Coffee and baking

The Plaza Cafe is open from 4 pm to 10 pm. It is a hole in the wall operation, in the literal sense. It is located close to the Gyanshila building. The cafe has a coffee machine, obviously, and also serves snacks of a single variety. I have Cafe Americano (a diluted espresso) and the snack. I am finding good company for the coffee nowadays. It is a good sign. A coffee tastes better when one talks in between taking sips. [I should probably patent this idea.]

Every alternate day, the snack happens to be a brownie. The brownies are fresh baked, light, fluffy and taste perfect. To top it all, it costs only Rs.10! Not for me the brownish black lumps of bread that masquerades as brownie at run of the mill coffee shops. I have become a fan of the brownies here.

Mussoorie has a baking culture, probably a vestige of the colonial times. I have read about few places on the Mall Road and Landour that are famed for their pastries and other baked items. Besides, there is an extra curricular module on baking and cooking. Few batchmates were kind enough to share with me their experiments with baking. I am looking forward to them improving their skills and testing the end products of their efforts on me. I am not averse to tasting a cake, brownie or a cookie every evening at 4.45 pm and passing my considered opinion on the baked goods and the baker.

I shall make it a point to visit the bakeries that made Mussoorie famous someday soon. The thing about making promises is that I am wont to break them. Even promises made to myself. But this is about food. I may find my feet walking to these places without me knowing it. All in good time KS.

One would expect the Officer Trainees to be more officer-like sometimes. However, I have no business standing in judgment of anyone. Probably with time one becomes officer-like by default. Time will tell.

The Ganga Dhaba and its unnamed cousin, the adjacent cafe/grocery shop/daru-sutta adda are gaining the batch's patronage steadily but surely. The mess and the cafe within the campus may have to work harder to retain the loyalties of the OTs.