Antara taught me how to rustle up a meal when you can’t step out and get that one missing ingredient and have to make do with what’s available at home. She prepared me for this crisis, initiating the training when she tossed me in to the deep end during Cyclone Vayu.
Once we had Antara up and about, the first thing we put in was jars of coffee and sugar. I had earlier stocked up on the cookware and some sixth sense made me stock up a week’s supply of rice, daal, oats and basic spices. So after 2 nights on board weathering out Vayu, I emerged a khichdi expert!
Dilip has enough and more experience with cooking when sailing. In fact, his cooking abilities are extolled by all his crewmates - Indian and otherwise. Check out how he balances while cooking on an Open 60.
As we began planning longer sails, we experimented with our meal plans. Initially, for our day sails we ensured we had enough water, juice / juicy fruits and buttermilk with us. People who sail with us either develop a great appetite or lose it completely. So lunch on day sails is usually vada pav, sandwiches, rolls; anything that’s easy to hold and to eat. Also, there’s always something tangy in our munchies bar: lemon sours, dry mango strips.
For our first overnight sail, we made our ‘sailboat special’: Goan sausage pulao. It’s what brought our Skipper his name and fame as a Chef!
For our long sails, standard provisions are rice, daal, coffee, sugar, tea, milk, juices, buttermilk, oats, pasta, fruits and a few snacks. Then I draw up a daily menu, just as we learnt to do in the Clipper Race. Most of the food is semi-prepared at home, packed and stored in our icebox. Meals are a mix and have included barbecue chicken (being served here by the Skipper),
mutton curry, prawn biryani, sabudana khichdi. We ask our guests if they have any dietary restrictions and only then design the menu. Here’s what one set of guests helped me draw up for a sail from Bombay to Goa with 6 of us on board:
Skipper says its always nice to have a hot meal; but that usually involves some interaction with the galley (kitchen in sail-speak), while balancing in a boat tilted about 30 degrees.
So we have a gimbal galley that adjusts easily to the motion of the boat. However, our guests don’t always manage. One 10 year old guest Neel, queasy but always game, did the next best thing - he had Dilip sous chef for him while he provided direction through the galley porthole!
Most of our guests prefer to volunteer with the prep work. That can be done anywhere! Here are Atul & Reshad, two of our very handy crew members, who helped with the dishes too.
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Love your style of writing Suchiiii, sail on
Enjoyed reading it. Looking forward to a delicious treat