Camp and Calories with Rabri

The son is going for a camp from school.

11 yr old going away for 4 days.

Without parents.

First time.

Lot of excitement at home.  

The Bengali mother, although extremely tired from the weekend's Bengali New Years program, decided to make "luchi" for the camp going son.

'Aha...Bhogoban jane camp e ki khabe na khabe' (poor boy, God knows what food he will get at the camp).

Haha!

No, these were NOT the thoughts that raced through her mind.

While rolling out each luchi, trying to make them as circular as possible, she realized that she HERSELF was actually craving for luchi for sometime. The camp-going son was an excuse.

The son, who is born and brought up  in Holland loves luchi with "alu-r torkari". He was therefore overjoyed with the "luchi" news.

A-senior, smiled (a broad one) when he heard the "luchi" plan.

A foodie family...no doubt about that.

After a happy luchi meal, mother and son focused on packing. A-senior parked himself on the sofa and appointed himself as the supervisor. The camping list which has been hanging on the refrigerator door for the last four weeks was spread on the table, carefully looked at, each item ticked off the list as it went into the camping bag. 

The sleeping bag, the raincoat, the walking shoes, the pillow, .....and THE TORCH!

The torch somehow got the maximum attention.

The mom tried to convince the boy to take the torch that was already there at home. It was quite a slick-looking small modern torch.

The offer got rejected....Apparently it did not look like a CAMPING torch!!

Learning 1: The torch is the most important thing for a first-time-camp-going 11-yr old.

Packing was almost done.

The last item was a pillow. The parents had really taken the pillow more seriously than the torch. So a "camping" pillow was bought. A very nice one which you can blow up into quite a reasonable size and softness without bursting your lungs. Amazingly handy. So small. So convenient. So exciting.

I remembered the one from my childhood.  Dark brown Duckback. One had to almost empty his lungs to get some decent air into the pillows. We always carried it on our overnight train journeys.

A-senior blew into it and showed off the soft pillow with utter pride. He did it twice to demonstrate what a good choice the parents had made. The mom narrated her childhood air pillow story and mentioned how much better and more camp-friendly this pillow was.

But the teacher had instructed them to take normal small pillows and nothing in the world (no matter what the camp-excited-parents said) could change that!!

Finally the "normal" pillow won.
Learning 2: Never try to impose your own camping wishes on your child.

The Mom asked while packing "Do you want to eat something special when you are back from camp?"
A-junior replied, "Sheddho bhat!! [Boiled rice with eggs and potatoes]"

Learning 3:  Bangaliyana is in the blood. 

The bus came. The boys lined up with excited faces. The parents lined up with excitement-mixed-with-concern faces. The fathers checked the luggage, the mothers huddled around their kids giving last minute instructions "Sleep well (as if camp is about sleeping), Enjoy well (as if they wouldn't if not told to),  listen to your teachers (of course!)"

The bus left. All the parents kept waving. 
The mom could not see the son through the dark window glasses......but kept waving too...sure that an excited boy in the bus was waving back.
Learning 4: When your boy goes camping for 4 days, he surely has grown up. Accept it.

Rabri  

If you are one of those people who count their calories everyday, then this is the right moment to leave the blog and go for a run. This recipe is laden with calories, thousands of them. It is also laden with taste (specially if you love sweets). 
I am not a sweet lover but realized that I wanted to make Rabdi because I love Malpoa. The two of them go together.....
The cooking part is pretty simple, but the main ingredient is patience!!
No, a diet-rabri does not exist, do not search the net!!!

Ingredients:

• 2 liters Full milk
• 3 spoon sugar
• 1/2 tsp cardamom powder
• Finely sliced almonds
• Few strands of saffron

Ready steady cook:

• Boil the milk at high heat in a heavy bottom pan.
• Wait till a layer of cream appears. Move the cream layer to the side of the pan with a spatula.
• Let the milk boil again and a fresh layer of cream appear.
• Move the cream layer to the sides again.
• Repeat this step till the milk is reduced to 1/3 the initial volume. [warned you about patience!!!]
• Add the sugar, the cardamom powder and the almonds.
• Now scrape the cream from the sides into the milk, mix well, cook for 2-3 minutes and then switch off the heat.
• Add a few strands of saffron.
• Let it cool down and then chill in the refrigerator.

I served it with warm Malpoa. HEAVEN!!