Yajna Patni

The fluff and smash thing sounds like what they do to the paratha things they make in Trinidad. They are called bussup shut. which is busted up shirt. They are very very flakey, and when they come off the Tawa you put them in a cloth and kind of pump and fluff which seperates the layers so they almost fall apart.

I have to say I didn't notice a chocolate flavour in the coffee i drank while there. However most of the coffee i drank was made suo da style, and i did pour in the sweet canned milk, so I might not have noticed. There was a fair amount of chicory in most of the coffe I drank there. Could that be the taste you noticed?

I just got a big bag of nopales. My question is how to prepare them. i got a bag of paddles. there are no spines, but there are the little brown nobs where the spines used to be. do i have to scrape these nobs off, or do i leave them?

I have a few recipies, they are all in the book from another Boston Cambodian resteraunt, The Elephant walk. according to the book, Somlah is a kind of soup using a herb paste, and machoo means it is sour. I think there are problems posting recipies straight out of books or i would post them, should i PM them to you?

I have four inherited silver tea pots, and i dont notice any off flavour. except one time i was zelous and silver polished the inside. I got them though because my mom thinks they make the tea taste funny. my family is not the rich kind so i assume most of them are plate. my palate is usually sharper than my moms, so i dont know.

swoooooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnn......those pictures! mmmmmmmmmmmmmm mines is pani puri, chat papri, and anything with crunchy fried dal and lots of red pepper. and fruit chat o yuum

As far as I know, Chai comes from the chinese for tea which is Cha I think, and has been adapted by other countries as tea hs traveld. Chai is tea in India, reagardless of how it is prepared, I have a chaldean friend, and they call tea chai too, so basicly chai means tea. HOWEVER in the US it usualy means the tea is mixed with spices and pounds of sugar.

that is the kind I have gotten in the US. The kind I got in Cambodia is slightly diffrent. the saucer thing is a seperate saucer, with holes knocked in the middle part. so there are two layers of holes, the ones in the bottom of the cup shaped filter, and the ones in the saucer. INside in the kind of your picture I think there is a little screw, or at least there is in mind. In the Cambodia one is just a flat round plate with a handle on top. this has holes in it, and you just tamp it down hard and pur the water in carfully so it dosnt float free. They both work pretty much the same. Incidnetaly I have taken to making cafe au lait for my morning coffee with these things. really yummy, and quicker to wash than my melita pot.

i usualy make a thoran with just mustard seeds and urad dal and curry leaves cooked in oil, then put in the veg and stirfry it till done, then put some grated coconut on top. Some times i put in ginger or turmeric or green chilis too. I have no idea if this is authentic or what but it tastes good to me. green beans, cabbage or okra are my favorite veg to cook like this.

If you look at Das Sreedharans books, either of them, they are chock full of really good Pachadis and thorans. Yum. yum yum

My favorite saag is at Rasa in London. I don’t like regular restaurant sag paneer. Its too slimy and doesn’t taste defined enough to me.. I am not sure really how to describe that. But in Rasa it is perfect. The spinach is not pureed, has definite bite to it, and has a strong taste of spinach that is not over powered by the cream. although the spices are mellowed slightly by the cream they are not diminished . I don’t think there are too many either. The cream used for the sauce is excellent ... English cream tastes more of cow and less of processing than US cream in my not so humble opinion. Any way, the palak or saag or what ever in Rasa was one of the best gustatory experiences I have had. Every flavour was clear and defined; nothing was overwhelmed by the rest or mellowed beyond recognition. Not that I have ever eaten a bad meal at Rasa, but this was wonderful. It was probably nearly 8 years ago now. edited because i can't spell

I love them. I got them in big huge balls being sold outside the anothropology museum. I have had similar in Thailand, but the balls are smaller, and contain seeds.

I have used sooji, and then fried them in peanut oil. that seems to make them hard.

cinnamon and cardamon would be good too, i just dont't like cinnamon much unless it is mixed with a lot of other things.

I am very envious too....mmmmm. They make a great chutney style jam. sweet with lots of heat. I think yamuna has a recipie, but i dont think I have ever used it. I just cook them with some ghee and sugar, and a little water if you need it, and some ginger, then make a chaunc with cumin and chilli and perhaps a little anise or clove, or put the clove in when you cook them..

I use cabbage and potato, and salt them, then leave them a while and squeeze the water out, then I use as little gram flour as possible. and make sure they are cooked through. A lot of times when i eat them in resteraunts, thye have way too much gram flour and are not cooked really well, so they have a bitter taste that i don't like, and a very heavy texture.

Sorry.... I am in Boston now. Far from South East Asia!

www.importfoods.com has them too

I got two of those aluminum ones in Cambodia this summer . THey were a dollar for two. They are not quite like the Stainless oens i have seen here, but the result seems just the same. They dont havea ascrew, but a little tamp inside with holes knocked in it with a little nail, and then a saucher under it with more holes with a little nail.

most of the absorbtion takes place while they are cooking

I soak them in cold sweet milk. THey absorb it better than thick syryp or malai. Then I put them to sit in cold kheer or malai. the squeak is an odd thing that has to do with the texture of the chenna ball... the rasgulla. it really shouldnt be grainy, more like spongy, and if it turns out just right there is an odd squeak on your teeth when you bite in, and the sweet juice rushes out.

mmmmm that sounds good.

I made chocolate samosas once. I cant remember the real name for them. But the filling I made from some recipie for quick burfee using powdered milk. the chocolate made a good combination... powdered milk barfi is kind of icky to me usualy, but with strong choclate it didnt matter. I made the dough very buttery, and fried them very slowly so the crust was crunchy hard and more like a fried pastry than a smaosa crust. then i dipped them in sugar syryp just enough to glaze them in a white glaze that didnt soak in and make the crust soggy.

It may be very wrong, but chocolate burfi is awfully good.... or with a marble of chocolate running through it with the rest plain or slightly cardamom flavoured. and on another thread some one mentioned chai wallas putting drinking chocolate into spiced chai. that sounds good to me. but then, chocolate covered newspaper sounds good to me. On a very weird note i have a box of cheap tea masala that has too much anise for me to like it in tea, but it makes an excellent spicy hot choclate.

My usual tomatoe chutney is very simple from Madhur jaffrey. I have run out and am going to try this one .....Would it be heretical to use canned tomatoes? Obviously fresh would be better, but the fresh ones i have acess to cost a fortune, and taste like wet slush. I ma hoping ot try this weekend.