Big Basket and McDonalds

Our grocery shopping experience did not end with Easy Day.  Lacey discovered through a local friend that there was an online grocery store called, “Big Basket”.  We decided to give it a try.  She found the website and we placed an order.  With just a hick up or two, we successfully placed an order which was set for delivery the next evening.  It was so exciting!  (Yes, groceries – yes, exciting).  They arrived at our house with boxes and crates of our order, brought them into the house and unloaded them.  Lacey was given her order sheet and encouraged to check it off.  Most everything we ordered was there and we paid the men. We had cereal, boxed milk and juice, butter, eggs, bread, meat (chicken and buffalo - water buffalo – not much beef to be found), and several other cooking essentials.  It was almost like Christmas!  We chose to shop this way for the rest of the time we were there.  The down side was we couldn’t see the produce and meat before we bought them – the up side was we didn’t have to pack it all in a rickshaw to bring home!

We purchased our bread from a little bakery, Bread Works, owned by some Believers.  The bread was really so good!  We had a local corner store that we went to in a pinch that was just a block away.  There was a little shop that sold and delivered our water that was in our block, and we discovered a small butcher shop that carried ground beef along with many other hard to find items.  Gelato was on the menu several days a week (Italian ice cream) and they delivered!  Chase and Lacey just couldn't resist!!

So, my first experience with buff, as they call it, was interesting.  We bought quite a bit of ground buff our first order.  We were ordering in metric measurements and didn’t have a good idea of how much we were ordering.  We put everything away quickly and planned to store it better or cook it in the morning.  When we got up the next day, there was a terrible funk in the kitchen.  It didn’t take us long to identify it as the buff when we were opening the fridge.  We had so much, and apparently it was ruined over night.  Bad food is not that easy to dispose of and so we just left it there for the day, trying to figure out what to do. 

Later that evening, Freda, a friend of Chase and Lacey who has lived in Asia for some time, came over.  I asked her about it.  She agreed that it didn’t smell pleasant, but she said it wasn’t spoiled and always smells that way.  I decided to cook it while Chase and Lacey were gone.  As soon as I got a sear on it, it began looking and smelling normal.  We had about 4 – 5 pounds of ground buff when it was cooked down.  I put it in the freezer and we made soup, chili, chili mac and other yummy dishes with it. 

The chicken looked pretty good, so I boiled it knowing that we were in need of chicken broth for Christmas morning.  It turned out well, and so the cooking began!

Lacey taught me how to cook in a pressure cooker!  I had seen them when I was little and remembered the whistle and the warnings of cooking with one.  Lacey was fearless!  And she was good!  We had some delicious southern American food during my stay.  I became a fan of pressure cooking!!

Christmas was approaching and there were some old familiar recipes that we wanted to put on the table.  We really wanted cornbread dressing, but Lacey didn’t think we could find cornmeal.  After some investigating we discovered that it would be called maize flour.  A friend told us where we could find it.  We also wanted some desserts that called for brown sugar.  Again, Lacey didn’t think it was available.  Lacey’s friend also told us about jaggery – the nearest brown sugar substitute that she had found.  She gave us some and then told us where we could get more.  We ordered some from Big Basket but it came in one huge hunk and we didn’t have a grinder with which to break it down.  Jaggery was a great addition to our pantry for Christmas though. When we went to the store that sold maize flour and ground jaggery, we also found chocolate chips!  We bought way too many – but it was worth it in the end.

Vanilla extract was something we couldn’t find, but I brought some with me, so we had enough for Christmas baking.  Spices in general, are in abundance there.  They come in little boxes with foil liners.  Something that we discovered quickly was that they were fresh and potent!  We each ruined a pot of chili by using the suggested amount in the American recipe we were following.  It was so tasty, but impossible to eat!  HOT!

This was my big baking mess.  I pulled the jaggery out of the package and it flew all over the room!

Baking was a challenge.  We didn’t have baking dishes, so we had to borrow some.  It was Christmas and most everyone was using their baking dishes.  A few people threw us some of their least used dishes and we made do.  All in all, we served really good cornbread dressing, chicken, a yummy slaw, green beans, and pumpkin pie.  We had friends over and our Christmas dinner was a hit.

Bangalore is a city with many western restaurants.  Chase and Lacey were in food heaven!  They don’t get to eat at many truly western restaurants where they live, so they wanted to make the best of it.  We ate McDonalds, KFC, Quiznos, Dominoes, Taco Bell, Subway, California Pizza Kitchen, Chili’s, and Hard Rock Café.  We also ate Indian food and in some Indian restaurants.  We ate a couple of times with friends in their homes.  My favorite by far was the Persian restaurant that Chase took me to.  We had schwarma, falafel, and cinnamon rice…amazing food and great atmosphere!

California Pizza Kitchen



Hard Rock Cafe



Read the box...quite entertaining





Indian take-out...pretty yummy



Menu at the Persian restaurant.  It is hard to see, but it was given to us in a wooden box and the menu was printed on cloth.

schwarma - pita-type bread wrap - filled with chicken and yummy thinly sliced veggies with an amazing sauce



I called this cinnamon rice...made with carmelized onion and cinnamon and a whole lot of other delicious spices...ummm



Falafel pita sandwich - The most delicately sliced veggies with hummus and three rings of fried falafel (chick peas that have been mashed and fried)  I know!  I would have never imagined myself liking this!  The little pickles were amazing, too.  Persian food - perhaps my very favorite!



Loved this Chinese food that we got at the mall!  If you look carefully, you can see the HUGE pile of rice that is ready to be made into wonderful other dishes!  It was spicy, but very good.  The name cracks me up (Beijing Bites)

Most of the foreigners have Didi’s – locals who work for them as house helpers.  They hire them, train them, and pay them fair price for their work.  The blessed ones are those that get some of the more seasoned helpers that are also Believers.  They can be trusted and become close to the family.  They know the local markets and do the shopping and have mad cooking skills.  I was the closest thing that Chase and Lacey had to a Didi during their extended stay – and I was lacking in all skills!