From Neyyappam to Moussaka: Expansive World of Mrs B F Varughese

Opening ‘Recipes for All Occasions’ feels less like leafing through a cookbook and more like entering a well-ordered kitchen, where a seasoned master calmly unlocks her store of flavours for the wider world.

At its helm is Mrs B F Varughese, the ‘Pachakarani’ to generations of Malayali households. With an ease born of habit, she moves from Piroshky and Moussaka to Coronation Casserole, and Greek-style shepherd’s pie, pausing only to remind her sous-chefs of Molasses Scones (more locally, Neyyappam), Vadukappuli pickle, or Banana Kutti Appam. The range is catholic and the tone is unadorned.

Presented by her grandchildren, Varkey Varughese and Paulose Varughese, this volume collects the recipes she had previously published across three books. Those, in turn, grew out of her weekly column in a Malayalam periodical under the ‘Pachakarani’ series. As the editors note in the foreword, she was eventually “coaxed to bring out an English version for the people who couldn’t read Malayalam.”

For Mrs Varughese (Saramma to her family), the intended reader is the practised home cook. She assumes competence. When she calls for “1.5 cups of flour” in an Italian Yeast Cake, she does not pause to specify the variety. This is not a manual for the hesitant beginner but a guide for those looking to extend their repertoire. In spirit, it stands closer to the venerable ‘Rasachandrika: Saraswat Cookery Book with Notes and Home Remedies, Useful Hints and Hindu Festivals’ than to contemporary cookbooks tailored for harried modern kitchens. Nor does it attempt the pedagogic thoroughness of Julia Child’s ‘Mastering the Art of French Cooking.’

The instructions are spare as she addresses cooks who know their basics. Consider her chicken vindaloo, the Goan, Portuguese-inspired dish where vinegar stands in for wine. The method is dispatched with brisk clarity: grind red chillies, turmeric, cumin, garlic, and ginger; brown sliced onions; sauté the paste; add chicken, whole spices, green chillies, and shallots; pour in vinegar and water; salt; cover tightly and cook on low heat until tender. There is no digression on provenance, nor any meditation on adaptation.

This old-world directness extends elsewhere. For Gateau Mocha, she specifies two teaspoons of Nescafe (not generic instant coffee) dissolved in hot water for dipping biscuits. ‘Chena’ is identified, precisely, as a corm. A drop of cochineal is recommended to tint a cake batter red. The editors have preserved these period details even as they standardise measurements from pounds and ounces to kilograms and grams. This is a decision that respects both fidelity and usability.

North Kerala’s repertoire may be largely absent, though biryanis find a place. The purists might quibble over her chicken biriyani. Yet with at least 1,320 recipes, the sweep is formidable. From soups, including beef tea, to Tulip tart, Mrs Varughese spans a culinary spectrum that is both domestic and cosmopolitan. In its economy of instruction and breadth of imagination, the book remains anchored in the home kitchen it seeks to serve.
(Recipes for All Occasions, 522 pages, ₹1,750, available on Amazon.)