The last month has been crazy for two reasons. The first is of course this self-proclaimed Diwali campaign that we decided to run for a whole month. The rest of my time has been spent on a project for work. Before I get talk more about the project, I want to give you a glimpse into the life of a comms agency. It’s one of the most fascinating places to work. Every day is a project of its own. We service clients, consult, and execute campaigns end to end. The best part about the work is the range and diversity of the kinds of things we could be involved in and the different industries that we communicate for. I love the work and for the most part, our clients work with us for our ability to not only execute campaigns but also come up with strategies and recommendations that may have been missed by the client themselves.

There will however be this one client that would creep into your portfolio that really can’t appreciate anything you do for them. To them, the execution of a campaign is too easy and they don’t care for your recommendations. This creates a liminal space. A space where I don’t like to be. At the end of the day, the reason why you hire an agency is not to just get a video made or post content for you on LinkedIn— it’s to build a framework of communication that can’t be achieved internally. If all you need is labour, then just hire people on contract. This project was essentially a virtual event in the non-profit space. The client, a huge retail donation platform, was launching a B2B service line and wanted a virtual event where 150 decision-makers from corporate India come together and have a conversation about CSR money. Boring stuff with very boring people. The ask was for us to work on the social media strategy, build some video storytelling, and facilitate a media partner that could run the event. Oh! By the way, the event was to go live in 3 weeks and of the 140 employees they have, no one seemed to give a damn about working on this.

Our point of contact was a consulting big wig who took a long time off corporate life and came back to join this non-profit in hopes of a cushy life. She was a month old into the system and boy did it show. This POC was the bane of our existence. Through the 3 weeks, our scope of work changed from what I mentioned above to literally doing everything. We were managing the technology of the event, building videos out of thin air, and we even started a call centre with high school kids (they got paid) who would make phone calls to their scant database of decision-makers for them to join the event. Physically and emotionally, this project was hell. Almost every team member had cried once, and each one of us struggled with getting done with the day. What I found fascinating was that the reason we struggled wasn’t that we didn’t want to do the work. We struggled because at the heart of it we are all creators and it hurts when the direction, strategy, and thought comes from the client which we know makes no sense at all. We were talking a whole different language and any intervention to correct for this resulted in our work increases significantly. I switched my working style radically. From a smart critical thinker, I became a labourer. Get the order and execute. It killed my essence to work but at least it resulted in my day being shorter than it could have been. It’s clients like these that make you wonder if the fault is in you. If you, someone who lives and breathes content creation, somehow are stupider than a middle-aged mother of two who’s never worked with a millennial in her life. There have been times where this feeling has been crippling (and some members of my team were going through that) but this time, it has been restorative. This project taught me some important things— the power of saying no, the magic of collaboration, and the level of creativity that can be generated by some of the most talented people even when the brief is literally a single sentence. Anyway, the event was a success. We got 200 people to join the event and we made some really awesome videos. The client of course has no scope to be thankful so we are just happy with what we were able to achieve.

These tandoori Hasselback potatoes are a play on a trend from circa 2014, back when every potato recipe was a Hasselback. It’s a little daunting to make just because of the cutting technique, but once you get the hang of that (check out the cool cutting hack in the method) the recipe is fairly straightforward. Potatoes in tandoori masala go extremely well and the addition of some low moisture cheese just adds creaminess and keeps the potato intact. What I love about the recipe is that it needs no parboiling and the construction of the potato makes the top super crispy and the inside super soft. Pro tip- don’t omit the extra butter! I hope you do try this recipe and if you do, share pictures and comment below!

Ingredients

3 large baking potatoes scrubbed clean

50 g yoghurt or dairy-free alternative

1 tbsp toasted chickpea flour

1 tsp Kashmiri chilli powder or paprika

50 g low-moisture mozzarella grated and then kneaded until pasty

1 tsp toasted cumin powder

1/2 tsp coriander powder

1 tsp garam masala

1/2 tsp turmeric

1/2 tsp kastoori methi dried fenugreek leaves

1/2 tsp salt

6 cloves of garlic, sliced thin

Method

• For each potato, cut a series of thin vertical slits almost, but not all the way through to the bottom. Each slit should be around 1-2mm wide. You can lay a pair of chopsticks down to prevent the knife going all the way through. Be sure to use a sharp knife.

• Mix together all the ingredients for the marinade, ensuring the cheese is well incorporated.

• Rub each potato with the tandoori paste.

• Lay the potatoes out on a baking tray. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 200C for 35 minutes. Ensure the potatoes are cooked all the way through using a skewer or knife.