What rice and curry teaches about the six tastes

Rice is the quiet centre. Around it we put six small things, not one large one. Sweet pumpkin. Sour mango. Salted lime. Bitter greens. Pungent mustard. Astringent gotukola. That is the teaching. Not a lecture.

Guests often ask for a menu. We give them a plate. If something is missing — if the meal is only heat, or only oil — you will feel it by four o’clock. The kitchen notices before you do.

We cook over clay. The rice is red, from a field twenty minutes inland. The curry leaves come from the hedge. Nothing is plated for a photograph. You eat it while it is still making a sound.

Take the sambol last. It wakes the rest. Then sit. The afternoon is long enough.