Just keep swimming

Hello,

Remember that annoyingly famous dialogue of 'Dory' from 'Finding Nemo'. It's one of my; all time favourite movie! Every time I dive in that underwater world, "Just keep swimmin! Just keep swimmin! Just keep swimmin, swimmin, swimmin bubbles in my head in endless loop.

For the sheer fun of it I unleash it on my family members with equal eloquence of Dory; favourite bakras hubby & bro :D
How they wish to dump me in the Pacific, that specific moment!!! haha...
But on a serious note, the meaning behind the dialogue is simple yet powerful.

I was being adventurous attempting a recipe from weekend news paper. The dish was aromatic & spicy Prawn curry. Well the recipe was simple : mustard seeds, chopped onions, few curry leaves & ginger juliennes sauteed lightly in one 1tbsp oil , add green chilli paste, turmeric pd, salt, small marble of tamarind, mix well, pour a full can of coconut milk (or one full fresh coconut milk equivalent) bring to a boil, add about 10-12 medium sized prawns/shrimp and let them change colour.

My hubby being the prawn fan cum connoisseur in my home was the first to sample the curry. His face scrunched up momentarily, before he rasped - salty and sour. Time for damage control, no way I could dash my better half's hopes of delving in his favorite crustacean for dinner.

I mentally ran through my options;
Coconut milk? Nah! that will kill the spice, not to mention will add 'sweet' to the list of adjectives.
Sugar & salt? Had heard somewhere it's effective for killing sourness. But wait we already have salt issues.
Vegetables? I mean many of my community dishes combine a diaspora or vegetables to the simple prawn curry; bhindi/ cauliflower/ beans/ gourd/ potatoes/ brinjal. Let me warn you; it's an acquired taste, but quite addictive once you get used to it.

That's it, in all that rambling I found the solution for my current predicament - potatoe!!! I had some boiled potatoes creamed for tomorrow's breakfast paratha; just borrowed 2 tbsp of my most likely saviour. Stir in with a gentle hand till blends homogeneously. Final check, yes problem resolved!!! (The curry thickens a bit that can be fixed with a li'l bit of water)

All through dinner I was itching to investigate the matter and ferret out the culprit, to avoid future mishaps since the recipe was a quite good and we definitely wanted to repeat it. By order of elimination was able to pin the crime to the jar of ready chilli paste; bought unsuspectingly last week. Had to undergo trail by fire (literally for my tongue) in bringing justice to the verdict; but hey I discovered an alternate use for that damned chilli paste - pickle! chilli pickle to be precise :) given it was perfect on salt & sourness to play the role.

As the say "all's well, that ends well"
Finally can't help but say - just keep swimmin, just keep swimmin ;)

Will look out for virtual chappals n rotten tomatoes.... :D

Cheers!!!