Edward

Monica, Which Indian store did you buy it at? It sounds great.

could possibly find them in latin stores...I think this is what people in Mexico call jamaica. It is made into a drink. Very tasty.

Hello Everybody, I have been a stranger these days, but I am about to embark on a journey. I arrive in Delhi this coming Tuesday and will be hanging around a little more since I will have a whole month of free time If you had a choice between Ahmedabad and Baroda, where would you go for tasty cuisine? I am torn between the two and would love some advive. Thanks Edward

Duh... Why didn't I think of that....

Shaheen makes a murg burfi that I see at my local grocery, but it contains no chicken. What could this mean? Is there another word similar to murgh that means something else..... I have eaten lamb haleem with sugar and it was beautiful. I have also had aloo halva and it was very good. How about maccher payesh(fish kheer)!!!!!!!!!!

Annatto is rare in Indian cooking. What made you think it contained annatto? Was the oil seperating from the dish and was it colored that bright yellow-red like you would see in island cooking containing annato? If so, it was probably a combination of turmeric and bright red mild Indian chili powder, deghi mirch. It gives the same effect.

There is a big difference in flavor between the two, but I feel it is ok to substitute the western kind in Indian cooking. They taste and smell different, but fill in the same flavor space in the dish. They do the same thing, just differently......know what I mean. The tejpatta is the leaf of a variety of cassia, which is what we use as cinnamon. The quills come from cinnamomum cassia and the leaves from cinnamomum tamala. They smell of cinnamon and clove with a slight citrus quality. It used to be very difficult to get these here in the US, but now it is easy. I definitely prefer them over the western variety.

I really like this book too. Lots of Bengali vegetable recipes. I am also drawn to the meat recipes. Interesting how he is from mixed Punjabi/Bengali heritage.

Are you boiling it enough while stirring? If it is only simmering it will take a lot longer to get to khoya. Diffrerent milks have different compositions of fat, viscosity, etc. Could be the milk you are using would take a lot longer.

On an overnight ride from Benares to Delhi, I can't remember the stop. It was before dawn and there was a few minutes before departure. I got off the train and had the most wonderful chai served in a clay cup. It was a little chilly out and it warmed me to my core. I still think about that cup of tea today.... I liked eating all the little things that the hawkers at different stops jump on to sell. Moongphalli,moongphalli, moongphalli! I like the taste of the black salt with the roasty-ness of the peanuts and the way it is wrapped up in a piece of paper so small...like a secret note. A sort of love letter to my taste buds. I purchased a little leaf cup of some sort of sprouted dal chat through the window of a moving train as it left the station..I think I remember not getting my change because the the guy selling the stuff couldn't keep up! And of course, bread omlette

Well, for starters, I don't use as much as I should. I have loved it since I was a small child. I liked to drink it instead of regular milk. I like to make salted lassi with it. It also makes a very good base for kadhi. If you put it in the batter for instant mix idlis(such as gits) in place of or along with the water it makes them taste nicer.

Also want to point out that how long or over what heat the spices are fried in makes a difference. For instance cumin slowly browned in oil tastes a little different from cumin that is thrown into very hot oil and rapidly browned. Some people like to fry cumin seeds until they darken a few shades and others may like them almost blackened. It is a matter aof taste.

Loved those pictures Monica. In just 4 weeks I will be stuffing my face like a paratha while walking down parathe wali gali! I am going to find that guy making the papad paratha and try one for myself.

Are you talking about split and skinned chana dal? 16 Hours soaking and 8 hours cooking and they are still firm!!!!!!!! I think your dal may be really old. Not even whole kala chana take that long. I only soak mine about 5-8 hours. I often use a pressure cooker, especially if I want them to be soupy. I also really like them butter soft but still holding their shape. That is a little hard to achieve though. I like chana dal with roti, rice and a spoon please

Hi Nessa, The tarka technique is something very special and unique to the cooking of India(Pakistan and Bangladesh too). In different languages and places it is also known as baghaar, chownk, phoron, sambhara, and talche to name a few. It is sometimes refered to as tempering. It is the act of frying whole spices and other ingredients like garlic, ginger etc. in hot oil or ghee. This changes the flavor of the spices themselves while simultaneously infusing the oil or ghee with the essence of the spices. This can be done at the beginning, middle or end of the cooking process. It is often used to start off vegetable preparations and is very common to finish off dals. Whole spices like cinnamon, cloves and cardamon are often used at the beginning of making a meat curry. There is no set list of ingredients. It can be done with any number of spice seeds and aromatics. Some common combinations are cumin seeds, dried red chili and asefetida or garlic; cumin seeds, onion and ginger; kalonji and green chilies; Bengali five spice and red chilies; cinnamon, cloves and cardamom and bay leaf; mustard seeds, urad dal and curry leaves.....it is never ending.....really. You can vary the taste of your dishes dramatically just by rearranging the spices in the tarka. When onions are added after the spice seeds and cooked until they carmelize you then have a combination of techniques tarka and bhunao. Bhuna is a sort of slow pan roasting-browning with oil or without. Thats what it takes to brown the onions. If you check out the egullet university classes that Monica did in the past you will see many examples of this.

I love the MDH kesoor methi but hate the garam masala. The Rajah brand garam masala is slightly better but still way too stingy with the cardamom. 2 teaspoons?! Either those are some huge recipes you're working with or it's time to start looking at some new cookbooks. That sounds like some serious garam masala abuse to me :) Kudos to you (and your consitution) for finding a more sensible path. ← Usually when a recipe I am using calls for that much it is for the roasted Punjabi-style, which has a lot more cumin and coriander. It is also usually for meat or chicken. I sometimes make a rajma that requires 1 tablespoon of garam masala, but it is mixed with water and other masalas like chili powder and hing and slowly fried in ghee until fragrant. In this case its not too much since it is the main flavoring. I recently bought the Whole Foods brand of garam masala. I have always avoided trying it because it is $4.29 a bottle(eek!), but I am teaching a course soon where the timings don't really allow me to teach it from scratch (besides, I know most people who just want to cook Indian ocassionaly won't want to make it anyway) so I am trying as many store-bought versions as possible. The Whole Foods brand was not particularly high on the "cardamom scale" as you might say, but it was very good. I was surprised by how fresh it smelled and tasted. I would definitely reccomend it. And it comes in a small bottle so it will be used up before it goes bad. I always tell people that if they have to buy pre-ground spices to spend the extra money and buy the small bottles from Mccormick Gourmet or Spice Islands. They will be fresh and get used up quickly. The packages of ground spices at the Indian stores are way to big for most people to use up fast enough.

I had a neighbor from the Phillipines who grew bittermelons in her yard. She would let me take as many leaves as I wanted. I would cook them in dal sometimes....definitely bitter. Edward, I think v. gautam is referring to the leaves of parwal or "patol" as the bengalis call it. This is different from the bitter melon. The "potol" vegetable itself is not at all bitter, as you know. However, the leaves are something else altogether. They are probably more bitter than anything else I have eaten. Re: neem leaves, you mentioned you like neem-begun a lot. You should probably consider growing your own neem tree (I did), since I don't know of any other way to procure neem leaves in the USA.. It grows well in a flower pot, and it will only grow upto the size allowed by the flower pot, i.e. if you leave it in a small pot, it wont grow big. It also makes a beautiful indoor house plant. In winter, we keep ours indoors. I knew what he meant, I was just adding to the discussion of bitter leaves to eat. I would love to grow a little neem tree. I wonder how it would fare here in the Mid-Atlantic. Cold winters and hot humid summers.

A big bowl of panchamrita made with milk, yogurt, sugar etc, garnished with ghee-fried makhana and rose petals. I'm starting to get this warm and tingly autumn is coming diwali sort of feeling!

Hi Yajna Patni, Welcome to the forum. I have had many ISKCON friends over the years and learned alot about Bengali and other vegetarian cooking from many of the institutions fine cooks. Even had a few good conversations with Yamuna about food 6 or 7 years ago(on the phone). ISKCON was my intro to Indian food in the late 80's early 90's. Never made it to Mayapur(decided on Puri instead, but that is a whole other story), but tasted the prasadam at Vrindavan. All this talk of luchis and kachoris is making me want to go the nearest Sunday feast!

I had a neighbor from the Phillipines who grew bittermelons in her yard. She would let me take as many leaves as I wanted. I would cook them in dal sometimes....definitely bitter.

I like neem begun...a lot. I've only ever been able to find the dried leaves packaged for cosmetic purposes....I figure those are not good to eat. Not to long ago I asked a friend who was visiting W.Bengal to bring some sort of edible neem, like a dried powder or something. He climbed up into a tree and tore off a whole branch and smuggled it over in his suitcase!! I dried the leaves and powdered them myself.

Wow, I have never heard of it being roasted chana dal. I have always known it as cracked wheat.

Hello Everybody, Fresh tomatoes here in the US are so inconsistent in quality, even at peak season. In order to ensure good results for my students or anyone else who might be using one of my recipes I now, pretty much always, test my recipes for gravy-type dishes with canned tomatoes and canned tomato puree. I especially like the canned tomato puree. It always thickens the sauce nicely and does not need to be cooked down with the masalas before you add the water, meat or vegetables. I like the flavor of fresh tomatoes, but I find a need to make adjustments each time I cook the same thing with the same recipe. That is fine for me, but not for someone who is following a recipe. What are your opinions on this? What has your experience been?

FYI- The latest issue of Gourmet magazine is about films and food. It features an article about Bombay-nothing new to any of us, but was still kind of cool. It also features a recipe and photo of puris from their "way we were" page-Madhur 1974 article. Even better than this though. The new Savuer has a beautiful article about Lucknow and its Nawabi cuisine.

The pods and seeds. unground should lasst 6 months to a year, if kept sealed in the dark. They will fade considerably after just a few months though. I find that the firmest bright green pods are usually the best. If the pod is plump and firm that usually means that it is full of good black seeds. I toss the lame ones with hardly any seeds into a container with loose black tea. That way I don't waste them and they will feel thay have a use in this world.