Preamble and full disclosure: I was raised quite differently compared to the other kids I knew growing up. My parents were indifferent towards religion, Hindu ceremonies and all the superstition that comes with it. So this just means that I know very little of the ceremony we had for Arjun. That is not to say that I did not have one as a kid, just didn't have the religious significance. Was just another reason to cook and entertain. Much like it is for us. Although I must say Tricia does take it more seriously.

The prep work for the Annaprashan nee Mukhe-bhaat started Friday afternoon. I decided to work from home so I could help out as much as I could. The menu was going to be:


- Stir fried cabbage
- Yellow daal with coconut
- Potato chechki
- Doi maach
- Posto chicken
- Kosha mangsho
- Tomato chutney
- Payesh
- Rice

And Arjun was going to get boiled rice. Nice huh?

So, Tricia and I started cooking early on Friday so we could start cooling things off to store in the fridge. It was long laborious process. See, we aren't really food snobs* but we like to use fresh ingredients. This includes all the spices, which we grind in our little Magic Bullet (Perfect for Indian spices).

Tricia headed off to Whole Foods to pick up the fish, chicken and veggies needed and then to Alladin a local middle eastern grocery store to pick up goat meat, in Indian parlance, mutton. Bengalis like me calls it Mangsho, which translates to meat, but almost always means goat.


If you haven't had goat, you sir/lady, are missing out. Lamb is OK and can be tough on many occasions especially if it's shank. Goat takes a lot of cooking and I will tell you shortly, just how long. In fact, I'll add all the recipes here so you can try some of this at home if you'd like.

We tag teamed all day and got most of the cooking done. One of the things Tricia always leaves up to me is the Kosha Mangsho, this is a very fragrant curry made with whole spices, simmered for about 6 hours. Yeah, it tastes much better than it sounds. Always a hit, never a miss.



Back to sunny boy, to be totally honest, we were having this ceremony for him, but last week he had his first bite of some sort of Cantaloupe during the Ford family reunion. He was just chomping down on it. Here's some TMI, later that evening, he popped the little cantaloupe bites out whole. No digestion or anything.

Arjun and Eve just played and laughed all day while I was multitasking between work and cooking. Tricia mostly focused on cooking so I could get my work done.

We cooked everything except the Alu Chechki, which is so simple to make, a caveman could do it. We cleaned up the place and headed to bed. It was quite a long day but we knew that we had most of the work behind us.


The next day I took Eve for her soccer practice, check the pictures below and headed home to shower and get ready for people to arrive around 10:30am. Tricia wore one of my mom's saris, I wore the only kurta I own, (yeah, I know it's a little pathetic), Eve wore her new salwar kameez that my dad brought for her and Arjun wore a kurta with a shawl. We are one solidly desi family... dontcha think?


We had a few friends not show up because kids weren't well, but that is the nature of the game. I got everyone drinks and then did the talk about Annaprashan. I did not know at the time but that day was Rakhee too. If I had known I would have had better material for my speech and it may have sucked less.


Unfortunately besides Vic and Paul none of my colleagues could make it, I had not given most people any notice. Told them the Friday before and most already had plans. Paul had known about this a month or so in advance so he chose us over sawing wood or whatever that madman does in his garage while his lovely wife melts glass in a tandoor. Quite the couple I must say.

Arjun sat in the high chair in the sun... I should have bought a patio shade... and took his first rice from his dida. And he loved it. He grabbed it with both hands and slurped it down. Considering he's been on a lactose diet for about 6 months now, I behave similarly.


He was so happy and smiled and laughed with everybody. We had a really good time with some great friends. I will add recipes for your perusal soon. And yeah, people pigged out on the food. I did make one mistake, I had made the cabbage in a hurry and forgot to salt it. Ah well...

* I may be a bit of a snob because I refuse to touch Velveeta, Mac & Cheese and anything that needs to be (re)hydrated unless I'm backpacking.

Labels: annaprashan, Arjun, rice