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Recently I have been playing allot with food influences from the subcontinent of India. There are of course a wide array of spices, and fruit that are used there (all which are very interesting). I have had some success with infusing chocolate with whole toasted spice, by letting the chocolate sit in the same airtight container as the spices. I have also experimented quite a bit with adding yogurt to ganaches (on a 1 to 1 ratio) and have had some excellent results. Just was wondering if any one had some creative ideas in the way of flavor combinations?

Numerous have been the occasions when our patrons have explained their absence during the summer months with ,' its too hot for Indian food'. What do you think ? I have some views on this but would like to hear from all you wonderful people out there. Thanks

Hello, I am curious about what experience others may have using mustard seed oil. In Canada, by law mustard seed oil must be sold with the label "for external use only". I have spoken to members of the East Indian community in Winnipeg (who describe themselves in that way to differentiate themselves from First Canadians who call themselves Indians) and I have been told that they use it with no ill effects. I realize that this oil has been used for a millenia, but in modern times, has use of it been discouraged in any other communities? Thanks! Rick

Having come over from the UK where Indian Restaurants go hand in hand with having a beer or other drink. I amazed at how few Indian restaurants there are in NJ that serve alcohol or wine. Fair enough a few operate the BYO system. But is it so difficult to get a liquor license in NJ??? All comments welcome

Do you mostly make it at home? How many items would you have at any given meal made at home for your daily meal? Go out to restaurants? Any particular items you like to eat more often? If you own an Indian restaurant, can you share with us what your meal pattern is? If you are non-Indian, could you tell us how often you prepare an Indian meal or even inspired by India meal? Do you have or know kids that follow a similar pattern to yours in regards to Indian food? What Indian foods do these kids find most appealing to them? Have they grown up outside of India and eating Indian food?

The use of rice noodles in Kerala cooking is common in breakfast and lunch dishes. However, we don't see many interpretation on Indian menus here in the US. How are rice noodles prepared? What are some good traditional rice noodle dishes? I think the use of rice noodles would be a creative and interesting addition to an Indian menu.

In an indian cooking class I attended today we used a spice called kasuri methi in a cheese curry dish. I thought I was quite familiar with Indian spices but had never heard of this before. It was a very green color and in powder form. It was added to the curry at the very end of cooking with the garam masala. What is it and what other types of dishes is it used in. I also had my first experience with black cardamom, wonderful, wonderful stuff!

Any ideas what one should expect at the Graduation weekend in an Indian household? Are there things Indian do differently from others in the US? Are there things that are similar? Does such an event even matter in an Indian household? Are their parties that happen? Guests that sleep over? Special foods that are cooked? What gifts does one take the family? What should one expect?

"To propel the cuisine to the next phase here in the US, we have to understand why it's stuck in a rut. What haven't restauranteurs done well to make it more acceptable. The biggest hindrance, I find, is the atmosphere in Indian restaurants. I characterize it as the single biggest reason for the stagnancy. Certain stereotypes: 1. The restaurants, kitchens included, in general are dirty as hell 2. The service is horrendous (there are to many more generalizations to add)" The above is quoted from a very relevant and poignant post made by eGulleteer Rks in the Indian Restaurant in NYC thread. What do you think about this? Do you think these are issues that ought to be addressed? Do you think these are issues that haunt Indian restaurants, or are they non-issues? What would you do if you agree with the above quote in addressing these issues? What do you think would be the impact on the Indian restaurant business if the key players in the business make a concerted effort to address these issues?

Pesarattu is one of my favorite dosas from the South. A friend makes these amazingly well. The home of this friend is a few blocks from my own. Makes for easy access to one of my favorite dishes. Have never made this myself. Recipe anyone? Tips??? PS: Prasad2 had mentioned this on another thread. Made me hungry for it... far away from NYC, I now am craving them.

If you are an Indian restaurant owner, chef or employee, could you please take some time and share with us what you know about the usage of store bought curry powder in your restaurants kitchen. Would you mind sharing with us what recipes you use it in. What role it plays in your kitchen. And where these recipes using curry powder come from. Thanks all!

I know that I have mastered the art of paneer making, I want to make one of my favorite Indian dishes saag paneer. any recipes? hints?

I loved this movie. What is the dish that the Mother wanted the girl to make? For those that have seen the movie can you provide a recipe or a link to the main dish that she was supposed to master before she got married. Sorry I dont recall the name but if you have seen the movie and are familiar w the dish could you post some info. Thanks.

Monica's article on India's white revolution makes me think about another little commented on aspect of it: much of the milk that goes into it comes from water buffalos as well as cows (I don't know the proportions, but I could try finding out). I think that has a definite impact on many Indian dairy products, but I don't know enough about the subject to comment on exactly how - can anyone explain? The even less noted aspect though is that a lot of water buffalos (I'm going to drop the 'water' from now on) must mean a lot of buffalo meat. But you will never find buffalo meat being sold as such. Indian cooks, perhaps correctly, feel that people won't want to eat buffalo meat, so most of what goes as 'beef' in India is really buffalo meat. Just like 'lamb' or 'mutton' is often goat. Vir Sanghvi, the editor of the daily The Hindustan Times, who writes a most excellent food column under the pen name Grand Fromage, noted that in Nepal you can find buffalo billed honestly, if a rather peculiarly, as 'buff steak' but you will never find anything like this in India. What is really strange about this culinary deception is that there are considerable and real penalties attached to it - not for the deception, but for consuming beef. Barring a few states like Kerala, West Bengal and some of the Northeastern ones, the Hindu religious lobby has ensured that killing a cow is a crime in most of the country. (For those unfamiliar with Hinduism the cow is considered very sacred for various reasons I don't want to get into because the chances of my saying something contentious are quite high [And I'm a Hindu myself]. All I'll say is that if you want an interesting take on it, read the anthropologist Marvin Harris' famous essay on the subject). The growth in power of Hindu fundamentalists means that cow killing has become an increasingly emotive issue. There is a very strong move now to make killing cows illegal across the whole country. (Apart from trampling on the rights of beef eaters, this will mean millions of starving decrepit cows, but that for some reason if OK, as long as they aren't killed). There have been several horrific cases recently of people being killed on suspicion of killing cows. And yet a lot of meat is sold and eaten, whether its from buffalos or cows. In my own city of Bombay not far from where I'm typing this I can go and find a number of places serving excellent - and another irony - very cheap beef. 'Mutton' is expensive, presumably because its legal, but beef is cheap which is another reason why its popular. Mmmmm, maybe this might be my dinner solution. Beef kebabs at Baghdadi in Colaba maybe, or beef khichada, a wonderful creamy stew of meat cooked with wheat and pulses, in the lanes of Minara Masjid. You have to know what to ask though - people are wary on the beef issue now. Only in the hearts of Muslim or Christian neighbourhoods will you find beef being openly sold. In the roadside places serving beef you might be asked "bade ka ya chote ka?" ("the big one or the small one?" where big is obviously beef and small is mutton). In butcher's shops you ask for 'undercut' or specify beef sotto voce. And if you ask an expensive restaurant where they got their steaks from they'll say it came from outside the state, since its illegal to kill cows in the state, but not (yet) to eat them. This isn't quite true, of course. Some really expensive restaurants do import genuine beef from abroad and some people are presumably shipping dead cows into the city (But from Kerala or W.Bengal, neither of which are near?). The bulk of course comes from illegal abbatoirs in the city and you can just imagine the workpractices there, since its all illegal anyway. And yet, despite all these problems, restaurateurs and butchers still shy away from saying that they are serving - quite legal - buffalo! I suppose it the unprepossesing muddy black look of the animal, though I rather like their cud chewing placidity as they stand in the middle of roads defying all attempts to move them - 'India's natural speedbreakers' as exasperated drivers call them. Cows can be skittish and will move with a honk, but buffalos will stand there till kingdom, or the kid in nominal charge of them, comes. Anyway, this mail did have a query, before I got carried away, which is this: when it comes to cooking the animals, how much does buffalo meat differ from beef? I find the meat I get at the butchers pretty tough and I usually have to pressure cook it which is fine for curries, but I guess means no steaks. I'm told restaurants tenderize like crazy. But is buffalo meat really tougher than beef, or is it more a reflection on the way both cows and buffalos are raised in India? Can it be used in almost exactly the same way as beef or should adjustments be made? And finally, are there other cultures less snobbish about water buffalo meat that have recipes specifically for it? I think I've read in Davidson about it being popular in parts of Southeast (but is it labelled as such, or is 'beef' again used?) What about Italy? What happens to all those mozzarella producers once they're past their producing days? And can anyone give me Italian buffalo recipes? It'll make a nice change the next time I get some 'undercut' from my butcher. Vikram

Does anyone know of cookbooks that cover the cooking of the Indian diaspora? I'm researching some stories on Indian cookbooks, and I thought this would be an interesting angle. The few such cookbooks I've seen are fascinating - familiar Indian recipes, but with differences in ingredients and influences that reflect the histories of these communities. I guess many of these cookbooks are conscious attempts to commemorate these communities, so they all filled with anecdotes and nostalgia that make them really interesting, and often moving, reading. I know the classic South African Indian 'bible' - Zuleikha Mayat's 'Indian Delights'. I have some South African Indian relatives myself, the wives of my Gujarati cousins who now live in India, and make some interesting recipes which they tell me they brought with them from SA. For example, they take kandh - yam with a weirdly blue-purple coloured flesh - and cook it and slice it thinly and use these slices to sandwich a mixture of grated coconut and coriander leaves and some other spices. It looks bizarre: purple sandwiches with a white-green filling, but tastes great. I've just picked up another really interesting book: Recipes of the Jaffna Tamils, edited by Nesa Eliezer and printed by Orient Longman. Since Jaffna is just a strait's distance from Tamil Nadu one wouldn't expect the food to be that different, and much of it is standard Tamil stuff. But there are interesting variations, like a whole section on recipes using the products of the palmyra palm. Also, and I realise this might sound political, but its not meant to be, Tamil Brahmin cuisine and culture seems to have less of a hold in Sri Lanka as it does in India. So while the image of Tamil food in India is dominated by vegetarian Brahmin cooking (at least till the recent rise of 'Chettiar' cooking), the recipes in this book reflect the non-vegetarian cooking that is very much a part of Non-Brahmin Tamil life. A recipe for rasam flavoured with chicken bones for example sounds really surprising to someone used to the common vegetarian only version. Are there other such cookbooks for the desi communities in Trinidad, Mauritius, Fiji and where else? A friend who was coming from Guyana promised to get me a Guyanese-Indian cookbook, though unfortunately he cancelled his trip at the last minute. (But this link has some interesting recipes: http://guyana.gwebworks.com/recipes/recipe...pes_alpha.shtml ) Any names, comments, recipes, suggestions from people with experience of desi diasporic cooking would be welcome. Vikram

Hi there - this is something that is ubiquitous on Indian menus here in Atlanta, but i'm not entirely sure what it's suppsoed to be. in some places it appears to be tired bits of tandoori chicken in a red sauce, other places it's a divinely buttery chicken curry with a tomato base, and a recipe i ran across yields a golden yellow chicken curry. any ideas?

I have not really every had this curry in any home I have visited over the years. Today, some friends told me that it is a dish many restaurants do prepare. Do you know of any that have this dish on their menus? Have you ever eaten a Mango Chicken Curry? What was it like? Where did you eat it? Did it leave a lasting impression? Was it made with the sweet chutney, Fresh savory Indian style teekhe aam ke chutney (spicy sour chutney), Green mango chutney? Or was it something very different??? I am so very curious to know any and all things about this dish. I have no clue what it is... I have never seen it on a menu.. and I have never ever even seen it served.

I read in the 'India Abroad', a few years ago, about National Curry Day being celebrated in the U.K. To mark the occasion an Indian restaurant prepared the world's largest vegetble curry. An Indian beer producer came up with a spiced up beer ( which was not very popular) they called it ' Madras in a glass'. Another company, not to be out done prepared a vindaloo using beer ( which sounds very interesting to me) and re-christned it Vindalager. Then on a recent visit to New Delhi ,I was confronted with huge banners and other advertising heralding ' National Samosa Week'. If you bought a pepsi from a participating eatery you would be treated to a free samosa. What is the forum's reaction to an International Curry Day ? The Day would be launched by the Indian PM in conjuction with an Indian celebrity Chef. It would be sponsered by Indian companies. There would be contests ranging from inovative origional reiepes with an Indian flavor to essay contests Why I Love Indian food. Prizes would range from complimentary airtickets to India, courtsy Air India to Gift certificates at local Indian restaurants. Suvir and Monica will conduct special gourmet tours to India, exploring regional cuisines. Indian restaurants worldwide will offer 'Buy one Get one Free' How was my dream??

I love good indian cuisine, and despite trying all of the top establishments in Paris (Indra, Annapurna,Chez Gandhi,etc) , have been disappointed every time. Anyone else? One I like, and which is consistently good (and is full pretty much every night) is called "Dip" , on the boulevard Saint Marcel in the 13eme (not far from Les Gobelins and the Jardin des Plantes). Nanda, the owner is actually Sri Lankan, and makes sure everything is fresh and delicious. Their website is Dip Indian Restaurant

We have invited some friends for dinner over the weekend, I asked them what they would like to try... answer "Lobster, Indian style". Okay now I am stumped.. any recipes? cooking insights? anything? Help!!!!!

Has there ever been a discussion of Indian juice bars on the board? I have a question relating to so-called 'special juices' which are sometimes on offer in such places. In Indian-run juice bars in the Emirates these often have great names, but there is often no clue as to what kind of fruit cocktail they consist of, and I am curious as to whether there exists a set of names that Indians across the world would recognise. I know that a 'Lexus' consists of mango and avocado juice with ice cream, but what about a 'Disco', a 'Titanic', a 'www', a 'Valentine Day' or a 'Computer'? I would guess that mixes such as 'Mumtaz' and 'Wastha' are specific to this part of the world, but perhaps I am wrong? I have a lot of affection for such juice bars as I think they provide drinks which are both tasty and nutritious.

Liz Johnson's current column in the Journal-News (Westchester) is devoted to Thali, and Indian restaurant in New Canaan, Ct. -- in a bank. http://www.thejournalnews.com/johnson/ Having been there twice recently, I'll add my vote and say that this place is Connecticut's answer to the best New York City has to offer: the only better Indian meal I've had in the United States was at Diwan, and there are some individual dishes at Diwan -- especially the tandoori duck in Cabernet reduction -- that are fully on par with the best Diwan has to offer (in fact this may be the best single Indian restaurant dish I've had).

I was making ghee and forgot all about it. My mother came out from their room smelling the lovely aroma of the browning solids... but it was too late. What can I do with the ghee I have now? It is amber colored.... does not taste bad... Ghee (clarified butter) is what the doctor has asked us to cook with. My dad is very happy.. the little he eats, we cook with ghee.

I have been asked by a company to come up with some yoghurt based dips that once sealed and refrigerated can have a 2 week shelf life. I immediately thought of raita. Does anyone have any interesting twists on raita that I could try out? thanks Helen

I tried my hand at a Basmati rice dish last night, using Julie Sahni's Classic Indian Cooking. The dish called for the rice to be prepared by 1/2 hour of steeping, then some frying (until translucent) and then about 20 minutes of cooking at various temperatures with the reserved water from steeping. The ratio of water to rice was 2:1. When finished, the rice had a watery taste to me, not the rice-y taste that I associate with Basmati. What did I do wrong?