Bass Do Minute - Meri Maggi Story

Smart devices are everywhere. On my train journey people (including me) have earphone stuck in their head and are swiping and tapping (no longer typing) on their devices. From Iphones, Ipads to Galaxy tabs and Kindles.They are more omnipresent than (dare I say) God!. While it seems we must be smart to have created these things and using them day in and day out, it does make me wonder if we are getting dumb through their use.

We do not remember phone numbers, email addresses, birthdays. Everything is customised and pre-filled as much as possible. 

While life is very much easier and intuitive, it does beg thinking whether it is enriched enough. 

I am probably what in market analysis would be called a Late Majority. AS and me as a couple probably own the least number of smart devices among all our friends.In fact there was just one since last two years and only now we have increased the number to 2.

The best things though about all this technology is you can connect to those you are closest to. Easily and quickly. 

Whatsapp messenger is a case in point. I have a group with two of my college friends on it. We share different lives and timezones. But for the past month or so we have been really connected. When you are swapping texts many times a day there is suddenly so much more to talk about. The tantrum of a child, the irritation of boss, the vagaries of weather. Instead of hearing about something when it is a memory, you suddenly are part of it.

While one such mundane but very relaxing discussion we happened to remember a thing we used to eat. Maggi sandwich. If I could I would probably send this to 'meri Maggi' contest. Apart from the usual canteen, there was a nescafe kiosk within the campus of our college. The best thing served there was maggi sandwich. It sounds yucky but it was good. Piping hot and the quantity always seemed less.

Maggi in India is a not just a brand. It is a way of life. You have maggi when you are a student. You got maggi at home when you wanted to have junk food (McD, KFC were not around every corner). You also got maggi when mum was just fed up of pandering to your taste whimps. In my house maggi was cooked with peas and as many vegetables as it could accommodate. The idea being that if I get one strand of maggi I should be forced to consume at least 1 tablespoon of veggies. That certainly did not endear it to me.

I was reintroduced when I joined college. The dreary stuff of canteen could be bypassed by an order of maggi. We have even tried making it unsuccessfully with a water heater. Maggi is something you have when you are short of time, culinary skills or just motivation of cooking.

We even had a case study on how the maggi brand established itself in India over a long period of time.

I tried recreating the it from what I could recollect. 

It is essentially very simple. 
Ingredients: 

One pack of maggi 

Bread of your choice 

Tomato sauce

The recipe could be just a single line. Make maggi, put between two slices of bread and toast.

But I am not known for my brevity. So here we go

There is some TLC involved in making the maggi. Because otherwise it would soak the bread.

For 1 packet of maggi, I use just 1 and 1/4 cup of water. Add to it more than half of the maggi masala.

Let the water come to a boil with the masala.

Now add the maggi and break it up. Add little bit of the remaining masala over the top and mix.

It should just take a minute or two at high flame for the liquid to be absorbed and maggi to be cooked.

Ensure that there is no liquid remaining. I prefer to make the sandwich immediately because I hate cold maggi.

Take a slice of bread. Spread two tablespoonful of maggi. Sprinkle the left over masala on it. Put another slice and toast it. I prefer to use a sandwich toaster. But you can use the frying pan, griddle!, or the toaster bags.

Once done, slice them open. They are best accompanied with Maggi Hot and chilli sauce.

I must warn that without memories associated with this sort of a thing, you will probably say goodbye after the first bite.

When puffiness is good - veg puffs

It is really intriguing how a situation endears certain things to you. Puffs veg or otherwise was no big deal to me. But when I spent 45 days in Trivandrum learning the difference between a sada dosa and ghee roast, upma and appam, a sole egg puff was my highlight of the day. The opportunity presented itself only once a day during the snack hour in canteen of the training centre. A delay of 5-10 minutes would mean a wait of another day. A golden half of a boiled egg ensconced in the crumbly puff pasty with spices was something to savour. I am not sure it was the best I have ever had, in fact I have never had an egg puff since.

Recently I came across frozen puff pasty sheets in the supermarket. I know these sort of things are easily available in the market. But frozen section gets a boycott from both AS and me, other than peas and kulfi. I tried out a simple veg puff. Actually its just a potato puff, as an experiment. They turned out well and tasted yummy. I still need to work out the best way of storing them as they lose the crunch if whatever way I try to store them. They are very easy to make and set a real good impression.

I managed to get a light puff pastry roll. Disaster struck next time though, because I bought short crust pastry. So look closely before you buy. But then I am assuming that you rush through the frozen section as I do. In that section I always feel like the dementors from Harry potter are following me. All exuberance of a supermarket experience drains away and I am left with a overbearing preoccupation with the chill. Thankfully I can shop online without these diversions.

The filling for this pastry can be anything savoury. You can try mixed veg, paneer. This is just a template for anything you want to adapt it for. I tried with a really spicy potato mixture because it seemed to go well with the intended blandness of the puff. Also you need to resist the urge to overfill the parcels. Because you need to account for the fact that the puff will expand. I made morsel sized parcels. You can try bigger sizes , but then they would take longer to cook so adjust the timing accordingly.

Ingredients

2 big potatoes boiled and mashed

1 sheet of rolled puff pastry

1 onion sliced 

garam masala 1 table spoon

coriander powder 1 tbsp

red chilli powder 1 tsp

chat masala - according to taste

Cinnamon- 1 pinch(option)

Defrost the puff pastry.

Boil potatoes. Peel and mash them up. To hot oil in a pan add sliced onions. Cook them till they turn transparent. To this add coriander powder, garam masala, red chilli powder, amchur or chat masala. The pinch of cinnamon is optional. Add the mashed potato and mix well. Add salt to taste and let it cook for 10 mins.

I spread the mixture on a plate to let it cool quickly. While it is cooling, you can prepare the pastry. Roll out the sheet and cut vertical strips of about 4cm in width. Slice the vertical strips into squares. Spoon in about 1 teaspoon is the mixture in the middle. Bring the two diagonal ends of the pastry piece together. Have a little bit of water handy in a bowl. Slightly touch the two end with water and bring them together. This should seal the two ends together. If this feels difficult work, you can simply fold it lengthwise, or even bring the four ends together to make a parcel.

Preheat the oven to 180 deg C. on a baking tray put foil paper and put the pastry parcels keep space between then because they are going to grow in size. For the size I have got here, it took 15mins. I knew the filling was cooked so all I looked out for was the layers of the puff rising up. When the top layer is turned a slightly darker shade than golden, it is time to take it out.

Spread them out on a cooling rack. I did not have one so I just put them on the place settings we use for crockery. The steel ones with slots. It is best to put it on something which allows the base to cool. Otherwise it gets soggy.

Since I have not yet worked out the best way to store them, I must ask you to savour some of them as soon as they cool.

I want to make the egg puff one of these days when intent and stamina are both in tandem. It was after an egg puff which started it all.

Kalatop ,maggi and movies

Watching movie in a theater is a big occasion for us. There are only few movies which inspire us both, and even fewer which justify an evening spend at a movie hall. Especially with a new arrival on way we tend to stay away from noisy places and a movie hall counts as one.

Recently though there has been a spurt in the number of movies which meet our stringent criterion. So finally last week we decided to take advantage of a midweek 2 for 1 ticket offer and went for a night show of Lootera. The songs and the trailers promised a good movie (in our case good does not always equate to happy!). Do not worry, I am not going to give a movie review. All in all we managed to sit through three hours in spite of the hero's insipid acting. The sets, costumes and songs were binding enough. But the best bit was the second half, which was shot at a place we had been three years ago.

The house which represented the Dalhousie home, is actually a forest guest house in a place called Kalatop, some hundred feet above Dalhousie. In December 2010, we had been on a forest tour with my papa in Himachal & Punjab covering Dalhousie, Kalatop, Kajjiar, , Gurudaspur and Amritsar. We did not know it at the time , but that was to be our last trip with papa. Seven months later he left us all. But left us with so many rich memories to treasure for a lifetime.

Kalatop guesthouse has thus got a special place in my thoughts.

Kalatop gets its name from the dense forest around it. The foliage is so dense and dark green that it gives a sheen of black when viewed from the panoramic clearing of the guest house. Hence the name Kalatop (Kala- Black, top - cover)

We only stayed there for a night. It was -2 degree C outside and we sat ensconced in the heat from the crackling wood burning fireplace, electricity being a premium commodity. It was a very clear night and there was a veritable traffic jam of stars in the sky!

Looking through the photographs of the trip I came across some great photos of the Dalhousie market.

Among the usual hill station street food staples of boiled eggs, tangy pickled fruits and warm crunchy peanut, interestingly enough there were vendors selling maggi. I tried one of them and this post is about it was made the himachali way. I have called the Dalhousie Maggi Masala.

Ingredients

1 packet Maggi

1/4 Onion chopped

1 green chilly finely chopped

1/4 capsicum chopped

1/2 tomato  chopped

The process starts with adding 1 tbsp of oil to a hot pan. To this green chillies and onions are added and sautéed. After 2-3 mins the onions should turn transparent, then the tomatoes are added. While the tomatoes are being cooked add the contents of the maggi masala (leave a bit to be used for garnish) to it along with the chopped capsicum. Capsicum is optional but I have found it does lend a nice edge to it. A couple of minutes of mixing everything together till the tomatoes disintegrate. Now add the required water ( iw would add 1-1/4 cup of water for 1 packet maggi). Everybody has their own preferred consistency of their maggi. Let the water come to a boil so that all the taste is absorbed into the water. Then add maggi to it and cook to your level of consistency.

Garnish with coriander leaves and the leftover masala.

It might not be the epitome of culinary delight, but in the December chill of Dalhousie the heat and spice from the maggi was really great.

I dedicate this post to the location manager of Lootera who short listed the kalatop guesthouse. If not for you, it might have stayed in my memories and might not have been recorded on a post.

PS : I recently came across a kiosk in the 'famed' DB mall in Bhopal which sells food items made exclusively of maggi. I have tried the spring rolls which were different (another way to say it did not endear itself to me).

Soya Chilli for Auld Lang Syne

"Purano shei diner kotha" is a song written by gurudev RabindraNath which is known by even the most distant of bengalis. It is sung almost like an anthem at farewells and reunions. It is evocative and you cannot but let yourself go down the memory lane as you listen to it. Imagine my surprise when during the my first new year celebration in london, I heard people singing what suspiciously sounded like this song. It turns out that Robert Burns wrote the poem Auld Lang Syne (losely translated as 'for old times sake') and Gurudev was inspired by it to create purano sher diner kotha. It always takes be back to the college and hostel times.

Apart from friends; food figures a lot in my memories of college and hostels. Panipuri from naka (junction), egg roll from sector six, chuski (crushed ice served with coloured sugar syrup) from benarasi thela , chowmein & pav bhaji from civic centre, dosa from Indian coffee house....the list is broodingly long.And this is just the first four years. Recently I remembered one such addition to the list.

There were two canteens in our engineering college. One for students and other called 'Chachaji's canteen' for teachers.The latter was out of bounds and by virture of this was the preferred one, especially for the samosas and kachoris. But there was one item for which the student's canteen was favoured. Soya chilli. It was a dark drab looking preparation. And it cost 12Rs a plate. Any spend in double figures were written with red ink in my monthly ledger.A few rash double digit spends could blow off the monthly budget of 500Rs. But soya chilli had to be had. At the cost of walking from college to hostel instead of tempo, or forgoing the other extras. If lucky, one could find someone ready to share the plate and more importantly the cost. If you could do with only half a plate of it, that is. Time and travel had faded out the memory of the precious plateful of tangy, fiery nuggets of nostalgia.

A recent dinner brought me together with some friends from those times. A last minute addition as remembrance of those days was soya chilli.

I did not have any recipe to refer to, so i made it mostly by instinct, trying to recreate the taste.

Ingredients

2 cups of Soya Nuggets 

1 medium onion sliced in rings

2 cloves of garlic finely chopped

2 green chillies sliced lengthwise

1/2 inch ginger sliched into thin lengthwise

3 tbsp tomato ketchup

1 tbsp light soya sauce

1/2 tbsp dark soya sauce 

1tsp lime juice

Like with everything else the story here starts with onion and garlic. In 4 tbsp of hot oil add the garlic and follow with the onion almost immediately. If you prefer the fried falvour of garlic more than the pungency than let the garlic cook for 10-15 secs before adding the onion. Save some onions rings for garnishing, if you want.

While that is cooking, soak the soya nuggets in hot water. I put them in the microwave for about 2 mins. I also add some salt to the water so that the soya granules get some of the salt deep inside as they soak up. you can either slice them up and i did or blitz them in a food processor to get smaller granules. The latter is good when you are pressed for time.

Add the chillies, part of the ginger and the soya chunks into the oil. after a minute of mixing them around, add the tomato ketchup and dark soya sauce and the lime juice. Mix well and let it cook covered for 4-5 minutes. Taste and add the light soya sauce. Let it be absorbed for the next 3-4 minutes. Check the salt and add more if required. 

The nuggets would already have got the salt from when they were soaked and the light soya sauce would have added to it, so it is best to check if you need any salt at all.

If you prefer you can change the proportions of the sauces to match your taste.

The ginger is an optional. It just adds a bit of zing and bite to the whole dish....and the canteen always had ginger in it.

Making it Simples....Poha (fluffed rice snack)

Sometime back we were given the name of Sinha Tours and Travels by our long suffering friends. Mainly because of our inclination to plan a trip to death not just for ourself but for those unfortunate enough to trust us with their trip details. We have improved over the years..in the sense that we do not bore others anymore with our planning. But like all good tour advising companies, we do not mind a bit of PR. With that in mind we have been sharing our travel experiences with friends in form of calendar. It combines two of our three loves..travel and photography (in case you are wondering, third is food). The latter is still a work in progress. This year I added some quotes to it, all related to passage of time. The most insightful one was

Not enjoyment and not sorrow, is our destined end or way; but to act, that each tomorrow, finds us further than today.

It is a simple concept. All it asks for is to make sure that what we do today has a positive impact on tomorrow. And if all our tomorrows turn out better than yesterdays would we not have achieved ultimate happiness? But simple in concept it is really difficult in practice! But does it mean that we should always exist in a state of strife and unrest? I do not think so. One set of people are always on the quest for more without really appreciating what they have at hand. There is another set of people who are so complacent with what they have that they do not strive for better. The path to steadfast sense of well being is actually a very tightrope walk. The straddling of past, present and future is probably why the religions came into existence to resolve.

One thing that strikes me as a shortcoming of our society is that perusal of scriptures is relegated to the sunset of life. Our vedas and upanishads transcend geography and religion in their wisdom. It is a distillation of the experiences of people who worked to make sense of our existence. They should be read and applied as we go through the daily churn of life rather than realize too late what we did wrong. 

On this eve of another year, let me set this as my goal. Hopefully a simple resolution to last a year. It feels good to set a goal for that elusive happiness within for the coming year.

New year's eve and a party due in the evening calls for some big recipes. But I just wrote couple of paragraphs about simple concepts so I will try to keep this simple.Or as Aleksandr Orlov calls it Simples.

Poha is a simple and healthy snack. Anyone brought up in central or western india could not have gorwn up without being familiar with it. In bengal it is called chirer pulao. In bhopal you can find cartful of golden fluffy poha with amber succelent jalebis to start the day with. In mumbai kanda poha, batata poha, masala poha are almost synonyms with the snacks routine.

It was never on top of to eat list of things. When AS and I, we were pursuing the usual correspondence that accompanies an 'arranged marriage',  I was in the process of disillusioning him about my non existent cooking skills. In our six months of courtship he put up a brave face and had probably reconciled himself to a lifetime of drudgery in the kitchen. He mentioned poha as his favourite thing to eat. It was also our first joint venture in the kitchen, with me in the role of something even below Souz chef. My first couple of trials met with exemplary failures. I learnt a few tricks from my mother-in-law on my next visit. Simple things which make a vast difference to the outcome.

Ingredients

4 cups medium flaked poha

1 medium onion chopped

1/2 cup peas

1 tbsp Mustard seeds

1 tsp turmeric

5-6 curry leaves

1/2 cup chopped coriander

1 tbsp sugar

juice of 1 lime

3 tbsp oil

salt to taste

 The first step is wash the poha in water. Twice. Drain the water immediately before the flakes start absorbing it. The sprinkle 5 tbsp of water on it. Add salt, just a little bit less than what you would eventually want in our poha. Add half the lemon juice and sugar to this. Mix with your hands and let it soak it all up.

Heat the oil for 2mins. Add the mustard seeds. After they splutter add the curry leaves. 10 secs later add the onions. Cook them till softened but not as much as you would for a gravy. they should hold their shape. Now add the turmeric and the peas. After the peas get some colour from the turmeric (which would be 30 secs to 1min), add the poha. Mix quickly so that it absorbs the colour of turmeric. The first 5-6 secs it might seem that you do not have enough of the turmeric. But keep faith and keep mixing and you will be rewarded.

Add the remaining lime juice and sugar. Check the salt. the reason for adding half of the sugar and lime juice later is that the taste remains fresh. You can adjust the lime juice, sugar and salt as per your taste.

At this point if I find the poha flakes are dry-ish, I sprinkle some water, cover the utensil and let it be for 5 mins at low flame.

Garnish with fresh coriander, pomegranate and freshly grated coconut.

Simples....

Kabuliwala & Aalo Kabli (Potato Chaat)

“Kabuliwala, O kabuliwala, tomar jholae ki ache? (what is in your bag)”, asked Mini

“ ete to ekta hathi ache (there is an elephant in here)”, replied the kabuliwala with a smile.

Kabuliwala, is a short story by Rabindranth Thakur. Written in a simple language it was my introudction to the vast world of Rabindranath Thakur’s literature.  Aptly it was narrated by my father, because it is the story of a father more than a little girl. Mini is the small girl who befriends a kabuliwala (Rehmat) selling his dry fuits in the lanes of Calcutta. Sometime later Rehmat is arrested on charge of attacking a debtor and is sent to jail. The day he is released,  Mini is getting married. I would not be a spoil sport by revealing all of it. Although it is not a particularly sad story, it felt sad to me. There are not many kids of my generation who can claim to have bedtime stories from their father.But I have had the pleasure.

Used to the five day week syndrome of the 21^st century, after a six day week, I would not have the energy to even stammer. My father used the Sunday afternoons to read to us from nonte phonte, batul de great, abol tabol, stories from sukhtara and sometimes from his memories. He would doze off in between and start talking something about work. I thought it really funny and would relate that everyone in house who would listen how Baba started talking about a big tree girth and bessel area in midst of a ghost story.

Kabuliwala was shared on one such afternoon. While he dozed off I stayed awake thinking not about the girl but kabuliwala. How lonely he must be in a different country away from all whom he loved, learning new language, learning new practices, all because he had to earn money to support his family. It is not fair to compare him and me. I am comfortably off with a much loving husband(inspite of my efforts to test his patience) living a good life in a foreign land,  but in the heart of the matter lies distances. When life trudges along in its routine, there is nothing much, but on odd occasions one feels a sudden yearning to be back and within easy reach of what has been home for 25 years of existence. It is also an yearning for the quiet afternoons spent listening to stories with Baba’s arm for a pillow. And also for the innocence which allowed feelings of tenderness. In my bid to be strong there seems to be a loss of the appreciation of  feelings.

Much much later I saw the movie made in hindi by Bimal roy and bengali by Tapan Sinha. Balraj Sahni’s potrayal was heart wrenching, so was the song ‘ae mere pyare watan’ by manna dey.

I always thought of this story kabuliwala when I heard the word kabuli channa. Don’t ask why. In the weird way that mind works, I seem to have a look-up created against these two words in my database. This post was written in two parts, one was my diary entry and the other I was writing up for the blog. It does seem all right to combine them together, because in my mind they are connected together

Snacks are a headache. I cannot afford at best of times putting in an hour’s effort for  something which is a filler item. Also when you feel like eating snacks you want it with immediate effect.  How to conjure up something in 10-15 min? I feel the need of a wand, accompanied by a spell, similar to those from Harry Potter.  Point at the stove and mutter abracadabra and voila! There is lovely snack sitting on the stove. But however much I search for Diagon alley and platform 9^3/4 in London, they have not condescended to reveal themselves to a muggle.

So till the time I get a wand of my own I make do with small tricks. One cardinal rule I have 

decided to follow for snacks is, try not to use the gas/stove. Microwave and grillers are exempted from this. Once I put a pan on the gas, I end up spending at least 20-30 mins on it. Not worth it as I already mentioned. If we have muri (puffed rice) then there is nothing better than a jhalmuri. Then yesterday I recalled Aloo Kabli. This was not a frequent snack item in my childhood but its teasing taste had placed itself in a corner of my mind. A couple of years back when I went to a restaurant called Oh Calcutta! in Bombay they served this as a nibbler while we were waiting for the sumptuous bangali feast. A sudden hunger pang at 4pm Sunday evening triggered my forefathers instinct and I started foraging in my cupboards and fridge. I was rewarded with a tin of chick peas (yes it is not kabuli channa..you cannot be so fastidious) hiding behind the neglected food supplements bottles. I dragged it out and started thinking. That is when the memory of aloo kabli shone out in bright neon lights.

It is a medley of salty and citrus flavours. Things that make it different is the crunchiness of the onion, flakiness of the boiled potato and fragrance of the coriander expertly held together by the juices of the tomatoes. Here goes the recipe...

Ingredients

3 medium bolied potato

1 large or 2 small tomatoes

1 medium onion

1 cup kabuli channa , boiled  (or use tinned chick peas)

Coriander – 2 tbsp

Chaat Masala – ½ tbsp

Lemon juice

Red chilli Powder

Salt

Quickest way to boil the potato is to put them a refrigerator bag and microwave for 5-6 mins. Let it stay for a couple of mins and then take out and remove the skins. The baking variety of the potato works best. But any will do.

Dice the boiled potato, tomato and onion into square sizes. We don’t want the potato to lose its identity and that is the reason to keep it big enough. Add the boiled kabuli channa to this. I have to confess here that when the fancy strikes to have aaloo kabli, I more than often resort to the tinned variety. I know it is not good for digestion, but try telling that after you have the first spoonful.Last time we had it, we added another word to our limited medical vocabulary..epigastric region pains. To be fair the blame should be shared by haldiram samosa, cheesy garlic bread, skipped lunch. So if you want to play safe and still want the fun...be patient, soak a cup of channa overnight and then boil them. You might even be like me on those odd weeks when healthy eating takes my fancy and the fridge is filled up with all sorts of sprouts. Mine rot away after the first couple days of zeal. On an extreme you can skip the kabuli channa altogether. Potato/tomato and onion is a star combination anyways.

So then, after this discourse on channa, mix all the items together in a bowl. Add the coriander leaves, chaat masala, salt, lemon juice and red chilli powder as per you taste. Give it a good toss. If you allow it to stay for about 10 mins the juices really become great and you can lick your bowl clean.

Pearls of Wisdom with Mangaudi (Lentil Pakoras)

Bank holiday is a term I have come to appreciate in UK. It brings constancy in life. You know the days you are going to have off...same time every year. Holidays in india vary by region, employer and of course, religion. There is a concept of restricted holidays allowed to govt employees. They can decide to take the days off during durga puja rather than guru nanak jayanti. As the year starts I start thinking about the four blocks of holidays. The easter, May , Spring and the august bank holiday. Chirstmas is not counted as it is generally reserved for India visits. For these four, each must be utilized. If there is even a distinct possibility of spending any of these at home, I throw tantrums, call up old promises, threaten with future restrictions..and in the way do anything but stay at home. A look back at the bank holidays over the past four years is a list of our trips. This year it was lake district. The beautiful lush green cumbrian countryside was a pleasure to our senses. We braved the drizzle for bext part of the holiday. We were blessed with one day of beautiful weather.

We stayed at a lovely cottage with nothing but the nature surrounding us. The sheep outnumber humans in the gently sloping landscape. We took lovely scenic drives around passes.

I had a choice of cumbrian sausage to satisfy me over three days, while others over won over by the scones with cream and strawberry.

Back home I had to come to terms with the fact that the next day off is three months away.It was time for comfort food. It was time to go back to kitchen. Strangely enough I did not feel like cooking something good. I decided to deep fry something. In fact I wanted to indulge so badly that I poured oil into the wok before I decided what to fry. A bowl of green moong daal was soaking on the windowsill. They were part of my ever failing effort to try and eat healthy. It was part of the pearls of wisdom a friend of mine shared with me. I was supposed to drain them and let them grow long tails or in other words let them sprout. They were supposed to be my snacks for the 3-5 pm time in office when I feel hungry and naughty enough to eat a whole bar of chocolate. That was what was intended for them. What happened is an entirely different story. It is the process by which I managed to convert a bowlful for wonderful healthy legumes into a plateful of deep fired oily indulgence. I submit no apology for it. My soul needed it.

Ingredients

1 cup whole greem moong daal – soaked overnight

Ground into a grainy paste with water

½ of medium size onion, sliced lengthwise

½ tsp ginger paste

½ tsp garlic paste

½ tsp chat masala

1 green chilli finely chopped

¼ tsp salt

1 tbsp gram flour (besan)

Oil to fry While the oil heats up, I quickly put the soaked moong daal through the rigors of the food processor. After a matter of 5 mins I had lovely grainy paste. Do not make a smooth paste, the mangaudi loses the texture if it is too smooth. Add the onions, paste and powder mentioned above to this. You can add chilli powder if you do not want the heat of green chillies.Add the gram flour bit by bit so that the mixture binds together. With a small spoon scoop up little morsels and drop them into the oil. It would sputter and rage about for a few minutes before accepting the fate as a pakora. One reason to keep the individual mangaudis small is to allow them to cook properly during the frying process. And it makes wonderful portion size as well.

I had never tasted mangaudi, till in one week, I was introduced to it by two different sources. And I loved it. How can you not love a spicy deep fried pakora. How very enticing it looks with the golden crisp cover and how very lovely is the crunch of the friend lentils and the onions.

I skipped dinner...in my enthusiasm I had made more than I could eat.

The wok of oil is still there. If my chain of thoughts is anything to go by...I might be putting up recipes which need frying.

Better Late Than NEVER

I have been lazy..and that too for so many-many months. There are about 4-5 pages worth of stuff I want to bore anyone who cares to visit these pages with. But somehow the recipes and the ramblings never came together. It is probably because it has been mad at work. I actually didn’t have enough time to even check my emails at times, which is saying a lot. I also felt guilt at starting something and abandoning it midway. I thought I need to cook something absolutely smashing to compensate for my absence (not that anybody missed me!). Finally after a month and half into a new year I have decided something is better than nothing. So I am better off at least start the ball rolling.
This time it is dhone pata boda. Coriander or cilantro is mostly used as garnish or at best holds fort as main ingredient of a chutney. You would not have heard something cooked entirely of coriander. And that is what this is. I am heavy handed with my use of coriander at the best of times. To have an opportunity to actually use it as the main ingredient is temptation difficult to resist. I have not heard of anything like this beyond Bengal to I will claim dhone pata boda as ours.
Dhone pata means coriander leaves, while dhone by itself means coriander seeds. I have a couple of times in the early days of telephonic support of cooking from my mom learnt this difference the hard way. My mom would say...ebar dhone jeere tel e de (now put coriander seeds and cumin seeds into the oil) and I would add coriander leaves and cumin seeds. The taste never came out the way I recollected from my childhood. Suffice to say when my mom finally saw me doing this, she managed to hide her astonishment at my ignorance quite well.
Well this dish done not have dhone but has dhone pata.
Bengali cuisine has a horde of ‘bhajas’- fried stuff to be eaten in the second course with dal. Boda basically means something of a dumpling shape fried up. While other bodas need a good dip in the oil, this one has less oil requirement to recommend it.
I cook this often on Sunday lunches when the Monday morning blues have started to set in and you don’t want to spend the rest of the remaining time in the kitchen. With rice revolving in the microwave and dal gurgling in the pressure cooker it takes a total of 10 mins to prep the boda. And that includes searching out the chaler atta (rice flour) and posto (poppy seeds).

Ingredients

250 gms of Dhone pata (coriander leaves)
3 tbsp rice flour (2 is you use gram flour)
1 tbsp gram flour (besan) [optional]
2 tsp poppy seeds [optional]
1 tsp white sesame seeds [optional]
2 green chillies
Salt to taste
Oil to fry

I like to use the stalks of the coriander as well for any purpose, but if you have time or the stalks are not good then pluck the leaves. Make sure you increase the amount of coriander leaves if you do not intend to use the stalks
Coarsely chop up the coriander and the green chilles. Mix all the other ingredients and add enough water to bind all together. The optional ingredients (apart from besan) lend a crunchiness to the boda. If you don’t have them, don’t worry it would still taste unlike anything you have had before. In case you do not have rice flour , you can use plain flour (maida) or corn flour. Do not increase the amount of besan if at all you are using it. That converts this from a boda to a bhajiya. Make the mixture into flat round shaped(approx) discs, about the size that can fit into the palm of your hand.
In a frying pan drizzle some oil and put the boda for more of a toast rather than fry. Keep pressing and changing the sides it from time to time. Soon enough the rustic fragrance of fried leaves would waft off. You know they are done when you get a dark green bordering on black colour on them. The reason to make them flat discs rather than balls is to allow the insides to be cooked without the use of a lot of oil. Be warned that it does take some time. Mine took about 10 mins on each side.
A perfect accompaniment to mushurir daal and bhaat. A complete meal without a fuss.

Barbeque - A Trial by Fire

We came back from Easter holidays (a mere 4 days) to find the season had turned a new leaf..literally. The tree visible from our living room window had sprouted pink flowers. The ones next to nearby bus stop had white ones. From a distance they look like a painter has laboured to put the dots on each branch to make them look like flowers. The day light saving in UK makes the weather changes very sudden. One evening you might be walking back home in dim sunlight and the next day you can feel the warmth of the sun when you are cooking dinner. Ok agreed I am exaggerating a bit...but you would have to agree it is only a bit :-). Our friends had come back from India and other trips and there was a serious need to meet and catch-up. The last weekend was fixed and we trooped over to the edges of Cotswold countryside to enjoy the sun. I have stayed in bungalows for the first 22 years of my life. And then Bombay happened to me. And I got used to perching on the top of high-rise buildings and sharing walls with strangers. The trend continues here as well. Much as I liked independent houses, the practicalities of keeping it clean and security makes us opt for flats. So whenever given a chance we love the country cottage feel of our friend’s dwellings.

It is officially summer, although the nip in the air sometimes doesn’t make you feel that way, so we decided have a barbeque. It meant we girls would actually not be in kitchen all the time trying to outdo each other with newest tried recipes. It was the first time we were trying the ritual of barbeque. We had heard of the basics and rest was left to google. The first attempt to fire up the coal resulted in a smoke so bad, it might have rivalled the one spurted by the unpronounceable (I am glad there are difficult things to pronounce in the world than my name) volcano in Iceland. Ok.. not that much..but certainly qualified for a complaint from the neighbour, if only they were not doing a barbeque as well.


Frantic search through google (how did we ever survive before it!!!) and few fixes later things were manageable and it looked like we were going to get lunch after all. Not just charred pieces of coal.

The veggies grill section certainly looked more colourful than the non veg. We did end up with more variety than a normal lunch.

Pineapple with cinnamon, olives, corn on the cob accompanied by at least 4 different dips, there was a lot going on. At the end of it all we had eaten so much that I could compare myself with a python and empathize with what the beast might feel after eating many times than what it can digest in one day. And my behaviour resembled one too. We all of us didn’t probably move much than the positions we took in the living room after this assault. While the stomach got to work, rest of the body just gave up. But it was a great first time barbeque and I hope will be followed up by many more.

There is no recipe this time. It is more of the experience that I wanted to share. One of the chicken was murg malai tikka which I have already shared as my post ‘Heaven on Earth’. The other chicken tikka is a shortcut. Chicken marinated with yoghurt and Everest Chicken Masala.Yes thats it. Things can be so simple. Thought I must admit I didn’t like using the ready made masala. I have come to take pride in my own preparations. But I am glad I did. Because the time saved was well enjoyed with friends. So we had two marinades a white and a red. And there were batches of paneer and chicken both marinated in them.

All then we had to do was get them skewered and grilled over the barbeque.


The barbeque allowed our better halves almost equal participation in the cooking process and I am happy to say, they did the job well. The sun shone down fiercely from above while the coal flames licked the dripping chicken and paneer pieces and turned them succulent. The grilled fare was stuff of dream. The smokey undertone to the tikkas poked our tastebuds and the subtle spices of the marinade tingled the palate. I guess this is how some food critic might have written if they would have reviewed our barbeque. For us it just tasted good enough to eat.

I would have taken a proper picture of the food if only it survived longer than 10 minutes after coming off the heat. So there are no finished products to show :-)

A small ode to barbeque.

The Barbecue

When summer evenings are nice and hot,
The thing to do is find a spot,
Where a barbecue can be set up,
So everyone can come and sup,
Relax with a bottle, and sit for a spell
Which would be really nice and would end the day well,
And enjoy the light hearted, cheerful chatter,
With friends, who to you, truly matter.
Right! The table's set, the flares are lit,
The music should be a real hit
The friends have arrived, the drink if flowing,
Laughter starts, the barbecue's glowing,
The cooking has started, the aroma's divine,
Everyone is getting along fine,

Not original but a google search. I have copied part of the poem but you could read the full version here http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-barbecue/

Heaven on Earth

I had once read a book, Five people you meet in heaven. It had one very interesting concept. It said there is no heaven beyond the clouds. Heaven is on earth. A very big statement to make. But it made sense when thought about it. Every human being has his/her own thoughts, beliefs, likes, dislikes and experiences. In experiences alone an individual becomes that, an individual rather than the mass, the crowd. That being the case, is it too difficult to assume that we each have our own concept of heaven. For me heaven might mean lying on green grass with the blue sky above me with my favourite books around me to read. Would not mind a few good savouries to nibble on while I enjoy the stories. This might be someone’s nightmare for all I know!!. For Scrat from Ice Age it may be the place with nuts.

How can God or the Supreme Being (whichever way you address the universal power of universe) construct a heaven which satisfies the fantasies of the billions inhabiting the Earth. It would be a very difficult task. After sweating over creating earth and earthlings for seven whole days, I doubt He (no offence to people who think I should write She) would like the task of replicating it for creating heaven. Nor do I think He/She would also like to share the existing heaven with us. It would have been built to his specifications anyways. So the idea would not have been far away, that why not make earth the heaven. And how to judge what should be heaven on earth? It could be the places we are happiest. Is it not this feeling of happiness that we want from heaven, increased manifold? So if there was a moment in our life when we were truly ecstatic, I would like to believe we would be coming back to that. In today’s world of customized offering, is it any wonder that God might give each one of us a Customized heaven. It is a marketing solution no one can argue against!!!

Once I had thought all this, I felt very comforted. So when I am going to heaven (it may take quite a while according to Hindu Scriptures and my current behaviour), it is going to be the best place ever. And most importantly I am sure I am going to love it, because I would have been there before. Visiting a new place anyways has a factor of unknown attached to it. What if you didn’t like heaven? Well know we can be rest assured we are going to like it. Finally one can die in peace.

So if I sit down to draw the specifications of My Heaven...I can end up either in Dehradun or Konigsee. Though Mureen and Kanassar would figure close seconds. So much for the place...food would have to form a big part of the place as well. What would I want to have in heaven? That’s a difficult choice. A very very difficult one. Phuchka (better known as goluppa or panipuri) should definitely be there. What else...I guess a chicken tikka with lots of onions (more about onions another day). There is this chicken tikka which is called Murg Malai Kebab, which would be quite perfect to have in the wonderful settings of my heaven. The first time I can recall eating it was in Ranjit ka Dhabba, a Punjabi restaurant in a small suburb of Mumbai. But the best I have eaten is in Hyderabad. In Sahib Sindh Sultan. This restaurant is a tribute to Sahib, Sindh and Sultan the three engines which pulled the first train in India. It has waiters dressed as porters and maitre-de dressed as ticket collector. There is a whole coach of train waiting on the actual rails to serve as a dining car. Very very realistically made, with a hat left in the luggage rack overhead or an odd suitcase. The menu is named creatively like laughpathgamini bhatti ka tikka and lipta mushroom masala :-). For details check out this link (don’t go weak in your stomach)
http://www.foodiebay.com/ncr/restaurants/gurgaon/ambience-mall/sahib-sindh-sultan-2428#menutop
They had this Reshmi Murg tikka, and it melted in my mouth. It was so subtle and so soft that the moment you put it in your mouth, it dissolved with a sensation of something exotic. I never thought I could recreate that at home. Until a few days ago, i felt the urge to have it again. I looked at various recipes and then finally ended up with an amalgamation of what i thought would work best. The result was awesome. It might not be exactly what I had at Sahib, sind Sultan , but it was a close second. And more importantly now I had the POWER.. to eat it whenever I wanted.
So here I share with you my taste of heaven :-)
Enjoy and let me know if it can be perfected still.

Murg Malai Kebab (Reshmi Murg Tikka)

Ingredients
1/4 kgs chicken breast
1 tsp ginger garlic paste
1 pinch pepper pdr

1 Green chilli (add more depending on how spice you like it)
1cup coriander leaves
A pinch cardamom pdr
2 tbsp cheese
1 tbsp curd thick
1 tbsp Oil(optional)
1 pinch salt


Cut chicken breast to bite size pieces and remove any water from from by patting with a paper towel.
Mix it with pepper powder, squeezed ginger garlic paste. Keep aside for about half an hour. I generally did not time it so strigently. I started making the second marinade after this and let it soak till it the next step was done.

The second marination is the key. This is what will make the murg malai kebab distinct. Start by kneading some grated cheese by hand to make a paste . I used mozzarella. You could any, though not the ones with lots of flavor.
Add curd (biopot set yougurt works very well) and double cream. Make sure you knead out all the lumps. I think it is necessary to do this by hand because in food processor it will not be so thoroughly done.
Make a paste of chilli and coriander. I used mortal and pestle as I didn’t want to use water to make the paste.
Add that to the cheese /curd paste along with salt,oil(optional),cardamom pdr and mix well .

Marinate the chicken with this marination and put in the fridge. Now is the trick. Marinate it overnight. Yes you would need to silence the insistence of the heart to taste it…and let the marinade seep in overnight.

Next day put the pieces on to a skewer and put in the grill. You could do this in oven also. I would update this if I ever try it with oven. But grill has worked for me as of now.
It would take just 20-30 mins for it to be done on both sides.

Enjoy with some green chutney and onions.
There you have my taste of heaven on earth. And would love to know what is heaven for you on earth...