up its literacy rate from 61%, it is reassuring to be invited to be a part of World Magazine Month. The editor of the Malayalam Manorama would be more apt given that their readership is a staggering 80 lacs+. However, I am happy to take K. C. Mammen Mappillai place.

In world magazine month, the suggested topic was Women in Journalism. I respectfully sent a topic I believe is more pressing. Women in Journalism have been there, done that, made the glossy and have it on video. Women in journalism and I count myself in that number also have a greater sense of responsibility and consciousness. And so, even though it meant a fair amount of research, I decided to take the earth-shattering bull by its horns and address Magazines and the Environment.

The numbers:  Cosmopolitan uses 328,577 trees every year; People uses 546,134 trees; Conde Nast Traveler uses 52,734 trees; and National Geographic uses 505,819 trees. And these are just the figures for the US editions

Less than 5% of U.S. magazine paper has any recycled content, a practice that consumes an astounding 35 million trees each year." Are you astounded? And we are the nation of the great Indian middle class with the greatest value in the written word. If it was written, it must be true. While 64% of all statistics are made up while the article is being filed (I just made that one up), it is a valid concern. Indians worship learning/ books and we should. It has proven to be the cornerstone of our progress. But a basic google search elicited no findings for a temple in honour of Prithvi. Not even as merely a consort to Vishnu.

Cut to today and the environment is a big issue in contemporary publishing. ‘Greening our Publishing'  is always followed the provocative question and realisation "Is it possible?" Roughly translated, a 400g book/ magazine equals c2kg CO2, the same as traveling 10 km in a typical car, or two uses of a tumble dryer. Earthscan, a publishing company, has offices that not been fitted with air conditioning, and all areas of the office have a separate lighting system. They have implemented other green initiatives, such as recycling, using Fair Trade and local suppliers, and grading suppliers on their green measures. There is even discussion of starting a wormery! These initiatives cost around 0.25% of the company's total profit, and ensure the staff are more aware of how to reduce their effect on the environment. Well, the reality is that 84% of the impact comes from the paper itself. So they are struggling to reduce a fraction of 16% of the stress they lay on the planet.

A leading magazine last year cut their print run by half from 3million to 1.5 million. Made the magazine more expensive. If you want it, you will have to pay for it. For advertisers and readers alike. It was probably more to do with cutting costs, but I doff my hat tot them. I am not at all sounding the death bells of print. I don’t think print will ever die, but it is time we look upon it as the indulgence it is. The sound of crisp pages being turned. The tactile satisfaction of going through a magazine – cover to cover – in immense. But we must kep in mind that the price of this luxury is being paid by all of us. At least 20% of annual global carbon emissions come from deforestation. If we can't stop forest loss, we'll struggle to stop climate change.

Once upon a time, news stories were entombed in newspaper "morgues" and rarely saw the dusty light of day. Now the news never dies. Millions of people can search the archives online -- an amazing benefit. While newspaper libraries meant that the content was in black and white for posterity’s sake – who among us had access to them. The need that is vital is the unchanging custody of our history. In digital, updates are possible. Recontextualising the social situations of a time and place. If it weren’t for that, to some extent, contemporary publishing (heavy lobbying notwithstanding) would lose its last leg to stand on. 

Magazine publishers are being pressurized to make environmental commitments. And perhaps because of this initiative paper is becoming more expensive, with a 20-30% rise in cost this year alone. A way to combat this would be to make more use of recycled paper. But the real solution is to turn to digital. "If the New York Times goes out of business, whose responsibility is it to preserve their digital archive? This kind of thing is happening as we watch. It's not speculation." 

In this utterly digital age, traditional print publishing now more than ever it has a unique place is preserving out history and our sociology. As the Internet Replaces Print Publishing, Urge to 'Unpublish' Means Censoring History. Everyday, there are requests to remove from archives the record of the sociology of our time. But this honour isn’t being respected in print either. The biggest motivating factor of our sociology is unfortunately driven by the advertisers budget. Murders have gone unreported and bribes are glossed over. In the digital space, every man is his own news network – you can call it blogging, tweeting or even limiting it to your own circle of friends on Facebook. The entry barrier is non existent so while New York Times and Times of India may be pressurized to unpublish digital content, how are you going to tell www.twitter.com/ flyyoufools that it is unaaceptable to comment on Govt Policy, critique the film Avatar or comment on the style secrets of Katrina Kaif.

Digital Readers is hopefully the way forward that will encourage our love and faith in the written word. Have you experienced a Kindle, Maybe scoffing at the iPad was so last year and maybe the Sony reader is a god sent. You don’t have to give up something you love – like Joe Kleins column in Time or Jerry Pinto’s scathing humour in Mans World or Suzy Menkez’s or Bandana Tiwari’s insight into fashion collections and real style. But maybe if you looked inside yourself you will find the writing is on the wall. Gently turn the leaf is a great by line for Arundhati’s column, but if you don’t turn the technology corner your granddaughter may never be able to know that pleasure.

So in order to keep our industry green, and save our planet, a recycled loo roll while you read your digital newspaper on your iPhone or your iPad maybe the way to start your day!'

Me? Write?

I have spent 12 years in the publishing business. Eleven in the same publishing house. I got appraised every year and for special skills I wrote, "I read and I write." That is all I do. It is all I know how to do. I feel most alive when I write. Like an active participant in my own destiny and the ideology of the people around me.

I am a typical younger child - more independent, more self contained, probably more selfish. I could retreat into myself and my world of books and was reading Ukranian folk tales to myself before I was 6. (It's what i got for topping first grade). As I got older, I read more. To have a long chat with me, my mum had to lock the book I was reading in her closet! And I went through all the phases. Enid Blyton was my first real friend. Famous Five, Secret Seven, Nancy Drews.... I even recall a Summer of Mills & Boons. Thankfully that didn't last!

I think the only thing for me to do was to write. My first poem was when i was 9. I still remember most of it. But I fell in love with prose and then feature writing. Essays, articles, papers. As my father spoke, I wrote. Turn of phrase was accorded special importance and I matured out of writing for myself and understood 'my writing as read by others'. And then I met the Post Feminist editor of Elle who gave me my first job.

Lifestyle writing consumes you. I have in my career worked for a fashion magazine, an upscale women's journal, launched a bridal magazine and edited a luxury lifestyle magazine that created an interesting trend within the fashion/ lifestyle magazines that existed around me. And last year after 11 years of taking my first job, I was asked to shut the magazines and clear out. Over a weekend. You know those pictures you saw after the Lehman Brothers fall, of people walking out with a box of their stuff - I had 5 cartons full. I practically lived at the office.

Last year, I went digital. You can't look back, you know. The numbers, the passivity, the environmental responsibility does not let you miss the feel of paper...much. At 31 I was a relic. There were 23 year olds who rolled their eyes before I had left the room. I was lucky to be working with some of the smartest kids of the digital block - in content, technology, creative, apps, gaming and most importantly marketing and distribution.

And I learnt some of life's lessons with the shift. I found scale. All the boundaries of exclusivity fell away and I became more inclusive as a human being. There is more power in participating in the marathon than there is in the most upscale private gym in the country. The global village was a clever 'turn of phrase' till I became a Netizen. I am one of the millions - more power to us!