Tapioca Thosai (Dosa) and Wartime stories

The tapioca dish I had with lunch today (home-grown tapioca supplied by a neighbour and cooked by Suguna, my wife) reminded me that it was the staple diet for many of us during World War Two. When the war came to the Malay Peninsula I was just one year old but my mother had told me stories about how we survived on home-grown vegetables including tapioca. This was in Banting, Kuala Selangor, where my father had been posted to the courts as interpreter after I was born. We grew vegetables in the compound of the government quarters just like the others and there was great cooperation with neighbours including exchanging ikan bilis and canned meat for vegetables. Many also reared goats and cows and we had fresh milk. So we had tapioca thosai, tapioca cake etc and craved for white or rava thosai. Part of the stories in my forthcoming book on Brahmin Pioneers in British Malaya: Profiles in Courage and Convictions.