Passionate about pasta

FOODIE

Gallerist Sharon Apparao is quite a revelation when it comes to the kitchen. She not only enjoys cooking "" though a busy schedule comes in the way of indulging this particular passion "" but is, in fact, quite happy to even get into other people's kitchens and cook for them if they request her for an Andhra speciality.

"Just the other day", she says, "I went to this home and they were asking me about Andhra food so I cooked them a fish pulusu (curry with tamarind)." If she wasn't into art, she sighs decidedly, she would be a cook. Then again, "In my old age, I will run a restaurant selling aphrodisiac food!" Uhh? "It's just different, isn't it?" she finishes.

At the recent India Food and Wine Show, Apparao has been holding an exhibition on food and art; she has dug out abstracts from her collection to go with the colours of spices, but we go in there asking for much, much more.

Apparao has to cook for us from whatever ingredients come her way and she is excited at the prospect, not at all worried "" "they'll definitely have olive oil at least", she says. They do, and they bring in some penne, tomatoes and cheese too from which Apparao manages to assemble some superb pasta.

Italian cuisine (and health food) is what Apparao loves to rustle up in any case, despite her love for Indian vegetarian fare. It is a love she acquired after a semester in Italian art when she went to live with friends of her parents, an Italian couple, in Florence. But if she picked up on all the nuances, she taught her hosts some too.

"They asked me to teach them how to make paneer in exchange, so I asked them for a fine muslin cloth. They didn't have any and didn't know what it was but when I said 'thin cloth', they said they had underwear that would do!" The garment in question, Apparao, stresses, was new; nevertheless, this is one piece of paneer-making she is unlikely to forget.

Apparao is as inventive when it comes to her menus. She talks about serving rusks with boursin cheese and avakkai (mango) pickle with as much relish as devilled eggs stuffed with rice and pickle, or cucumber sandwiches without the bread with a filing of hung curd between the cucumber slices. And she promises that she specialises in no-oil recipes too.

But that apart, there are traditional recipes in her collection picked up from old cooks employed by her land-owning family. "My mother didn't know how to cook. So on days the cook wouldn't turn up she would say 'please make something before you go to school'." Now, that's one child we'd all love to have!

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FAVOURITE RECIPE

Pasta Arrabiata

1 cup penne pasta
2 tsp of olive oil
2 pods of garlic, chopped
1 red chilli
1 onion, pureed
2 tomatoes, skinned and finely chopped
A dash of red wine
A cube or 2-3 small pieces of cheese, cheddar or anything stronger like blue cheese
Salt to taste
A pinch of oregano seasoning

Heat oil in a pan and saute the garlic in it, add the red chilli and onion and fry for 2-3 minutes. Add a dash of red wine. Add the tomatoes now and fry for another 3-4 minutes. Add any veggies you like at this stage and let them cook till al dente.

Boil the pasta with oil and salt till al dente. Drain. Take the cheese and toss the pasta with it so that it absorbs the flavour. Then pour the sauce in the centre. You can again add a dash of wine at this stage. Finish with the oregano seasoning. Serve.