Vaanu Thiruonam

I have graduated from "I cook so that I do not starve" to "I'm a good cook".

I cooked a huge Ona sadya for few of our friends, they all enjoyed it and had a wonderful time.

Very rarely we invite more than 2 people at a time and my usual menu is Fried Rice/Vegetable Pulao and chicken curry. This is something that you can never go wrong with. Everyone likes it and it is easy to make.

Onam has always been a special time to me, so this Onam I decided to do it on a large scale (cooking for 8 is a large scale according to me) and invited people very close to us.

Me being my usual self had a time line of things to do whole of last week with Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday mainly being shopping and cleaning. Thursday was supposed to be the prep day, but something else came up and that did not happen.

Friday since I missed a day, I was little on the "I can not believe I'm behind" stage. Friday evening I started cooking and some last minute cleaning. Woke up around 6.30 AM on Saturday and cooked till around 11.00 AM and I was done. I was so happy because I never knew I had it in me to be able to cook such a elaborate meal.

All our friends came, all the girls were dressed in Set Mundu and the guys in Mundu and Juba. We lit our Nella Vilakku and sat around it and ate our lunch on Vazha ella (banana leaf).

It was such a beautiful experience to celebrate Onam with dear ones.

Happy Onam to all.