In celebration of her 75th birthday, celebrated writer and socialite SHOBHAA DE authors a humorous book about the year before the big day
Few women have quaffed so copiously at the fountain of life than author and social commentator Shobhaa De. She has done it all.
From fashionista to writer, editor, columnist, novelist, public speaker, critic…. the list is never ending in a glorious and celebrated career. So, it is hardly unusual that, for her 75th birthday, she has delivered an irreverent memoir about the year leading up to the landmark event without being, as she professes, “profound, pedantic and pretentious.”
Her dazzling wit and exuberance tacked resolutely in place, Shobhaa regales her readers with wonderful tales of feasting and fasting with family and friends, the soul-searching that inevitably accompanies the aging process, her travels in India and abroad, and her encounters with fascinating — and not so fascinating — folk.
The core concept of the 282- page chronicle: “Insatiable: My Hunger for Life”, is that “food fortifies, food is our friend, food is fundamental to building bonds”. Food and relationships are deeply intertwined to give life its varied nuances and meanings, turning the memoir into “a multi-course banquet, with a curated menu”.
Shobhaa melds the menu into an appetising spread exuding multiple aromas and enchanting flavours. She discusses the differences between a Gujarati aam ras and a Maharashtrian one; she claims that the best lassi is to be had in Jaipur and Trishna in Mumbai perfects crab dishes. She shares her thoughts about laal maas and chole bhature with Nobel laureate Abhijit Banerjee, while encountering him by the breakfast buffet at the Jaipur Literary Festival. He is then welcomed into her home with his family to partake of a major Bengali meal organised by husband Mr De comprising paturi maach, josha mangsho and malai chingri, Shobhaa details how the artist M F Husain painstakingly prepares a layered lasoon kheema drizzled with ghee, and reveals how dinner with Aamir Khan and his family began with a biryani from his mother’s recipe and concluded with a rich sheera studded with dry fruits.
Read the full article in ‘Viva Goa’ magazine copy.
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