About This Site

What Is Khojana?

Khōjanā is a Hindi verb that means to search for, discover, seek or quest. It is a fitting term for the journey I have been on while learning and trying to improve my cooking.

What This Site Is All About

For many years, I would cook Indian dishes from cookbooks or downloaded recipes with less than satisfactory results. Something was missing or did not taste right. At first I could not pinpoint the problem. However, every so often I would stumble upon something that would improve my cooking: a recipe; a different book; or just a good day in the kitchen.

One night after a particularly good day in the kitchen, I wrote a few paragraphs about the dinner. Something like a short blog post. I guess I just wanted to remember my successful efforts! Over the next few years, I would occasionally write brief articles, and save them on my computer. Around 2019 I read through them, added a bit to them and fixed grammar issues. Then I wrote a few more articles.

By the time 2020 rolled around I found my self writing additional articles more often. Around that time I began to wonder if these articles could become a book? At that point, my cooking had taken a few great leaps forward, and I was much more confident. In fact, I was truly inspired by some things that were starting to come out of my kitchen. Since there wasn’t much else to do during that time, I kept cooking and writing. Eventually I had a first draft.

After having a few friends read the manuscript, I set it aside to marinate for about a year. The comments were generally positive but... I also had some misgivings about parts of it. I realized that there is much that goes into a book, and a lot of rewriting would be needed if I wanted to publish this. After looking at it again in 2023, I decided that the content might work better as blog posts rather than a book. This would allow me to present the best stories and not have to worry about the flow of a book. I could also publish at my own pace.

Who Am I?

My name is Aram, and some of you might recognize me from the Stanton Park Records website, label and several Boston-area bands. Those who know me well are already aware of my fascination bordering on obsession with Indian food. For years, I tried nearly every Indian restaurant in the Boston area at least once. I also visited most of the grocery stores to supply my cooking needs. Cooking at home started off with occasional dishes while in college to interrupt the overabundance of pizza and refried beans. Over the years the food of India slowly but surely became a larger part of my diet until the point where most of my dinners were sourced from one of its regions.