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Percy, Thanks for your awesome descriptions of food and travels in Mumbai. Have been loving all the Parsi food photos especially.....any chance you can provide some recipes once ur back home? What cities/towns do you have lined up next? -- Sent from my HP TouchPad using Communities

I have no idea at this point. It's up to the teaching chef I guess. I wrote to her that I had some panela...you can't get it here...but in her reply she didn't mention that. What is your favorite kind? Or favorites? And do you make it usually? Any tips to give me???? Yesterday I made the Mexican equivalent of chikki using a very dark panela (the same pretty much as jaggery) called palanquetas. I added pepitas, almonds, pine nuts and sesame seeds. Delicious. Monday I am going to take some to my dentist who is from India and longs for homemade goodies. (I have this awful suspicion that the chef's chikki is going to call for white sugar. She sort of hemmed and hawed when I asked her today in person.) Using jaggery (or in your case panela) gives a flavour profile that cannot be had by using white sugar. Chikkis are simply awesome. Sometimes in India you can get good rose petal and pistachio chikkis which are also very good. -- Sent from my HP TouchPad using Communities

Thanks percyn. It is difficult to find real Mughlai food outside in the US or the UK for that matter. Even in India, there is a serious loss of regional an court cooking styles especially in many of the restaurants that seem to be serving a menu that draws from the popular but over-stressed recipes from around the country. In recent years I have had the dispensation to question any restaurant that advertises a dish as Mughlai especially if it comes with tomatoes and chillies in it. Those two ingredients didn't exist in early Mughal era and were only later incorporated into the court cuisines. As an example, I have never seen a Malai Kofta that is a white gravy - its called malai kofta because the kofta is white/cream in colour and not because there is tonnes of malai in it.

Jenni has given a wonderful answer on the use of various types of spice mixes that are seen commonly in Indian cooking. Typically you want to make the masala fresh everytime you use it for a dish. Something more general purpose ones like a Sambhar masala or a garam masala can be made and I tend to store some part of it in the freezer which I find the next best thing to making a fresh batch. Regarding the garam masala recipe in Julie Sahni's book, I would be of the opinion that a Mughlai garam masala is just a more luxurious version of the home-style garam masala. They are bound to have a higher proportion of ingredients such as mace, cardamom, saffron, dried rose petals and would typically include the use of shahi jeera (royal cumin) instead of regular cumin. These type of masalas were typically used by royal courts and palaces in their cuisine and are unique to the particular family to whom the recipe belongs. I would say choose a garam masala recipe you like - and really each dish such as rajma, chole, baingan bharta, chicken, dishes have a certain masala that goes best with them.

Some of the traditional and popular dishes of Mughlai cuisine (as it is understood today) are Malai Kofta, Badam Murgh Korma, Navratan Korma, Shahi Paneer, Shahi Pualo, Kababs of various kinds, tandoori rotis, naans, varieties of biryanis. Desserts include shahi tukda, falooda and sheer kurma as the favourite. Mughal food married traditions from Turkic, Persian and Central Asian cooking styles with existing Indian ingredients and cooking styles to create a hearty and rich cuisine. It is often characterized by the usage of malai or Indian clotted cream, nuts (almonds, cashewnuts, pine nuts, melon seeds, chironji), dry fruits (raisins, apricots and plums) and more pronounced use of spices such as Black cardamom, black cumin, star anise and rose petals. Over-time, as Mughal cusine synthesized into regional court cuisines (such as Hyderabadi, Awadhi, ..) they took on influences of the local regions and created their own sub-cuisines. While there is some historical record from the time of the Mughals, many of the recipes that are considered Mughal dishes today bear little resemblance to historical recipes. The common theme between both though is the idea of enriching food by using malai, paneer, nut pastes, dry fruits and black cumin.

Here's a fairly simple recipe for the kind of chutney you're referring to (though this has a tadka that Chris' friend's version doesn't seem to have. 1/2 cup peanuts 1/2 cup grated coconut (if you can't get fresh, use frozen that's been thawed a bit, but never use dessicated) A small piece of tamarind (remove any seed) (In South Indian cooking terms, we'd like to measure size by asking to use a lime-sized ball of tamarind) 2 cloves of garlic, slivered 2 green chillies, chopped (optional; use less or more as per your heat preference) For tadka: 1 tsp mustard seeds 4-5 dried red chillies (the longish ones) 1 1/2 tsp of urad dal 1 1/2 tsp of channa dal First you dry roast the peanuts on a low flame. Then in a pan take a tsp of vegetable/peanut oil, and add slivers of garlic (or more if you like garlic). Add chopped green chillies, and saute for a bit. Add the dry roasted peanuts, coconut and tamarind piece, and warm through for say 30 seconds (coconut should not brown). Grind the whole mixture to a paste of a consistency you desire (with some water if needed), adding a little salt for seasoning. It should not be watery, and it's typically around the consistency of guacamole. Also, don't grind it too fine since you would like some texture to the whole chutney. Now for the tadka, heat 2 tbsp of oil in a regular pan or the tadka pan (Usually you would heat the oil to just bring it to smoking point, and then bring of heat immediately, and then let it cool down say 10 seconds and then add the ingredients in order), add mustard seeds and after they pop, add the channa dal and urad dal, and saute lightly till the lentils turn light golden brown. Pop in dried red chillies, and saute them as well (the aroma will tell you wen the chillies are done). Pour this tadka mixture over the chutney. and mix well.

I agree too with the curry powder debate. All this started with the rise in popularity of Indian food in the West, and everyone thought adding curry powder to a stock of some sort would make a curry, and while appreciation for the sheer variety of Indian 'curries' has been late in coming, it has started. However, I think a lot of Indian commentators on this topic take their disdain for this practice too far.Just remember that every Indian home has a variety of curry powders, or masalas, each for a specific dish. Garam masala is the one generic spice mixture used quite a bit in India. Using spice mixes is very much a part of cooking in many regions of India. The important thing is to use a mix that is as fresh as possible, and to store your mixes properly. And curry powder is indeed useful in many dishes - I love it in a chicken salad!

Fenugreek seed. I use yellow mustard seed, it probably doesn't matter. Dried Indian Chilies (see this post for varieties you could use). Buy them from an Asian food market rather than a Mexican food supplier. Typically in India black mustard is used in a generic curry powder/garam masala recipe - it has a similar profile to the yellow mustard seed but is a little stronger in flavour. You can use any dried chilly you find in an Asian store because all of these the requisite amount of heat but if you get to an Indian store in your area you should be able to find a pack of these