mongo_jones

sujatha, sounds yummy. quick question: how ripe do the tomatoes have to be? by the way, this is not unlike a salsa. mongo

He does not call it Indian -- I believe I did. He calls it Euro Asian, I believe. It looked like a good menu and I thought we should try it. That is all. monica, i'm not attacking you or m65--merely posting my thoughts as evoked both by the menu and by the initial conversation in this thread. it seems to me that since m65 begins this thread by asking people for their definitions of contemporary indian food and then says in a later post that what he does is going to be it, that it wouldn't in any case be too much of a misinterpretation if one did think that he was calling it contemporary indian cuisine. either way, i think this is a valid discussion--fusion cooking involving asian cuisine is all the rage in the u.s: it is interesting to get different people's takes on it. regards, mongo

yes, masala potatoes are real contemporary. personally, i look at amma's menu and i think yes, this is an indian menu that is different but is still an indian menu. when i look at something like this menu i think here's someone who is cooking some things with indian ingredients and combining indian sides with euro-standards--it may be good but why call it indian any more than anything else? that's a genuine question, by the way.

and, as i've asked in other threads, why does indian food only become "contemporary" if it involves non-indian ingredients or if it is "fused" with something else?

yes, but is this a contemporary indian menu or euro-standards jazzed up a little with asian-inflected sides?

i looked at the website--i'm having trouble seeing how it is "contemporary indian"--can someone explain? is it because garam masala is used in one dish?

well, humans have that too.....

all this squeamishness about eyes--bengali cuisine not only has recipes for things made predominantly with fish-heads but many bengalis also eat the eyes of fish. and i don't think bengalis in general object to oily fish either given the obsession with macher-tel.

maybe smoke while you eat? just a joke. and not a very good one. i apologize.

bhasin, as it turned out the variation you posted is pretty much identical to the way i normally make alu methi--sometimes i also add a little chilli powder, which i omitted this time. it came out very well. i'm glad to know that my taste-guided recipe turned out to be the genuine article. now, how about posting some of those "numerous recipes and variations"? mongo

my policy is: never cook something for the first time with witnesses present

in re-reading the posts in this thread i was surprised to discover a whole bunch that i hadn't read. suvir: your interpretation of my original post was correct--i have no objection to your price or your serving bhel-puri. indeed, i hope to try your version on my next visit to nyc (whenever that will be). vikram: thanks for pointing out that it isn't just fancy restaurants in the u.s that serve indian street food. i've been to many a nasty 5-star coffee shop in my time (why oh why did we find them so irresistible in college?) but somehow never noticed the bhel-puri etc. on the menu. this knocks down a part of my vague theory but not all of it. anil: interesting that you think that it is nostalgia on the part of desi patrons that is driving the trend toward street food. indian restaurants in nyc must be very different from the ones in los angeles if there are more indians in them than non. in l.a most indian restaurants are dominated by anglo angelenos. of course in artesia it is a completely different story--but that stretch of pioneer blvd. is like a mini lajpat nagar: you have restaurants and you have sweet-shops; everything seems altogether more congruous. okay, which item from amma's menu should we break down next?

i bought two bunches of absolutely vibrant methi (fenugreek) from the local indian grocer today. plan to make it into alu-methi tomorrow. my usual modus operandi is to make alu-methi exactly the way i make alu-palak. if this is a crime against nature and humanity i take cover behind my bengaliness. let the truth(s) set me free: how do punjabi homes (as far as generalization is possible) make their alu-methi? bhasin?

how about starting at a reasonable price and sticking with it? of course, this raises the question of what a reasonable price is--is it merely determined by total monetary units charged? or is it based on some relationship between price and quantity/quality?

this has gotten so far away from my original point that i don't feel any real connection to this discussion. nonetheless, i'll reiterate: i'm not upset that suvir and hemant mathur are charging $6 for their bhel puri (like the $40 burger someone mentioned, i can imagine fancier versions of pretty much every basic dish)--i'm just interested in what the cultural narratives etc. are that enable bhel puri to take on this incarnation, and sit alongside fancy new fusion/hybrid indian cuisine in an expensive manhattan restaurant. i take the point that many people who may order and eat it may have no idea that it is street food in india and not some hip new snack/appetizer. i get a feeling though that the movement of bhel puri in the u.s from indian sweet shops in artesia and brooklyn to fancier places has more to do with a different kind of consumer. nor am i saying that street food can't be eaten in restaurants--i'm taken by the fact that (as far as i know) fancy restaurants in india haven't started serving it, while some here seem to have. as i said originally i can't tell if this is a welcome democratization or whether something else is happening simultaneously--if what is driving this (at least in part) is a quest for a new indian "authentic/exotic". after all, there's plenty of other great non-street food dishes from india that are yet to be featured in restaraunts in the u.s--why then is it suddenly things like bhel puri and frankies rather than, say, kashmiri or awadhi style dishes, that are representing the novelty and originality of tony indian restaurants in the u.s? bhel puri itself (and the enjoyment of it) is almost separate from this question.

excuse me for resurrecting this long-dormant thread but i was struck by the lack of l.a area chinese restaurants here--major east coast bias huh? i've eaten chinese food all over the u.s and i'd be hard-pressed to pick too many outside of the san gabriel valley if i had to pick 5 to eat at in the u.s. chung-king on garfield (just past garvey) in monterey park is my all-time favorite, though hua's garden, lake spring etc. are all very good. there's a whole bunch of great restaurants at 140 west valley in rosemead as well (in the huge 99 ranch complex). 888 seafood a few blocks down the road was my favorite dim sum destination in the valley. alas, all of this ended a couple of months ago as i moved to boulder, colorado. the three dim sum places i've been to in denver have made me want to weep.

jason, i don't think any of this has much to do with restaurants and homes as such. some of the best biryanis i've ever had in india are ones cooked in restaurants. in the u.s it may have more to do with the fact that the average non-south asian patron has a limited sense of what a biryani is (corroborated somewhat by the liberal definition of biryani in most of the recipes on that site), allowing lazy establishments to get away with all kinds of crap.

bong, this recipe sounds good--however, i am likelier to use goat than lamb. what do you think the cooking time variation should be with goat? it'll take longer than 40 minutes at 350f, but there's also the rice to worry about. perhaps cook the goat halfway first? also, does anyone know if green papaya paste is available commercially?

by the way jason, what's the story with your signature? or should i not ask?

jason, part of me suspects you're having us on. but ignoring that part for now: a biryani is basically a dish in which rice and another flavor base (usually meat, but sometimes also vegetarian) are cooked separately for a while and then finished together, so that the rice is completely infused with the flavors of the latter. different parts of india make biryanis differently. in some places they tend to be fairly moist, in others almost completely dry. some make biryanis with fully cooked rice, some with parboiled rice, some add raw rice to the liquid from the flavor base. some cook in sealed clay pots, some in pans, some in ovens. some have subtle flavors, some are extremely spicy. it is a complicated mess, but a delicious one. mongo

well, i've seen highly elaborate recipes for hyderabadi biryanis--marinades for the meat etc. can get highly complex and involve a lot of spice-pounding. i'm looking for quicker recipes that find ways to creatively approximate the tastes and aromas of the longer methods in 60-90 minutes.

prasad, that sounds exactly like what i was asking about (and a great deal!). i don't know when i'll be in your neck of woods next but will definitely try to stop in when i am. how popular is the chaat station? by the way, is there a clear ethnic breakdown in your clientele? is there a large indian contingent? and does the interest in the various stations break down ethnically at all? just wondering. mongo

does anyone have a regular home-kitchen friendly recipe for chicken or goat biryani that they'd be willing to share? what do i mean by "regular home-kitchen friendly"? a recipe that doesn't require multiple hours of prep, multiple helpers or overly expensive/exotic ingredients or utensils. thanks in advance!

my original musing--less about price and value for money, more about the strange journey of bhel puri from indian streets to tony manhattan restaurants--has gotten lost in this thread, so i'll let it go. on my way out though let me ask another question: are there any innovative indian restaurants in the u.s or u.k that have set up mini snacks/halwai areas in their space where people who want to enjoy indian snacks--samosas, pakodas, chaat etc.-- or sweets can hang out just for that stuff in a more casual kind of ambience (like a seafood or tapas bar)?

is there really no place in nyc that makes genuine article, over-stuffed, tava alu parathas? los angeles is crawling with them--of course not the restaurants (for all the reasons people have given) but the larger grocery stores and sweet houses. the india sweet house on pico (1/2 block west of fairfax) serves the most divine alu parathas (humongous and extremely cheap) with home made dahi and achar; they also have a mean sev-puri for about $2 and change, and the best saag-paneer (paneer made fresh in their own kitchen) in town (for about $3). then there's the ambala snack house in artesia as well as jai bharat (which in addition to the north indian standards also has great gujju snacks). i guess having lived in los angeles for 10 years i've been a little spoiled--missing all these things now in boulder.