Striving for the perfect chapatti

Living miles away from home, I miss the simple pleasures that I took for granted, such as home cooked South Asian food.

You see, I grew up on a diet of hot spicy food, accompanied by chapattis. At a very early age, my mother, a housewife, taught me to knead dough and make chapattis from scratch.

Until recently, I had forgotten just how pleasurable kneading dough for chapattis can be. Sticking your hands in a large pile of soft atta (flour) mixed with lukewarm water and slowly kneading the mixture until it becomes tough, it is truly therapeutic and pleasurable.

I only rediscovered the act after my housemates requested that I treat them to a home cooked Asian dish.

The best I can do is samosas: triangular pastry with a hot spicy meat or vegetable filling.

Through cooking, I can understand how generations of South Asian women coped when life became stressful, daily chores, hardships and difficulties could only have been relieved by the simple act of kneading dough.

During my playschool days, I have vivid memories of imitating my mother and practicing cooking with plasticine.

If I weren´t to be found playing dressing-up games in the large, life sized wendy house or kicking a football around with the lads, I could be found sat quietly in a corner, contently playing with plasticine, doing my best to form a perfect round shaped chapatti.

If my chapattis were not round or perfect, NO WAY would I put them on the stove or serve them oval shaped or deformed.

It is true what they say about us Virgos, it is our nature to strive for perfection.

At one point it became an obsession in my life. At times I would just get so frustrated that I would cheat by placing a round plate on top of the dough and cut off the excess, presentation was everything to me.

Even when I cook samosas, they have to be perfectly triangular.

My housemates find this amusing but wait patiently for me to shape my samosas into perfection–fry them and give them a minute to cool and then they will devour them- not appreciating or realising just how much effort I took to get them perfect.

I have always been adamant in portraying myself as a modern day western woman, a professional, who prefers to dine out, not get messy in the kitchen.

It seems no matter how much of a city chick I perceive myself to be, one thing is for sure, I´ll never forget the simple pleasures in life, such as kneading dough for chapattis or samosas.

During my teens I recall visiting my parents homeland, Kashmir.

I remember observing the daily routines and what the women did for a living.

My lifestyle is a complete contrast to the way it could have been if I had not been brought up in England.

In the rural villages of Kashmir, each day began with a simple prayer, then women would get on with daily chores and life, they carried water in ewers dragged up from a well, and most spent half their lives squatting over a stove or washtub, cleaning or cooking, it was a way of life, at the time I saw them as prisoners of culture and traditions.

After witnessing a different lifestyle I returned to England and vowed I would never become trapped in life.

I gave up on perfecting my chapattis and focused on my studies and went onto university and now, instead, I am a slave to a 9-5 job.

Working down south I am always busy, but now, whenever I feel homesick, I burn some sandalwood scented incense sticks, play my favourite Oasis tracks and knead some dough.

It is a very relaxing and liberating sensation, far from the trapped feeling I used to associate with making chapattis.