Tarang, or the Arts Fest, is a huge event in our school and has been celebrated for a long time. I’ve chosen cooking since it was introduced as an option in the Arts Special subject two years ago, and this is the second time I’ve been part of the arts fest cooking section. There were a bunch of changes made this year with regards to the congestion, disorganisation, and decreased quality that happened the first time, and they were successful in making Tarang a perfect event for the chefs. We had 5 items we were making and selling, along with one special item made especially for the cooking students and teachers:

• Pav Bhaji Fondue
• Grilled Sandwich
• Grilled Vada Pav
• Puri Bhaji
• Fruit Salad
• A gigantic cake (The special item)

The Pav Bhaji Fondue was partly prepared a week ago because it was impractical to be able to make all of it in a couple hours along with the rest of the food. The Bhaji was kept to freeze and on the day of the event it was heated and cheese was added to it. The rest of it was prepared by students of grades 7 through 11, where people were already divided into different groups to do certain roles. Once the food was ready, the stalls were set up instantly. Once the parents left and the event was over, the cake was cut.

An unfortunate accident a couple days before the event had resulted in a fracture in my arm. This reduced my potential worth in the preparation of the food greatly, however, I asked Khyati ma’am whether I would be able to do any work, and with her affirmation, I participated in the event.

LO1:

While making the Pav Bhaji Fondue, I also learned that I was more comfortable with the preparation of raw materials. The process for converting the raw food to the cooked food (heating, baking, sauteing etc.) was where I was weak. The heating required more of timing than precision, and I realised my expertise in chopping and similar processes required more precision and were not at all affected by precise timings. I realised that the spontaneousness and awareness of timing are where I lacked behind most.

LO2 and LO4:

As I mentioned, I had a fracture in my arm (the left one, fortunately {I’m a righty}), and I was worried I might not be able to do a lot of work during the event. However, I had invested my efforts in the previous class into making the Pav Bhaji Fondue and wanted to be able to watch, if not contribute more to, the event. I was able to do some stuff despite my handicap. I stirred and mixed the Pav Bhaji Fondue, prepared a ton of whip cream for the cake, took pictures, did some testing to check if the food was ready, and helped with the touching up of the cake. During the stirring and whip cream preparation, I did feel an ache in my arm. With only one hand to work with and a lot of stirring and beating to do, my right hand started to strain a little bit. But I pushed through it as I knew that if I wouldn’t do this then there was no point in my coming here and I would’ve been a burden to the ones who are making efforts.

All of this work kept me busy through most of the day, which relieved me as I had to take a huge chunk off of my weekend (when I schedule my exam revision) and it was worth it. None of the students from my grade were coming, and I knew that they didn’t think it was going to be worth it (probably due to the problems faced during the previous Arts Fest), however I knew how enthusiastic ma’am was and that there was going to be a more efficient process this time, and luckily it turned out to be much better than I ever expected it to be.

LO2 and 5:

During the whole process of the event, I was able to learn a ton of stuff regarding management of a huge kitchen and preparing large quantities of food. Throughout the day of the event, I kept noticing how ma’am handled the huge task of leading a team of around 30 students and making food for more than a 100 people in very limited time. I observed (and tried to learn) the ordering of raw materials of the right amount, the division of the team into various tasks of the process, and the merging of urgency and perfection in the preparation.

The teamwork was what, according to me, led to the success of the event. The teams were divided according to their grades, which made for the greatest efficiency. The assembly line setup was the perfect method to tackle to the problem of quantity and quality, as if one person would do one task, he’d do that with much more precision than him doing multiple tasks at once. Having a big team helped us a lot here.

LO7:

Although this event wasn’t supposed to be charity, and was rather a display of our learning throughout the year in Arts Special, I felt as if we prepared an enormous amount of food, and quite a bit got wasted too. I realised that this issue could have been tackled with realising that some food items would not be as popular as others, and with some estimate of the ratio for the hypothesised popularity, this issue of wasted food could have been tackled. I suggested this to ma’am, and she did agree with me. We discussed how we can keep this in mind for the next event. I also suggested that instead of giving us what was left of the food, we could prepare some extra food and have some underprivileged people come over and give them the food. This would tackle the issue of the ambiguity of the amount of wasted food, and could make a lot of people happy.