Housewives arm themselves with culinary variety to tie kids to home food

CHENNAI: It may not be long when idly and dosa have to co-exist with muffins, pasta and risotto on the dining table of middle-class families. With the present generation seeking gastronomical variety and housewives eager to learn Chinese and continental cuisines, the middle-class kitchen is all set for a makeover.
The demand is so much so that the only government-run Institute of Hotel Management, Catering Technology and Applied Nutrition in the city is reviving a tailor-made course exclusively for housewives after a gap of 10 years.A plethora of requests prompted the institute to prepare a crash course not only on culinary techniques but also on the nuances of service and table arrangement.
"A decade ago, such courses used to have very few takers and that too from the elite class. With too many enquiries from housewives now, mostly from the middle class, we've decided to revive the course," said an official of the institute.
For Jayanthi (48), cooking became a challenge after her son started going to college. "He started complaining about the dishes I prepare and preferred frequenting restaurants with his friends. That was when I decided to join a cookery class to learn continental and Chinese cuisines to break the monotony, so that my son can have home-made dishes that will be more hygienic. Besides, it will also cut down our hotel expenses," she reasoned.
Suguna, a home-maker who has enrolled for the course, has more plans. Her interest in cookery has always encouraged her to convert her kitchen into a lab to experiment with different recipes. "Besides the traditional sambar and rasam, I also try out a variety of dishes on my own to entice my two school-going children to the dining table. Now, I've planned to carve out a career for myself by operating a catering service from home, for which I am going to attend a course." she said.
Commenting on the trend, celebrity chef K Damodaran said a majority of women he had interacted with wanted to learn dishes like noodles and fried rice as their children were bored with traditional items like sambar, rasam and curd rice. "Children have become very demanding when it is come to gastronomy. As middle-class families can't afford to spend money in three or five-star hotels, they want to prepare dishes at home at a lesser cost but without compromising on the taste," he added.