THE
KHAKI KOOK BOOK
A Collection of a Hundred Cheap and
Practical Recipes Mostly from
Hindustan.
By
MARY KENNEDY CORE
Bareilly, India.
Printed for the Author
by
THE ABINGDON PRESS
Copyright, 1917, by
Mary Kennedy Core.
Preface.
WHY THIS LITTLE BOOK.
About ten years ago the idea of writing alittle cook book had its birth. We were inAlmora that summer. Almora is a station farup in the Himalayas, a cleanlittle bazaar nestles at thefoot of enclosing mountains.Dotting the deodar-coveredslopes of these mountains arethe picturesque bungalows ofthe European residents, whiletowering above and over allare the glistening peaks of theeternal snows.
We love to think of thisparticular summer, for LilavateSingh was with us. Thethought of her always bringshelp and inspiration.
One day she prepared forthe crowd of us a tiffin ofdelicious Hindustani food. That afternoonwhile we were sitting under the shade andfragrance of the deodar trees, we praisedthe tiffin. Before we knew it we were planning[4]a cook book. It was to be a jointaffair of Hindustani and English dishes, andMiss Singh was to be responsible for the Hindustanipart of it. Our enthusiasm grew. Forthree or four days we talked of nothing else.We experimented, we planned; we dreamed, wewrote. But alas! other things soon thrust themselvesupon us, and our unfinished cook bookwas pigeon-holed for years and years.
And it is not now what it would have been iffinished then.
Many of the recipes, however, are those thatMiss Singh gave us then. Some of them shemight not recognize, for they have become quiteAmericanized, but they are hers nevertheless,and I hope that you will not only try them andenjoy them, but that they will help you to solvesome of the problems of living and giving whichare confronting us all these days.
I have told this story before, but it fits inwell here. A lady in India once had an ayah,who from morning until night sang the samesad song as she would wheel the baby in itslittle go-cart up and down the mandal or driveway;as she would energetically jump it up anddown; as she would lazily pat it to sleep, alwaysand ever she could be heard chanting plaintively,"Ky a ke waste, Ky a ke waste, pet ke waste,pet ke waste."
The lady's curiosity was aroused. The[5]words were simple enough, but they had nosense: "For why? For why? For why? Forstomach! For stomach! For stomach!" wailedthe ayah.
Desiring to know what was for why, andwhat was for stomach one day, the lady calledthe ayah to her and sought the interpretationthereof.
"This is the meaning, Oh mem sahiba," saidthe ayah: "Why do we live? What is the meaningof our existence? To fill our stomachs, tofill our stomachs."
You may smile at this and feel sorry for thepoor benighted Hindu, who has such a low idealof the meaning of life, but after all we cannotignore the fact that we must eat, and that muchas we dislike to acknowledge it, we are compelledto think a great deal about filling ourstomachs. This is especially true