Make it a Spicy 2010!

Happy 2010! Hope this year you're able to do everything you always planned on--take a trip, get that degree, earn millions, be healthy, stay healthy, eat at the restaurant you always wanted to, laugh a lot, laugh everyday, write that book, be patient, sing that song, cook for friends, make new friends, keep old friends, be nice everyday, fight nice when you need to...you know all the things you wanted to do and be but life and time got in the way...yes, those things.

     We took this break to hang out in San Diego and decided to go to our favorite soup haunt. It's a Mongolian hotpot restaurant. No, don't groan. It isn't a large cast-iron skillet noisy joint with all-you-can-eat veggies and meat. That's a Mongolian all-you-can-eat place. (Just because you heard Mongolian, huh? Shame on you!) This is soup and fun stuff like that, cooked on a burner right at your table, and you get to choose your own soup broth (vegetarian, beef, half and half, pretty neat). The restaurant is called Little Sheep Hot Pot and I'll wait till you stop laughing. We did the same when we heard of this place. What does little sheep have to do with soup unless they're in it (yikes!)? And we're dealing with a vegetarian spouse here, so, that wouldn't have worked. But Little Sheep has a wonderfully flavorful all vegetarian soup broth as well as non-vegetarian options. It's apparently quite popular in China, and there's reason why. The spices are so interesting--gojiberries, galangal, chinese ginger, star anise, four types of pepper, a hundred berries I don't have a clue what they are, mushrooms, I mean...it's really fun if it's slightly cold and you're in the mood for soup.

     Little Sheep in San Diego's located in a strip mall in Clairemont Mesa Boulevard, and you could easily miss it. But inside, the restaurant is impressively huge, and mostly and usually filled with families who are serious about soup. Man, no one even looks up from their plates, it's that good.

     So we went. Sanjay, who was fighting a cold, and being the manly man that he is, told the server, "We would like extra spices in our vegetarian soup broth". The server nodded, no expression. I should have known. (You know where this is going, right?). Anyway, here's how our soup looked when it showed up:

     You have to admit, it's pretty. Look at the spring onions, the mushrooms, the berries...and we were planning on adding tofu, watercress and more mushrooms to this. It was supposed to be fun. Well, we then fished out the red chilies that Sanjay obviously had expressly requested. This is the proof:

     And we fished out even more as the soup boiled in chilies slowly releasing their chiliness (that's a new word you learned in 2010). At least a hundred fiery red chilies waving hello at us. Oy.

     Chicken that I am, I tried one bowl and gave up. And believe me, it's my favorite soup place! But I don't give up that easily, so I moved to their salad, an order that I placed (no spiciness requests were allowed this time!).

     They have a very interesting wood fungus salad that's infused with seasme oil, tons of garlic (yeah, maybe not a first date kind of salad if that's what you're worried about, but garlic's good for you!). It goes really well with soup, especially the 'non-spicy' kind.

     I had two orders of the same while Sanjay, the manly man, had the soup to himself (maybe that was his plan all along...hmmm, didn't think of it that way!).

     Anyway, here's Little Sheep HotPot's salad:

The celery and baked tofu along with the wood fungus is really flavorful and a fun dish with their green tea.

     I've made my own twisted version of the same. So, here it is:

Twisted Wood Fungus Salad

Ingredients

1 packet dried wood fungus

Tofu (half a packet, cubed, optional)

4 large garlic cloves, grated

4 tbsp spring onions, chopped

1/2 cup diced carrots (optional)

2 tbsp sesame oil

1 tsp chili hot oil

2 tbsp lemon juice

salt to taste

Recipe

Boil the wood fungus for about 5 minutes in salt water, drain, cool

Mix the wood fungus with garlic, tofu, spring onions
Toss in more tofu, carrots if need be
Add chili and sesame oil and mix the salad
Add salt to taste
Squirt lemon juice and mix again
Chill for about an hour in the fridge (not you, the salad, silly!)
Serve with soup or as an appetizer

     See, it's simple, isn't it? All you need to do is go to any Vietnamese or Chinese store and ask them for the dried fungus. You can even get dried shitake mushrooms that you could soak in water for about an hour or so and toss that in too. This is what mine looked like:

     So that was our greatly spicy start, and hope you enjoy the new year with new, exciting and fun foods, good health, and fun times!

     More in a bit, till then, enjoy!

Daal Pakoras Before Christmas

Hope you're in the Christmas spirit by now. Am assuming the packing of gifts, the drinking of wine, the eating of chocolates and all things dessert have peaked or close to peaking right about now, huh? This year, it's been quite a mellow holiday season for me, just the way I like it. In case you didn't know, I like boring. Excitement isn't good for the heart, or your stomach. And I live for what I put in my stomach! Anyway, back to food. I thought, how about sharing yet another appetizer recipe, and a quick and easy one at that? In fact, how about using up yesterday's lentils that you don't really want to eat, but can't bear to throw because, hey, it's daal (दाल) and who throws out daal?

     This is what I learnt from my mother. She had innovative ways of fixing fresh meals from leftovers, and she'd tell us, yes, it's a new appetizer. Or she'd say, it's a very popular and well-known dish (she never did clarify where it was popular, and I was too intrigued with the food to care to ask!), and I couldn't wait to eat it. So when I looked in my fridge and found a bowl of day-old lentils, this is what I came up with.
Daal Pakoras with Coriander Chutney 
Serves 2 (two very hungry souls)

 Ingredients
1 cup cooked daal/lentils (use moong, or masoor daal)
1 tbsp whole wheat
2 green chilies, chopped
1 purple onion (medium), diced
2 tsp cumin powder
1 tsp coriander powder
2 tsp Kashmiri chili powder
salt and pepper to taste
2 tbsp grapeseed oil
4 tbsp chopped coriander leaves
2 tsp lime juice (optional)

Recipe

• Strain the lentils so most of the liquid is separated. Use a sieve if need be.
• Add the whole wheat to make the mixture thick. Add more if needed.
• Add half the onion, cumin, coriander, chili powder along with half the green chiles and half the coriander leaves.
• Mix the ingredients well, and mash the lentils with a spoon while mixing.
• Make flat round balls of the daal pakora, and place them on a plate
• Heat the oil in a cast-iron skillet.
• Saute the daal pakoras, making sure they don't touch.
• Add more oil if need be, but since you're using a cast-iron skillet, you should need less, that's the idea.
• Transfer the cooked pakoras to a bowl, sprinkle coriander leaves and green chilies as garnish.
• Season with pepper (optional)
• Spice it up with lime juice (optional)
• Eat with fresh coriander chutney.

     My favorite memory of home has been eating pakoras with a hot cup of tea when it's raining outside and there isn't much to do but eat and make my sister's life hell. I'm not sure what your memories of good times are, but make daal pakoras, and you'll know what I mean when you bite into one.
     Enjoy, and happy holidays!

Shrimpfest Saturday!

I'm thinking shrimp today. Don't know why, but I am. I'm allowed to, right?
     In Bengali cuisine, there are multiple mouth-watering recipes for चिंगरी, chingri, or shrimp. "Gauldaa chingri" or prawns or big shrimp has its own flavor and recipes from simple shrimp curry in tumeric, ginger and cumin to steamed shrimp in mustard sauce, or shrimp in coconut milk are dreams that memories are made up of. These are like the gold standard recipes of Bengali cooking, will share them with you in a bit, but today I thought of sharing a North Indian recipe, with my twist to it. Meanwhile, drool at this fish in mustard sauce, will you? Recipe to follow when I feel like making it again, okay?

     By the way, if you live in the US, have you checked out shrimp? Not checked out in that way, you weirdo, but just compared them to those at the fish markets in Kolkata and Delhi? Let me tell you, they just don't compare. Really. Shrimp in the US, while fun to cook, don't really have the flavor you get in India. I have no idea why, and if you do, do let me know. But we still use US shrimp, don't we? We complain, and yet we do it...oy.
     Regardless, being a fish foodie, I've twisted a traditional तंदूरी tandoori recipe using shrimp instead of chicken as an appetizer. A tandoor, or clay oven, is almost impossible to find, though there are multiple companies selling tandoori masala or paste. I like the one from Rajah, I think it is a British company, and the flavor is as close to the Delhi dhaaba (road-side food stalls) tandoori food as it gets. If you don't have that, try any tandoori paste, and let's see the results. I'm just a bit skeptical of the food coloring in them, so, making one's own tandoori paste is also an option. Anyway, use the paste and maybe a cast iron pan or tava for high-heat cooking. It may not be authentic tandoori, but it's close. You can substitute shrimp for chicken or fish too, if you want.
     Here's my recipe for home-made tandoori paste. Remember, it's mine, and it could be completely different from someone else's, so, don't sue me. I don't add food coloring, and it works for me. You can modify it and make it yours, how's that?
Home-made Tandoori paste
Ingredients
4 cloves garlic
1 inch ginger
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tsp Kashmiri red chilli powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cloves, powdered
1/2 tsp cardamom, powdered
1 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp cumin powder
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 medium onion
1 cup yogurt
Recipe: Blend the ingredients. Slow cook on medium fire. Use as paste on fish, chicken, or paneer. Store remaining in airtight container in the fridge (4 weeks or so).
  And now, for Tandoori Shrimp (for ~7-10 people)
Ingredients
50 medium shrimp, cooked, de-veined
6 cloves garlic, grated
4 tbsp whole milk yogurt
1 medium serrano pepper, diced
4-5 tbsp tandoori paste
1 medium green bell pepper (capsicum)
1/2 cup white onions
2 tbsp grapeseed oil
salt to taste
lime juice (optional)
Recipe:

• Mix the tandoori paste, with 3 cloves garlic, yogurt, and 1 tbsp oil and serrano with the shrimp in a big bowl. Coat the shrimp liberally, and use more paste if needed. Cover the bowl in the fridge for about 10-20 minutes.
• On a तवा tava, heat the rest of the oil, add the garlic, sliced onions, and bell peppers. Once the peppers slightly brown, add the rest of the garlic. Saute some more.
• Add the shrimp to the hot tava, and cook for about 5-10 minutes.
• Don't overcook the shrimp, unless you like to chew on rubber bands.
• Serve on a platter with naan. Squirt some lime juice if you want on the shrimp right before eating.

Note: Make this appetizer fresh. Limp shrimp doesn't cut it.

 Enjoy!

Festival of Lights Dinner and Post-Dinner Food Coma

Don't know about you guys, but cooking for this Diwali's get-together has put me in quite a state of exhaustion. I would say it's got to do with age, but as my friend Marcie says, we'll always be 29, so I can't blame my tiredness on that, huh!
Hope Diwali was fun for you. For us, it was great, after a long while. Not because we rushed off to the temple and did all temple-y (is that a word?) things but because we ate (what else?) and ate a whole lot. I think that's what I have right now, food coma! Yes, that's my excuse for this late post. How's that?

On Diwali, we did light our little tea lights, and pretended they were diyas. This year, having been quite a crazy one (more on that on a later post), I thought it'll be great if we had our close friends with us to celebrate the 'new year' with. And so we did. But the problem with these people (and you know who you are!), is that they're too demanding--they want recipes of all the food they ate. I mean, really, come on, will you really, really make them? 'Coz if you do, and you're reading this, you have to send me images of the same, no exceptions, got it?

Anyway, this year I printed out a menu for the gang, just to increase their knowledge but did any one of them take their cards home? Oh, no, of course not. And when they're reading this post, they'll say, oh, c'mon, we know you'll post it here. I know them! And they know me. So here's the silly menu:

 And yes, the picture is somewhat fuzzy, but this is what I made--Sev Bhelpuri, Moong Dal Pakoras, Daal Makhani, Butter Chicken, Olan, Rice Kheer (though we were planning to make tapioca kheer but that was a disaster, more on that in the next post).
Anyway, as you can see, I made a lot and we ate it all up. And everyone wanted to know how to make Sev Bhelpuri, so this is for you you, V!

The next few posts will have the rest of the Diwali menu, so don't say I didn't warn you and if you overdose on Indian recipes, just go look at Orangette or The Hungry Chef, would you?


Appetizer: Sev Bhelpuri

'Sev' stands for the chickpea flour-based spaghetti like crunchy appetizer you find in any Indian store. It's sold in small bags, you can substitute that with aalu bhujia, very similar and slightly spicy in this dish. Bhelpuri means small, wheat-flour based deep fried disks, which makes Sev Bhelpuri crunchy and soft (with the tomatoes). But in an effort to avoid an overdose of fried additives, I've substituted bhelpuri with diced potatoes sautéed with a pinch of salt, chili powder, toasted cumin powder and chaat masala. I usually buy chaat masala (MDH varieties are great).

The tamarind and coriander chutneys can be made at home or bought. I made mine by boiling tamarind, adding sugar and chilies (it's got to be a slightly more spicy since you'll add half a teaspoon to each serving), and blending 5-8 Tbsp coriander leaves with rock salt, chilies and a half tsp of ginger. Buying a jar of each is also good if you're not in the mood to make them from scratch. They store well in the fridge for quite a while.

Ingredients
Traditional recipe:
1 cup  tomatoes, diced
1 cup purple onions, diced
2-3 medium chilies (jalapenos, or serranos)
1 cup boiled garbanzo beans (or 1 can)
1 cup Persian cucumbers, diced
5 Tbsp coriander leaves, diced
1 cup sautéed potatoes, diced
4 Tbsp puffed rice
4  Bhelpuri
2 tsp lime juice
1 Tbsp chaat masala
salt to taste
1 tsp chili powder

Serve with coriander and tamarind chutneys

Alternate recipe
Ingredients:
1 cup tomatoes, diced

1 cup purple onions, diced
2-3 medium chilies (jalapenos, or serranos)
1 cup boiled garbanzo beans (or 1 can)
1 cup Persian cucumbers, diced
5 Tbsp coriander leaves, diced
1 cup sautéed potatoes, diced
2 tsp lime juice
1 Tbsp chaat masala
salt to taste
1 tsp chili powder
Serve with coriander & tamarind chutney


Recipe (Traditional)
Mix all the ingredients in a bowl, add salt, lime juice, chilies, chili powder, chaat masala, coriander leaves
Add puffed rice, bhel puri & sev right at the end so they don't get soggy with the cucumbers and tomatoes
Serve with a splash of coriander & tamarind chutneys 
Recipe (Alternate)
Add the potatoes to the serving bowl
Mix garbanzo beans, cucumbers, onions, tomatoes with coriander leaves, lime juice, salt, chili powder and chaat masala
Finally add the sev.

Serve with coriander & tamarind chutneys
Serve with an extra sprinkling of sev



We've actually made a dinner meal out of several bowls of bhelpuri, so that's an option too. If you take out the sev, then it's almost a salad, (or salsa!) which may be an alternate recipe. But then, it won't be sev bhelpuri, or as fun. 

Anyway, have a blast making this, enjoy!