I mentioned about having snacks in Life in Local Train but I didn’t mention which snacks I enjoyed while commuting. Whenever we had to eat something, we used to order it to Manish bhai. Manish bhai, an ITI professor used to live in Mahemdabad (a small town 40 kms away from Ahmedabad). He used to board the train from Mahemdabad and was part of the group. So whatever we wanted to eat, we used to tell Manish bhai to get that thing before boarding the train. We used to call him in the morning after checking everyone’s presence at Maninagar. And he used to get and deliver that snack hot and fresh from the store.
Though Mahemdabad is a small city but it is a great city for foodies. Even small stalls in the streets will serve you delicious snacks. More than Mahemdabad, I would appreciate Manish bhai here. It is not easy to take time out of morning schedule. Manish bhai used to manage and bring the delicacy as per the order. We tasted almost every dish of Mahemdabad. From Khaman (a gujarati dish) to Samosa, Manish bhai delivered tastiest and best quality snacks of Mahemdabad. Every time, he would recommend a dish which was good and tasty according to him. And we used to order it after checking the number of people present in the group.
Once, we were confused about what we should have, because we had tasted almost everything. We were thinking of repeating the dishes but Manish bhai recommended Bread Pakora. Due to some reasons, we were reluctant to try Bread Pakora but because of strong recommendation of Manish bhai, we thought of giving it a try. Next day, we called Manish bhai and ordered 10 Bread Pakoras. Manish bhai bought and brought Bread Pakoras in the train. They were wrapped in newspaper and newspaper was in polythene.
Bread Pakora
When a Bread Pakora came out newspaper, the first impression was ‘whoa! It is big.’ Its texture was perfect. Neither it was over fried nor under cooked. When I took its first bite, the feeling was, this is the best Bread Pakora in the world. The stuffing was perfect, it was cooked as per the size of bread and the perfect amount of spices were making it delicious.
We were glad that we went by Manish bhai’s recommendation. I ate two Bread Pakoras that day. After eating that out of the world Bread Pakoras, we made it our first choice. We ate those Bread Pakoras thrice in a week’s time but after that they simply disappeared. The man who was selling it, closed his shop and started concentrating on his catering business. We asked Manish bhai to find another Bread Pakora seller in Mahemdabad but no one else was interested in making Bread Pakoras. It was heart breaking that world’s best Bread Pakoras became extinct in just two week’s time.
Read about Rishi’s fascinating journey in Life in Local Train. It is available on amazon kindle. Click here to grab your copy.
