#1: I hope this letter finds you eating samosas...

Hello and welcome to Fried Lines, a newsletter that helps me talk about my fondness for potatoes.

In the first chapter of this venture, I am hoping to tell you why I write this newsletter… and eat a samosa!

Most of my happy memories have twirled around eating potatoes, particularly samosa — the piping, hot snack which is coveted by many South Asians.

As a teacher, I remember resorting to a plate of samosas in our canteen after giving my lessons to mark the day — a story which always makes me smile in reminiscence. Amidst a whirlwind of fried potatoes and smoking cauldrons, I was hit by an amusing reflection that mapped a big chunk of my life as I see it today.

The story of dressing samosas in chutney and hot sauces has spun throughout my life, being an everyday token of both celebration and escape. As a child, I would wake up to the irresistible aroma of fried oil incensing the house. My mother has always enjoyed embellishing a steel thali with little doughs of potatoes, laced with a range of spices that she often made from scratch!

On one of the autumn evenings in 2000, my mother met a couple happily tossing tiny samosas in wood fuel outside a temple located in Chatra, a district in Jharkhand. Compelled to buy a few of them, she dug in the delicacy and ended up having one of her eureka moments.

Thus began my mother’s quest to find the perfect taste for the little treat in our kitchen. She would roll the dough and blend different spices, in a hope that she recreated her appetizing experience. The magic, explains my mother, is keeping the size small to savour every ounce of ingredient — her most insightful takeaway from Chatra.

Growing up, my heart called for samosas everywhere — either at home or when I stepped out for a bite. With a samosa by my side, I have sailed across a lot of places as I transitioned among different cities, and travelled within the fluidity of both happy and stressful times. I remember stuffing my mouth with the crisps back when my undergraduate program was the centre of many national debates (twice). I lived in a climate of uncertainty and disarray but my dabba full of samosas always had my back. Our bond bloomed over time when I stressed over meeting deadlines at work or simply when I wanted to celebrate my birthday!

Spanning across diverse events, samosa has often been both a luxury meal and a quick fix for me. At a time when the prices of potatoes are soaring in the Indian market, I am privileged and fortunate enough to still afford them, buy them, eat them… and write about them!

My fellowship with samosas has helped me achieve many satisfying breakthroughs. While North India helped me garnish them with chickpeas, onions, and tomatoes (essentially a samosa chaat), living in Maharashtra made me acquainted with squeezing samosa and chutney in a pav, teaming with fried chillis, and going hand in hand with one of my memorable discoveries — the marvelous peanut chutney, the spicy mix of mashed peanuts. In an attempt to derive a healthier experience, I also found a way with samosas covered in whole wheat flour and olive oil. However, my biggest revelation was when I tried replicating my mother’s recipe to make samosas on my own. (They were half burnt and out of shape, but I loved them.)

I am often asked to describe the best samosa I ever had. Isn’t it what a ‘foodie’ should do? My relationship with a samosa, however, transgresses the conventions of judgments, and for a peculiar reason, I am unable to draw comparisons among potatoes. ‘Love’ might be too strong a word but I have indeed loved every potato samosa I have had in my life. Our friendship, glistening in hot oil, flips across pages sprinkled with flour and narrates a simple story of hope. I call our friendship ‘a perfect mash’! (I am not good with jokes.)

Perhaps, it was the warmth my mother had felt on her trip to Chatra that stayed with me forever! Smacking our lips over a plate of samosas is certainly not a family tradition but merely a sweet symphony that we had discovered two decades ago. Yet the feeling, quite often evolving itself, still lives with me.