bhelpuri
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Scott,
Neither Pakistinis (sic) nor Bengalis are eating anywhere near 90 coconuts a year.No. But most Indian regional cuisines up and down the coasts use coconut very liberally.
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So to refer to the people or the cuisine as Ceylonese is bad, but its okay to refer to the tea they grow as Ceylon?
In effect.
The tea is a varietal, I'm pretty sure that you can get Ceylon tea not grown on the island (not entirely sure, though).
I do know this though. There is a tea called 'Darjeeling'. Thousands of tons of 'Darjeeling' tea are sold each year, but only a quarter of it (at best) is actually grown in Darjeeling. I have the strong feeling this is the same for Ceylon tea.
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Someone else will have to describe Bangladeshi food. Though I've eaten meals prepared by guys from Sylhet probably 300 times (we all have, they're the Indian restaurant cook/owner mafia especially in the UK), it's always been half-assed versions of Punjabi preparations.
But Pakistani food, once again, reflects the geography and ethinc make-up of the country. It's a very diverse country, hard to describe even in half-a-dozen sentences. There are Baluchis and Pashtuns and Sindhis and Punjabis and Kashmiris, and that's only beginning to describe the main geographic components. There are also tens of millions from all different parts of the subcontinent, who went there post-partition.
Anyway, I've not managed to go yet but there are certain things that Pakistan is famous for - each city has signature kebabs, or rice preparations, or certain grilled cuts of meat. Chappli kebabs from Peshawar, Sajji from Balochistan, shammi kebabs in Lahore, etc.
In effect, I suppose you could compare Pakistani food best to the range of North Indian non-vegetarian regional cuisines.
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Sri Lanka's food ('Ceylon' is colonial, and can be quite offensive) partly reflects the island's ethnic and religious make-up ( Sinhalese/Tamil and Buddhist/Hindu/Muslim/Christian).
But the whole mix is made much more interesting by the centuries of being at the center of a trans-oceanic trade as well as the comings and goings of a whole range of colonialists. At various times, the island has been Portuguese. Dutch and British. The first two occupiers particularly left strong impacts on the culture (and food) of Sri Lanka, though the contemporary picture is muddled by the recent near-total migration of the two distinct 'burgher' communities.
Anyway, a lot of Sri lankan food is fairly indistinguishable from Indian.The signature items are probably 'hoppers' and 'string hoppers' which are little bowl-like crispy-chewy rice or vermicelli 'pancakes'. You can have an 'egg hopper' which is one of these with an egg cracked (and cooked) in the bowl, and then you eat this with a wide variety of curries ranging from roughly Europeanized and mild to black and fiery. 'Hopper' seems to be a corruption of the word 'appam'.
Another famous Sri Lankan dish is 'lampres' or 'lamprais'. It is rice cooked with meat/fish and stock, mixed with a curry or sambar, and then baked in banana leaves. This is apparently somehow of Dutch origin.
Then there are all kinds of dishes which Indians would recognize as vaguely anglo-Indian, or the sort of food you can still get at the older Gymkhanas and clubs. Cutlets, potato-chops, croquettes, that kind of thing.
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There are a couple of very decent Sri Lankan restaurants in NYC, and one or two real little concentrations of migrants in the area. The major little community center is in Staten Island, actually, and there is one trade that the Sri Lankans have cornered like Indians have taken over newsstands and Koreans took over corner groceries.
Wait for it. If you know it, we now know about you.....
....it's porn. Sri Lankans own most of the remaining porn shops in the city. Odd, but there you have it.
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Fine post, whippy.
exotics unequivocally stand up to indian flavors (how does it taste?). after all, what wouldn't be improved by a thoughtful masala?when using foreign ingredients, i try to follow some rules:
--one exotic ingredient per dish
--never use exotic spices (thyme, lavendar etc.)
--adhere to indian cooking techniques
--taste carefully and recognize success/failure
All of that is extremely sensible, a very othodox and reasonable way of going about introducing unfamiliar ingredients to time-honored techniques of cooking. (Also, love that phrase, 'thoughtful masala', it'd make a good jazz-band name)
Finally, the recipes for 'Dungeness Tikke' and 'Indian Caesar Salad' are inspired, they sound like perfect (and perfectly delicious) fusion.
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Seems to have its possibilities, and could find a niche in rice-eating countries.
Maybe Episure can comment, he's in Bangalore.
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Jamaican Oranges is correct.
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Here is the sign from my favorite halal butcher (photographed for a thread in the New Jersey folder). Note the entertaining mis-spellings, "stake" for steak, "champ" for chops, etc.
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I'm surprised (very) that all the words are spelled correctly. In the stores near me, there are all kinds of funny transliterations.
One example - Jamakan Orens.
Can you guess what's being advertised?
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This is easily my favorite instant heat gratification food, and we make several versions.
The traditional base, as observed in this thread, is a ton of coarsely chopped garlic. Then there needs to be a strong olive oil, we tend to use the intensely aromatic and flavorful Portuguese ones. Then the pepperoncino.
Probably my favorite version of this includes some good cured/smoked sausage, finely chopped, anything from linguica to soppresata. And maybe a few finely chopped olives, and then a diced tomato thrown in a couple of minutes before the pasta is added to the pan.
No cheese, of course.
It's highly satisfying, and takes a round ten minutes to cook - from start to finish.
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Great article, Vikram. I just realized that I've been reading and admiring your work in sundry Outlook Traveller issues for a while now.
This ‘traditional-fusion’ approach enables Jhaveri to achieve something important: a balance between Maharashtrian and Gujarati cuisines. Gujarati food by itself can often seem too rich, the natural flavour of the ingredients drowned in added sweetness and ghee. Maharashtrian food is the other extreme: austere and simple, sometimes to the point of dryness. Combining the two traditions makes for an ideal mix, very tasty, but never over the top.This kind of says it all, and 'traditional-fusion' is a neat coinage. The food is a highly plausible outcome of the Bombay rality, even the regional reality I was talking about. It's not an experiment but a genuine fusion. Or so I maintain.
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This thread will be extremely short, which is fine I guess. But perhaps it can morph into a discussion of something else you (Vikram) said at the beginning of this discussion.
Its one of the few restaurants where I feel there is someone really interested in food behind it.What are the others, in the Indian tradition (at home or abroad)?
We have lots of restaurants which work on preserving, conserving, traditions. I'd put the dum-pukht and Bukhara's in this vein. But which are the restaurants which are innovating in an intelligent manner? Putting carefully considered new spins on old traditions? Reviving worthy techniques and applying them afresh?
I can think of only one, right away. It's called 'O Cozinheiro', and is tucked away in Betalbatim, Goa. There, you have the young Goan equivalent of the monomaniacal chef in 'Big Night', a person so devoted to his loving reproductions of local food that he scorns what is available and bakes his own bread (Goa is a land of good bakers), cures his own meats, makes his own vinegar. The food doesn't stray from the seasonal and the regional, but this is a bright, open-minded, young chef (with years of experience cooking abroad) who is willing to improve and innovate in order to avoid compromise.
Goan food, beyond the stereotypical sausages/sorpotel/vindaloo, is terribly represented in restaurants - even restaurants in Goa. Far, far more than the other cuisines in India you have to eat it at private homes. This restaurant, O Cozinheiro, changes that and you'll see it daily packed with the exact same (local) people whose households are famous for their food.
It's an expansion of the traditions, see, within genuine homage. And thus a very compelling place to eat.
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You could easily say the same about Swati.
Now, where else is this kind of exciting development taking place?
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thus even that strip of konkan coast may normally comprise fairly discrete food-practices that are being made to speak to each other at swati,
Actually, I didn't mean to leave the impression that Swati is a Konkan restaurant. In fact, it's Gujerati, and made its name as a clean purveyor of Gujju-influenced Bombay street food like sev batata puri and pani puri, etc. It was the only place that I could get away with openly eating that stuff, as a kid.
But the more interesting dishes - which have emerged since Swati was redone - are different. These are very fresh and new to my palate, but the underpinnings seem pretty orthodox (speaking in regional terms). For instance, the kokum curry with the jowar khichidi seems like a very plausible item from the Maharashtrian part of the Konkan. Etc. Admittedly, I've never had a jowar khichidi before eating the wonderful version at Swati.
Anyway, the geographical strip in question has all kind of long-standing cultural and political ties. For roughly a century, for example, it was part of the larger unit known as the Bombay Presidency (though, granted, this unit encompasses a vast territory including many many totally disparate cultures and cuisines).
Anyway, I was hoping to hear more about this suggested fusion aspect of Swati's food from Vikram, who will no doubt be able to describe it extremely precisely.
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It's quite different (what I'm describing) to the 'all Indians are my brothers and sisters' enjoyable culinary mish-mash that might be displayed in an officer's colony tea party, and several giant steps away from the kimchi-stuffed hilsa (or buglogi cooked in mustard oil?) that might result from your interesting personal adventure in cross-cultural affairs.
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Anyway, I've seen it several times and was going to let it slide, but perhaps not.
a take on a goanese pomfret dish'Goanese' is much worse than writing 'Parsee', and it's significantly worse than saying 'Keralan' instead of Malayali (or Keralite). At the wrong moment, it's a fighting word. The correct term (which I've also seen you use) is Goan.
I know an entertaining old fellow, who when referred to as 'Goanese' in public always used to respond "Go an' ease yourself!"
Kindly refrain.
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How very odd, I posted (I thought) something quite lengthy to this thread about Busybee, and then it disappeared.
But I'm kind of glad it did, because when I searched for it I found a whole thread on the deceased gent.
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I recently took a fairly well known American chef, Michael Nischan there and he was just raving about it. He said he's been in India quite often and thought he was getting a hang of Indian food, but these were taste sensations he had never come across.
Totally buy it. Your comments are a bit reassuring because I too have been raving about the place (after only two meals there, though) and it's good to know that it's consistently astonishing.
Please do e-mail me the article on Swati, or post it here for everyone. I'm very interested.
One thing -
You say she's "fusing across Indian traditions", is that strictly true? What are the traditions?
It seems to me that the food comes from a roughly contiguous strip of territory stretching along the Konkan coast up all the way to Gujerat, lands which have always related to each other.
Anyway, I was not kidding at all when I made reference to New York and the foodie/restaurant scene here. If someone could come close to reproducing that fantastic series of dishes abroad, they'd completely shake the perception of what Indian food can be like. Hell, two meals at Swati certainly managed to shake mine, even in India.
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While it's true that food coloring is widely used in India (particularly in sweets), their use in things like the bright red tandoori chicken is geared to Western eyes.
You might be slightly unhappy to learn that these dyes can be cumulatively posionous - warning.
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in shrilal shukla's "raag darbari
Ah, yes. The loving, lengthy, descriptions on how best to pair bhang with almonds, milk and so on. Rather got my attention, I mean it sounds great - get high and address the munchie issue at the same time.
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Phd in Indian lit, eh? Nice going, Dr. Jones.
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The thread topic has been nagging at me.
If you'd asked me some of the common themes always reliably turned to by Indo-Anglian writers, food would trip off my lips quite early. Yet, when you think a bit harder about it - and I spent a swift two-three minutes walking up and down in front of my shelves - nothing specific jumps out.
Yes, Amitav Ghosh's evocation of Penang cuisine in Glass Palace kind of sticks in my mind. But without actually opening up the books on hand, the sight of only two specific books properly jog my memory. Neither are Indian, per se, but what the hell. There is Ondaatje's odd and lovely 'Running in the Family' which had me salivating for certain unknown and exotic sounding dishes (then I figured out what they were). And also Romesh Gunesekara's poignant first novel, 'Reef' in which one of the main character spends much of his time lovingly preparing meals for the other.
There must be more, certain titles nag at me unspecifically.
But one little, light-hearted, book definitely has some enjoyable food writing. It's a flimsy paperback containing some of the self-consciously humorous English-language essays of the Marathi writer, Gangadhar Gadgil. I know of no one who mentions Gadgil's English writings favorably, and no one (other than me) who particularly likes his writing. He is, putting it mildly, quite unsung (for English, in Marathi letters he's a pillar).
Still, this little Laxman-illustrated paperback, entitled 'Crazy Bombay' has often given me pleasure when I'm in a mopey where-is-my-Bombay mood.
So, for kicks, I reproduce here a lengthy extract from 'Crazy Bombay', on How to Eat Pani Puri.
The bhelpuri stall consists of a low wooden platform draped in red cloth on which are displayed in various pots, pans and jars the puris, sev, puffed rice and several other ingredients. The display not only makes the mouth water but is also aesthetically very satisfying. The piled-up sev has the lustre of broken pieces of gold thread, and the crisp, puffed puris look like exquisite golden brown balloons of edible delight waiting to float lightly out of the jars and into the expectant mouths of discriminating Bombayites.The dahivadas that lie heavy and somnolent in jars filled with water have the shape, form and feel of primordial contentment which is experienced when teeth sink into them and they melt imperceptibly into nothingness. The ragda – peas cooked in spicy gravy – emits a heady aroma as it simmers gently on a charcoal stove, and the throbbing peas seem to be squealing with delight. Even the boiled potatoes invite admiration for the gold of their bodies, while the red, green and amber-coloured chutneys carry in them a hint of the morbid pleasures secretly enjoyed by the Emperors of Baghdad in the heyday of their medieval glory.
There is nothing mild and subdued about the taste of bhelpuri preparations. They are hot stuff – as hot as a raging prairie fire. Therefore people who are brought up on mashed potatoes (mashing a potato seems to me to be the worst insult to which it can be subjected!) and who have eaten nothing hotter than hot dogs, should not venture to taste them without expert guidance.
But once they learn to enjoy the ecstasy of setting their tongues on fire they will realize that bhelpuri preparations are not merely hot. They are also sour, pungent, peppery, salty, spicy, creamy, crisp, fluffy (and believe it or not) sweet. All these tastes annoy, tease, titillate and soothe the tongue while the fire continues to rage on.
Eating panipuri is an art, an achievement and heavenly bliss. It takes a lot of character, courage and training to eat it. It has to be performed in the company of friends, if for no other reason than to avoid choking oneself to death by eating panipuris in too quick a succession.
The panipuri eaters have to stand in a semi-circle near the stall and strike the proper stance. This means that everybody has to plant his legs wide apart, bend forward a full sixty degrees, raise his chin, half open his mouth and hold his hand ready to snatch the proffered panipuri and shove it into his mouth.
A stranger who happens to see the panipuri-eaters in such a stance may feel puzzled, but a true Bombayite would know how necessary it is to take such a stance and would even advise the persons concerned to roll up their sleeves, tuck up their trousers, unfasten their collar-buttons and bend several degrees more to avoid any mishap.
When the customers are thus ready, the assistant serving panipuris picks up a crisp, puffed puri about the size of a ‘B’ grade egg in a San Francisco supermarket, pokes a hole in it with his thumb, stuffs it with sprouted and cooked moongs, dips it in spiced water and offers it dripping to one of the customers standing in the semi-circle. He then offers the puris in quick succession to all the customers and by the time the first one has managed to swallow his first panipuri, he gets another.
Whatever the state of suffocation of the customer, he cannot afford to wait and waste even a second when the panipuri is offered to him. It must be shoved into the mouth before the precious spiced water oozes, drips or squirts out of it. At the same time care has to be taken to prevent the water from squirting on the shirt front, dripping on the trousers, running down the arm into the shirt sleeve or past the chin and down the throat into the collar.
Not everybody can handle the panipuri with such dexterity as to avoid these mishaps, and one sees at Chowpatty many a shirt and sari telling tales of eventful bouts of eating panipuri.
It is not easy to shove into the mouth a stuffed and dripping puri of the size of a ‘B’ grade American egg. The flexibility of the facial muscles is sorely tried in the process and at that time the parties concerned with their contorted faces look remarkably like characters in a Hitchcock film who are in the process of being murdered. Once the panipuri is securely wedged inside the mouth, there follows a moment of agonizing and tantalizing suspense. The jaw, which is on the verge of being dislocated, refuses to move. The muscles of the throat want to swallow but dare not, and for good reason. An invisible lid is securely fastened on the windpipe and lungs scream for fresh air. The eyes pop out. The temples are about to burst because of loud and incessant knocking from inside, and the spiced water acts on the tongue like vitriol. In other words, one goes through the thrilling experience of being about to be choked to death.
Just when it seems all is lost the puri is pushed into the correct position by automatic muscular movement and then the jaw sets working, the throat starts swallowing, air gushes through the windpipe, the charred tongue is bathed in saliva and happy tears trickle out of the eyes. But the ecstasy is shortlived. For one suddenly becomes aware of the protesting convulsions of shocked intestines, and at the same time one has on hand another dripping puri that brooks no delay.
After partaking of panipuri, there is an instinctive urge to quench the fire in the mouth with several glasses of water. But to do this is really to miss the point. The fire must be kept burning, and in fact must be stoked judiciously by eating other bhelpuri preparations. What should be changed is the intensity of the fire. The initial blaze should be subdued by eating dahivadas or other preparations where dahi (yoghurt) is used; and then in the subdued fire must be released multicoloured flares of varied flavours of the chutneys and other ingredients of bhelpuri. Once this principle is understood, everyone can fix for himself the order in which he would like to eat the varied preparations.
Finally, when the whole spectrum of flavours has been sampled, the bhelpuri addict drinks a glass or two of water. That, however, is not the finale but the prelude to the grand finale that soothes the tongue and lubricates and quietens the exacerbated intestines. The grand finale comes in the form of kulfi,which is, or at least ought to be, creamier than cream itself and cool as cool can be. Two fat luscious cones of this kulfi, allowed slowly to melt in the mouth in all their rich creaminess are just the things to end the orgy of eating fire. As they melt in the mouth the temples stop throbbing, the taut nerves relax, contentment seeps into the intestines and a reflective somnolence spreads over the mental faculties. One enters into a state of beatitude and comes as close to nirvana as is possible in Bombay.
In that state of beatitude, the Maharashtrians stop being surly, the Marwaris look at the millions of stars without being reminded of their own millions, the Sindhis admire the horizon without any intention of selling it, the Gujaratis speculate on the moon instead of the scrips they should have sold, the North Indians dream of things other than Hindi as the official language of the United Nations, and even the Parsi ladies stop nagging their husbands.
Ah, Bombay.
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By the way, the rubber-limbed and hilaririous Aasif Madvi had a one-man show off-Broadway a few years ago.
Sakina's Restaurant traced some of the characters associated with an Indian restaurant on Manhattan's 6th Street (the owner, his sexy wife, customers, waiters, etc). Mandvi played all of them, it quite deserves to be turned into a short feature.
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After reading quite a lot in the old threads, I think it would be interesting to make a cross-over, cross-cultural movie -
Amma Natural - The Suvir Saran story
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Hahahaha!
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What's wrong with calling a kathi roll simply (zimbly?) an "Indian hot dog", one wonders.
However, I've yet to recover from seeing vadai described on a menu as "savory donuts", so perhaps I shouldn't wish for things I can't handle.
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i'd strongly recommend the penguin series
Oh, I'm already sold.
Love the Parsi one, have several times re-read (but not cooked from) the Anglo-Indian one, and have approved of (but given away, twice) the Goan one. Passed on the N-E volume, but am rethinking.
The Hyderabad one is atop the list for my indulgent (but unsuspecting) NY-bound relative.
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i think it isn't till we see an indian style abomination on the order of the olive garden or p.f chang that it will truly arrive
I tend to agree with Mongo.
That is, we have yet to see a bagel moment or a fortune cookie moment, where Indian food enters the cultural lexicon. My instinct is to be skeptical that it can ever happen, the taste/look/smell of Indian food is so very alien to the residents of Yankistan.
But then, it has happened in the UK. Granted, there are specific factors which paved the way, and the Indian migrants to the UK are concentrated in a much smaller territory so their tastes/aromas were far more directly thrust under Brit noses.
So, I suppose it can happen here but it will take some a-ha product and some cultural moment that ties into it. Like if Shyamalan makes a remake of his hero's ET, maybe the alien can eat chicken tikka or something.
Anyway, the guys who have this restaurant (and its sister concept) seem to have something with potential crossover legs.
Now if only they can get some product placement in the next version of Friends.
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I have to admit that I know little about unripe mangos.
Scott,
These unripe mangoes are sold specifically for making into pickles (achars). There are many many different versions and recipes. They don't ripen, particularly.
I think that's the best looking okra I've ever seenHere is something you should know about Indian grocery stores in general, and J. City in particular.
Certain vegetables, those which are prized in indian cooking, are always better at the decent Indian groceries. If a store has a fair amount of business and regular turn-over, they will buy their groceries from specific distributors which serve the rapidly growing (and very particular) Indian community in the tri-state area.
Thus, as a rule, you will always get the best okra, eggplant, green beans, coriander/cilantro and ginger at Indian stores. In general, the prices for these will also be better than at your "regular" supermarket or grocery.
My okra, by the way, becomes what is pictured below - one of my all-time favorite vegetable preparations. Yum. yum.
Subcontinental Street Foods
in India: Dining
Posted
To start with -
Amritsari Street Food