I wrote about the wife taking one of my sister’s cooking classes in a previous entry. All of my sisters are excellent cooks. I like to think that I am also. My mom was amazing in the kitchen and I believe we all inherited that from her. My sister has been able to take that talent to another level through her unique idea to teach Indian cooking classes. Her classes have proved to be very popular and having attended quite a few to take photos for her, it is clear that one of the main reasons is her ability to teach a complex subject quite easily to people unfamiliar with it. I remember my mother demonstrating her techniques and passing on various tips to us and I am reminded of her when my sister does the same thing while teaching her cooking class. A lot of it also has to do with passion for the topic at hand. I think people who are teaching a subject they care deeply about, who possess significant expertise in it and who are able to connect with their students do a much better job in conveying knowledge. Students in such an environment are much more willing to learn and feel much more satisfied. I have seen my sister Hajra, who has been teaching for thirteen years, lecture to a class and she is similar to Hanifa not only in mannerisms but in her passion for the subject. She has a comprehensive grasp of what she teaches, is an expert in the field, is able to relate to her students and extracts the best out of them. This love for teaching seems to run in our family because another sister of mine loves teaching young children and she had taken a course in early childhood development although she did not pursue teaching as a career. I love standing in front of a class, speaking about a topic I am passionate about and engaging in discussions with students. I can see myself doing this permanently at a university at some point in the future. I think that this desire to pass on knowledge stems from our mother and the way she would always relate secular and religious stories to us, teach us prayers and interact with us while she cooked.
The “About Me” section of Mircha’s facebook page speaks about the influence of my mom’s culinary skills and teaching on Hanifa’s cooking. I have cut and pasted it below:
"Hanifa Nakhuda is an Indo-Barbadian cook with deeply embedded roots in traditional Indian cuisine. Born in Barbados to parents of Gujarati Indian origin, she learnt how to cook Gujarati food at a young age at the feet of her mother, Hawwa Degia.
Hawwa, an extraordinary cook, would have polished her culinary skills in her village of Kaphletha before moving to Barbados. In a Barbados of the late 1960s/early 1970s, she was faced with constraints in locating certain spices and ingredients, leading her to develop the art of improvisation. As her children grew older and demanded Barbadian and Western food, she began to experiment with those cuisines as well as fuse Indian and Western cooking. The increasing number of Gujarati immigrants in the late 1970s and early 1980s was accompanied by a more expansive availability of Indian spices. Therefore, Hawwa took advantage of this to showcase fully her talent in cooking a wide array of Indian dishes and desserts.
It was no wonder that growing up in this type of environment, Hanifa and her siblings emerged as master cooks in their own right. Hanifa began cooking Indian, Bajan and various Indo-Bajan fusion dishes for her immediate family before graduating to extended family, friends, neighbours and colleagues. Widespread encouragement from family and friends to take her skills to another level led her to enter a few local cooking competitions all of which she won. She also started a small catering business, focusing on authentic Gujarati food. Her burgeoning popularity resulted in her being asked to fill a serious dearth that existed in Barbados- the teaching of authentic Indian cuisine to Barbadians. Her cooking courses proved to be an immediate hit with classes being constantly oversubscribed.
Hanifa’s latest venture, Mircha, is aimed at bringing her expertise and experience as the standard-bearer of Indian cuisine in Barbados to a wider cross-section of Barbadian society."
The “About Me” section of Mircha’s facebook page speaks about the influence of my mom’s culinary skills and teaching on Hanifa’s cooking. I have cut and pasted it below:
"Hanifa Nakhuda is an Indo-Barbadian cook with deeply embedded roots in traditional Indian cuisine. Born in Barbados to parents of Gujarati Indian origin, she learnt how to cook Gujarati food at a young age at the feet of her mother, Hawwa Degia.
Hawwa, an extraordinary cook, would have polished her culinary skills in her village of Kaphletha before moving to Barbados. In a Barbados of the late 1960s/early 1970s, she was faced with constraints in locating certain spices and ingredients, leading her to develop the art of improvisation. As her children grew older and demanded Barbadian and Western food, she began to experiment with those cuisines as well as fuse Indian and Western cooking. The increasing number of Gujarati immigrants in the late 1970s and early 1980s was accompanied by a more expansive availability of Indian spices. Therefore, Hawwa took advantage of this to showcase fully her talent in cooking a wide array of Indian dishes and desserts.
It was no wonder that growing up in this type of environment, Hanifa and her siblings emerged as master cooks in their own right. Hanifa began cooking Indian, Bajan and various Indo-Bajan fusion dishes for her immediate family before graduating to extended family, friends, neighbours and colleagues. Widespread encouragement from family and friends to take her skills to another level led her to enter a few local cooking competitions all of which she won. She also started a small catering business, focusing on authentic Gujarati food. Her burgeoning popularity resulted in her being asked to fill a serious dearth that existed in Barbados- the teaching of authentic Indian cuisine to Barbadians. Her cooking courses proved to be an immediate hit with classes being constantly oversubscribed.
Hanifa’s latest venture, Mircha, is aimed at bringing her expertise and experience as the standard-bearer of Indian cuisine in Barbados to a wider cross-section of Barbadian society."
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