I’m going to make you the most awesome soup, ever,” came a tinny voice from the speaker in my lap-top, and I leaned forward, excited. V, my American friend, has a taste for cooking. He’s been trying out at least one recipe every single day, and posting Youtube videos online. V is about as web-proficient as my cat – which is to say, just a little bit – but they were interesting. Today, he’d sent me the link for a brand-new recipe, and arrived almost simultaneously, for a chat online. (I am one of those awesome people without web-cams.)Here he was, in his kitchen (re-decorated to resemble a fish-shop), with his pots, pans, stove and ladles, introducing the “complicated recipe of Mulligatawny Soup,” and began to take pieces of carrots, apples, chicken pieces, curry-powder – I hit the pause button. “You put chickens in it?” I tap the question in the tiny chat-window, incredulous. “Actually, the recipe’s got everything from ham, crabs and lobsters,” came the answer. “It’s kind of an all-purpose soup. You like it?” “So where’s the pepper, the milagu that’s actually part of the recipe?” Silence. After a few moments, came the answer. “There’s no milagu in the Vegan Detox Mulligatawny recipe I have.” I gaped at the screen. “You do realise that Mulligatawny Soup is the anglicised version of Milagu-Thanni? Literally, it means Pepper-Water in Tamil. Here, we call it rasam.” “But – I thought it was Irish. From Mulligan Stew or something.” I rubbed my hands in glee. “Time for a lesson, amigo.” Somehow, I could sense V groaning about it. “Don’t go into too many details, okay?” “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, very much on my dignity – not that V could see it. “Mulligatawny Soup is the British version of a Tamil dish – when they arrived here, they wanted soups to go with their meal and asked the locals, but no one here had soups, of course. They got hold of the nearest soup/stew dish and added it to their meals. It had these hot spices they’d never eaten, so it was pretty exotic, for them.” “If it was just pepper-water, how did chicken and apples come into it?” “They probably found the original a bit too bland,” I theorised. “But it’s been very popular ever since the 19th century. The Nabob’s Cookery Book – priced at the princely sum of one shilling, has it. And Lady Charlotte Campbell Bury included it in her book of recipes too, in 1844. The book was called “The lady’s own cookery book, and new dinner-table directory: in which will be found a large collection of original receipts including not only the result of the authoress’ many years of observation, experience and research but also the contributions of an extensive circle of acquaintance adapted to the use of Persons living in the Highest Style as well as Those of Moderate Fortune,” I ended, beaming. “That name is as big as a book.” “Shut up. Here’s this account of a guest who had wonderful tiffin on board the ship Merkara, a British-India Company mail-steamer, when it arrived in Brisbane. It was published in the Brisbane Courier in April 1881.” I copy-pasted the text in the box. “ ‘I have heard that an Indian cook scorns curry powder and makes his mullagatawney from the fresh condiments ground up on a stone. The mullagatawney made by a Bengalee is hopelessly unattainable to the European chef.’ ” “Aside from his superiority complex, sounds like he enjoyed it.” There was a pause. “So, tell me how to make this milagu-rasam.” “Only if you promise never to add apples to it,” I said with a shudder.
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