Mrs Dubey, and the terrifying upma!!

first of all I do not know how true this story is. A very close friend of my father mr ranade, has narrated this several times. I always used to tell ranade uncle that this cud never happen, but he always insists and says it did actually happen. A very jovial character, its always fun when he is around. We see less of him now, as he isn’t keeping very good health. God bless him!

The incident dates back to somewhere between 1961 and 1964, that’s the time my father, and ranade uncle, and several others in their group, spent at IOCL’s Guwahati Oil Refinery, in Assam. Out of a group of 10 odd friends, a few were married. One such friend was mr dubey, who was newly married, and his wife, who hailed from garhwal, had just very recently, arrived from garhwal.
On a Sunday morning a couple of friends happened to visit dubeyjee’s place. And it was decided to have upma for breakfast.

A coy mrs dubey, hailed from the mountains of garhwal, and hadn’t the faintest of ideas of how upma is prepared. So, the two bachelor friends, and mr dubey, explained the entire upma recipe to mrs dubey, and then they spent their time chatting in the drawing room, while the lady went in the kitchen to complete the job. For the first time, she was trying her hand at preparing upma.

She made a strange mistake. Instead of taking ‘rawa’, she took another ingredient having similar physical appearance and characteristics, light off-white color, and similar granular feel. It was a local make detergent powder. I do not know what this detergent powder was doing in the kitchen but that’s how this story goes. So in went some ‘rawa’ into a kadhaai, and for a few minutes, madam dubey religiously roasted it. Later on, once she felt the ‘rawa’ was well roasted, as per instructions, she took boiling water, already kept ready on the other burner, and poured it on the rawa. The moment she did this, there was a huge ball of foam that formed over the kadhaai. This site of so much foam was so scary for mrs dubey, that she dropped the ladle in her hand and ran outside into the drawing room, screaming. I can only imagine how she must have felt, her upma going up in foam!!!

Unable to understand, the three men rushed into the kitchen, and for a few seconds were shocked to see so much foam. When mrs dubey pointed out the tin from where she had taken the rawa, things became clear, and the trio burst out laughing, an initially embarrassed mrs dubey also joining later on.

Actually mrs dubey had just arrived the previous afternoon, was joining her hubby for the first time in guwahati, and wasn’t familiar about where exactly the provisions were stacked in the kitchen store, and hence, this crazy mix-up! I have heard some amazing culinary flops or even disasters, but I guess this, if true, takes the cake.