Search the Community

Where can I go to get indian products and the like. I am curious as to what I would find at one of these stores. I am also showing my Indian buddy around town for a month and he inquired about this. Thanks for the help! Ben

The other night I tried out Mattar Paneer on the recommendation of an indian friend of mine. I loved it, I had forgotten how much I loved well cooked peas. Does anybody have a recipe for this? Is it difficult to make (little to no indian cooking experience)? Also, is it difficult to make paneer or are there places to buy it? Thanks a bunch Ben

Tandoori Prawns 12 Jumbo Shrimps 1/2 cup lemon juice 3 tablespoons ginger paste 3 tablespoons garlic paste salt to taste 3 tablespoons chickpea flour 1 teaspoon carom seeds 1 teaspoon white pepper powder 1 teaspoon garam masala 1/2 teaspoon turmeric 2 cups yogurt 3 tablespoons melted butter 1 teaspoon chaat masala 1 lemon 1. Preheat oven to 350?F. 2. Mix the ginger, garlic, lemon juice, salt, chickpea flour, carom seeds, white pepper powder, garam masala, turmeric and yogurt nicely. Add the yogurt a 1/4 cup at a time to ensure you have no lumps in the marinade. 3. Marinade the jumbo shrimp in this for at least 2 hours. 4. Grill in the tandoor, or in the oven for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and let cook for 15 minutes. Toss the half-cooked shrimp in melted butter. 5. Place back into the tandoor or oven and cook for another 5 minutes, or until done. 6. Arrange on a platter and sprinkle the shrimp with lemon juice and chaat masala.

Ghee is the purest form of fat made from butter. It is mentioned prominently in the ancient Hindu scriptures. These texts have been dates back to at least 5000BC. Ghee is clarified butter made from the milk of cows and buffaloes in India. Ghee made from cows milk is called Bariya ghee (great ghee) or even Usli Ghee (real ghee) In days past when refrigeration was not available, ghee was the way milk and butter were kept from spoiling. Some Indians, break the norm and prefer using buffalo milk for it keeps the ghee from turning less and the end product is also lighter in color and less smelly.

Lately i've been wondering about the use of food colouring in Indian food. Is there a traditional aesthetic use of it, or is it maybe to reproduce the colour that chilli powder or saffron would have given to a dish?

All this talk of Indian food made me dig out a cookbook my Mom gave me years ago. "Indian-Jewish Cooking." I've never cooked anything out of it, and the recipes seem fairly simple. But there's a good amount of new and interesting stuff in there. The author is Jewish-Iraqi, born in Calcutta. The book has a brief summary of three Jewish communities in India (Bombay, Calcutta and Cochin.) It's published by the author in England: Hyman Publishers 10 Holyoake Walk London N2 0JX

Mustard oil keeps showing up all over the India board. Is it a flavored oil, or, as I suspect, oil pressed from mustard seeds? Does it have a mustard flavor? I am intrigued. I like to spread fish with prepared Dijon mustard before broiling it. I remember seeing a post (by Simon?) about frying fish in mustard oil, but I haven't been able to locate it. Can someone fill me in, please? What other uses are there for mustard oil? As Waverly Root pointed out in The Food of France, much of the character of an area's cuisine is determined by the type of cooking oil used. I believe this is true in India, as well. You mentioned that mustard oil is used in the north, for example. Does "ghee" properly ever refer to anything but clarified butter? (I have seen labels, saying "vegetable ghee." What other oils are regularly used? Are certain oils preferred in certain regions? Are certain oils used for certain foods?

Kashmiri Cuisine Kashmir is in the north west of India. It is mantled in the venerated Himalayas. When Indians think of beauty, Kashmir is one of the first thoughts. The food in Kashmir is a mixture of Indian, Iranian & middle eastern styles. This fusion gave rise to the traditional "Wazawan" style of cooking which is cooked in a lot of spices. The aroma that arises from the food is highly sensuous and very woody and symbolizes the true essence of Kashmir. The population comprises mainly of Moslems or "Brahmins" or "Kashmiri pundits" who also eat meats but surprisingly do not include onions & garlic in their food. Yogurt is an essential ingredient, used extensively in Kashmiri food. Saffron from Kashmir is a scarce commodity but a prized spice. The descendants of cooks from Samarkhand, the Wazas, are the master chefs of Kashmir. Their ancestors came to India with Timur in the 15th century. The ultimate formal banquet in Kashmir is the royal Wazawan. Composed of thirty-six courses, easily fifteen and thirty can be preparations of meat, cooked overnight by the master chef, Vasta Waza, and his assistants. Communal eating is a tradition and upto 4 people share food from one plate called the Trami. Meal begin with a ritual washing of hands in basins called Tash-t-Nari. Then the Tramis arrive, heaped with rice,and laced with the many courses that follow. Condiments (Chutneys and Yogurt) are served separately in earthenware. New Tramis keep coming with new dishes as the meal progresses. To Kashmiri Pundits, eating is a sacred tradition. Some dishes are a must in most any dinner. Rogan Josh, Gushtaaba, Aab Gosht and Rista are a few of them. Most all meals end with Gushtaaba.

Tandoori Cooking The Tandoor has been known to the Indian region for many thousands of years. It is as old as its culture. A cylindrical clay oven that heats upto a very high temperature, it cooks unlike any other oven. The coal embers provide for a flavor that is at once very tasty and scrumtious. The meats and vegetables cooked in the tandoor are different from other grilled stuff in their recipes. Tandoori foods are very simple to prepare and very light. Attention is pais most to the marination and the cuts of meats. Even though the tandoor has been used in India for centuries, it was only afer the partition of India and it's getting freedom that one has seen a reintroduction of tandoori foods. Today foods cooked in the tandoor are the main dishes on most Indian restaurants. The famous Indian flat breads are prepared in this clay oven. The naans, stuffed and layered and plan parathas, kulchas and rotis are made in minutes in the tandoor. Tandoori chicken, that famous rose colored grilled chicken cooks into a flavorful, crunchy and moist textured meat in just some quick minutes. The secret to this dish as also to many other tandoori recipes is mostly in the marination. Grilled shrimp, succulent lamb chops, seekh kababs, malai kababs and slamon tikkas are some of the other famous dishes.

Like any art form, the foundation of Indian cooking is based on technique. There is a body of knowledge about the food itself - the vegetables, the spices, the herbs, the sauces - but this information is meaningless unless applied with sensitivity. I use the words sensitivity and knowledge in all of their nuances: knowing when a vegetable like the bitter melon, karela, is perfectly in season; understanding how to remove the bitterness; and, finally being aware of its healing properties. There's a perfect moment to eat karela, just as there's an appropriate time for an Indian raga to be played. There are monsoon ragas, morning ragas, and ragas that are played when the lover has gone. Music and food are always respected for their ability to cleanse the soul, and heal. Indian cooking has always found a willing companion in art and music. They always seem to go together. Any musical gathering first begins with prayers to the gods and offering of food to them. Just as emotions are a part of music so are they a part of cooking. Thus in India one finds that to evolve ones palate one also studies the appreciation of music and art. In the Indian kitchen one entertains spices or masalas. The seeds, stalks and powders are all found. There are masalas that can set ones palate to receive taste sensations in the most profound ways. There are those that can alter feelings. Grains are an integral part of cooking throughout India. A vegetarian cuisine that would otherwise be nutritionally weak is complete by the mixing of lentils, beans, rice and vegetables. Rice has been know in India for over 5 thousand years... Maize, barley, semolina, millet, countless of lentils and beans and many peas form a crucial part of the Indian pantry.

I remember a show from the early 90s called "Cooking with Korma." Korma was a Western Hari Krishna and he cooked vegetarian Indian food. He had one show on "chonks." From what I recall, he put dry spices and ghee in a metal ladel and heated it directly over a fire until the ghee flamed. Then he added this to daals or other curries. I've never seen it before or since. However, I often notice a subtle flavor in some daals, usually chaana daal or yellow lentil, that tastes almost smokey. I wonder if that's where it comes from?

Do you make any Indian dishes in which you use curry powder? If not Indian, what other dishes have you used it in? What brand do you like? Do you toast your curry powder? Do you every make it at home? Is there a recipe for it that you like?

An Indian buddy of mine from Kansas City will be in town for the next month and he has been starved of good Indian Cooking for the last few years. Which places do you view to be the most authentic Indian food in Seattle/Eastside? I understand that Raga is good, and have been to Ceaders numerous times. Thoughts? Thanks, Ben p.s. he is hindu and is thusly vegetarian so good meatless dishes are a plus.

In the early 1980s Varadarajan, a Minister at the Indian High Commission in London, organized a remarkable series of intimate recitals by some of India’s greatest classical musicians. These were held at the October Gallery, where my sound studio occupied the basement, and so I was asked to amplify, balance and record the concerts. I had listened casually and with pleasure to Indian classical music, but knew nothing of its intricacies. There were no scores; no books could tell me what I had to hear. And so I placed microphones where I was told and made adjustments as instructed by the musicians who left the ensemble one by one and listened to the balance among the others. Gradually over several concerts I began to feel the music as an entity. I was able to anticipate and adjust as one musician, then another emerged from the texture for an extended improvisation (which a jazz musician would call a riff) and then submerged again into the totality. A smattering of applause would often see him out, and I began to appreciate just what had given the audience pleasure. My proudest moment came when the great Ravi Shankar ended a pre-concert sound check after a couple of minutes with the comment, “It is good. Don’t change anything.” This is very much the way that children growing up in a community learn to understand the strange noises that float about their ears, gradually realizing that many of these sounds convey information. There is no instruction, only repetition, in which certain sounds accompany particular objects, events or emotions. These sounds become “words” and begin to relate to each other; gradually a “generative grammar” gives them a collective meaning. Children who grow up in a kitchen are apt to learn about food in much the same way. Step by step they may observe what takes place as what comes out of the basket turns into what goes into their mouths – in other words, they learn cause and effect. What they learn and the way they learn it will be conditioned by the cuisine that surrounds them, including the dishes, the tools, the pots and pans, the ingredients. These in turn will influence how the food is handled: whether it is chopped, cut or torn apart, whether ingredients are mixed by hand, by spoon, by fork or by machinery. What are the stages? Is there intermediary cooking or does everything go straight into the pot at once? Is there an effort to save time or are processes allowed to set their own inherent schedules? For occidental and oriental cuisines there are very different answers to all these questions. For instance, to watch an Indian cook pulverize and sear the seeds and spices before adding the other ingredients one by one to the pan is to enter another culinary world. Even the manner of eating may be foreign to us. As M.F.K. Fisher observes in her introduction to Shizuo Tsuji’s Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art: “Our physical habits are different [from the Japanese], so that we chew and swallow and sip and raise food to our mouths differently, with different tools.” In the West, our post-Beeton recipe-oriented approach to cookery assumes that any dish, no matter how foreign to our experience, can be created by measuring out the specified ingredients and following a sequence of instructions. But as John Thorne reminds us in his Simple Cooking, “[C]reativity is a one-way street: very few cooks are willing or even able to afterward evoke the ferment, the confusion, the groping before the moment that shaped the dish. What we get instead is a rationale that works backward from the finished dish, a rationale that makes everything seem as if it had all been clear and obvious from the start.” If this is the case with dishes from our own gastronomic tradition, how much more are we deceived when a brief recipe pretends to include the relevant input of an entire foreign culture? In an era which attaches a monetary value to every aspect of our existence, the creative impulse behind the food we eat must be established as someone’s intellectual property and quantified in relation to the competition. Thus the celebrity chef at the top of his profession must approach every new cuisine, not as part of a culture to be respected, but as a treasure to be confiscated. Sophisticated diners will come to his restaurant equipped with score cards on which they will rate his success in displaying his trophies so as to massage, seduce, astound or ravish their eager palates. So how, finally, can we properly understand a foreign cuisine? Few of us have the opportunity of absorbing it directly from its masters, even those living in our own country. Even fewer may learn it as Fuchsia Dunlop absorbed Sichuan cuisine, by learning Chinese and going to live in the province for a couple of years. Our most probable source will be books written by those who know – or pretend to know – the cuisines we want to discover. But as Thorne wryly observes, most cookery book writers cite few sources, speaking as though they had invented their subject from scratch. And so one is forced to consult a selection of the most plausible authorities and observe carefully the various ways in which they argue among themselves. Trying them out in the kitchen, one learns gradually what methods and materials are best suited to one’s own tastes and resources. In coming to terms with the foreign and the unfamiliar, we must above all approach it with humility. We can’t instantly transplant ourselves into an alien culture but neither should we attempt to force it into the straightjacket of our own culinary tradition. As Diana Kennedy constantly reminds us, we should never try to adapt one cuisine to another, but instead adjust the two of them to each other. This, after all, is what is happening throughout the world as the traditional barriers of time and place are broken down by migration and communication. Just remember – the ever-expanding and interlocking panorama of global cuisines is not solely the prerogative of the rich. The lowly Spam is now a native of Hawaii. ©2002 John Whiting

How do you use this flour? Do you have favorite recipes that use it? Where do you buy your flour? Do you have a favorite brand for besan??

mango kulfi rolled in toasted pistachios What about you,any favorites? (with recipes ofcourse)

In America, we think of pickles as a kind of a relish, or side dish – a cured vegetable that adds a sour or tart note to the meal. We pickle a variety of different vegetables but, for whatever the differences, pickles all have a recognizably “pickled” taste. Indian pickles use many of the same ingredients – salt, vinegar, coriander, mustard seeds, turmeric, cinnamon, cloves and ginger – but they present some of the most diverse and exotic tastes and textures imaginable. They are fiery hot, sour, pungent, fragrant, sweet- and- sour, and tart. They are crisp, silky and chewy. Flavors may be fresh, the taste of each spice distinct, or married and intensified by months or even years of aging as the textures of the ingredients melt and soften. While Indians eat some pickles (such as the Mixed Vegetable Pickle, below) in relatively large quantities, the pickles are often too intensely flavored to be eaten that way; they’re used in tiny amounts as a spice or condiment to enliven a dish. Indians also use pickles in a way that Americans never do, that is, medicinally, to cure an ailment. Indians love to taste food; they live to taste food. Indians want many layers and many contrasting tastes. No one food can satisfy that hunger except a variety of pickles. I have jars and jars of multi-colored pickles sitting on the kitchen table. One is a tiny onion pickle, picked young and fresh and pickled in rice vinegar, that is common to almost all north Indian homes. Several are pickled chilies: one is made of whole green chilies and is dangerously hot while another, made from habaneros stuffed with spices, is more savory than hot, and a third is made from chopped green chilies soured with lemon. There is a crunchy sweet- and- hot cauliflower, turnip and carrot pickle, a ginger-lime pickle and a gooseberry pickle. These pickles are made from recipes that have been handed down by the women of my family for two to three hundred years. Some of these jars have been maturing for just a few days, others for much longer than that. A jar of lemon pickles made by his family chef at home in India, a jar that has been maturing for 60 years. In India, food is understood to be intimately related to health and medicine. The Ayurveda, the ancient Hindu text that defines the relationship of food, spices, exercise and meditation for the health of the human body, gives recipes for various medicinal foods and elixirs, of which pickles play an important role. I use lemon pickle as it is traditionally used in my native country: to cure queasiness and tummy aches. In my New York household I use pickles the way that wealthier households do in India, as a condiment guaranteed to give plain foods taste. In fact, in India it’s considered rude to ask for pickles if they are not on the table; it suggests that the food isn’t savory enough. Indian homes make several signature pickles, recipes that have been passed down through generations of women. Pickles made the season before are served daily. Aged, well-loved pickles are brought out when someone is sick or when the household is hosting a special meal. With the exception of some pickles that are made with winter produce such as cauliflower, radishes, turnips and carrots, pickles are made in Indian homes in the heat of the summer. Fruits and vegetables are bought from local vendors who sell door to door. Women spend several weeks preparing pickles. The fruits are laid out on terraces on sheets of muslin for several days in the summer sun to dry, or “ripen” and concentrate their flavors. The produce is brought inside every night to protect against dew and laid out again in the morning. The pickles are put up in very large ceramic jars, each about 20 inches tall and 8 inches wide. Once jarred, the pickles are ripened again for several more days in the sun. If you ask an Indian where the best pickles are made, they will name three centers: the Marwari and Baniya trading communities in northern India, the state of Gujerat in western India, and the state of Andhra Bradesh, in southern India. The Marwari and Baniya communities are completely vegetarian and they subsist on pickles and bread. The people of these communities make pickles everyday and their meals include several different types. Pickles that are spiced with fenugreek and fennel and pickled in mustard oil, are likely to be from northern India, as are pickled cauliflower, carrots, turnips and radishes, the so called “winter vegetables” that are grown on the northern plains. Pickles represent a ritual world of food and community in India. Pickling is an ancient art and a part of Hindu spiritual practice: according to the laws of Hindu religion, pickling, or “cooking” foods with sun and air is one of the three acceptable ways to make raw foods palatable. The rituals of pickle making define a certain period of the summer in India when entire households are given over to the task of their making. Traditionally, in small towns, the women join together, spending days outside in the shade of tamarind trees cutting, preparing, and drying the fruits and vegetables. The kids play above in the dense greenery of the trees, eating the green fruit of the tamarind and tossing the seeds onto the ground below. (Stomach aches and tiny tamarind seedlings are evidence of their gluttony.) Play, food, music and storytelling combine to give the season a celebratory mood. Even in urban centers in India today, the time of pickling still invites ritual community and celebration. Women call each other on the phone to organize the making of the pickles or to ask for the gift of a jar of a favorite kind. Life slows a bit, personal connections are made, and thousands of years of ritual is repeated. --Suvir Saran and Stephanie Lyness

Hi Everybody I've been lurking for a few days. Great board. So many interesting things to learn and of course I love Indian food so I think I'll fit right in Unfortunately we don't have any Indian restaurants around here and I miss all those Indian goodies so much. I'm craving for some Indian Chicken Cutlets. Sorry I'm not sure of the name. Can someone help? Thanks Betty

Suvir, How do you feel Achaya has been able to codify and map out the evolution of Indian cuisine? I thank you very much for any feedback

Rice Chaawal, Bhaat, or Anna, rice is what makes for the most important element of Indian cooking. It is believed in India that our lives depend on rice. Rice is symbolic of life itself. When sick, most patients are fed foods that are rice based. This takes us to the nurturing qualities of life. Rice plays a very important role in the daily lives of all Indians. A childs first non dairy meal is the eating of rice. Called anna-jal or anna praashan sanskar, the paternal grandparents feed the baby with simple boiled rice. The rice given to the baby is the same as that which is offered to the gods after a ritual prayer and offering ceremony. The ceremony is grand and special, after offering the gods, the child gets its first bite. Thereafter all the elders, family and friends sit down for a multi-course meal. During the Hindu wedding ceremony, the brothers of the bride fill her sari with grains of rice. This is symbolic of showering her with blessings of a long life, and of procreation. Rice is a symbol of life that is eternal and everlasting. By putting rice in her sari, which is made into a bag resembling her womb, the brothers are blessing her with fertility and also take a vow to protect her for life. Basmati rice is only one of many different kinds of rice found in India. Basmati rice actually grows only in a very small area. Long grain, small, fat, thin, curved and brown are many different types of rice found in India. Puffed rice and beaten rice (poha) are other forms of rice. The tastes of each of these grain varies. They can be aromatic, sweet, nutty or starchy. Known in India well before written history, rice is a part of Indian life unlike any other grain. Rice became a integral part of the Aryan society. It is offered to the gods. Used for healing and to bless. Payasa, known as Kheer in northern India, Payassam in Southern India, is basic rice pudding. Many believe that Rice Pudding as we see today in restaurants around the world owes it origin to this dish. Cooked for hours in milk and then sweetened with sugar and flavored with cardamom, this pudding is offered to the gods and is the essential dessert of any Indian feast. From Kashmir to Kanyakumari in the southern tip of India, from Bombay to Calcutta in the east, every formal banquet has at least a few preparations of rice. One often sees just plain steamed rice an aromatic pilaf of some kind and often a biryaani. The steamed rice is prepared for all to enjoy the subtle flavoring of the savory dishes. Pilafs and Biryaanis are eaten by themselves as they are able to give the palate a very rich culinary experience in each bite. Then there are teharis and khicharis that are made in most homes. These are simpler pilafs that are made either with rice and vegetables alone or often some lentils are mixed as well. When one needs a break from having eaten very complex and rich meals during festivities and special events, one sees the Khichari take a very plain form. Then there are those versions of Khichari that are very lavish and complex. One heals an overworked palate while the other excites a dull palate. Puffed rice and beaten rice are other ways of eating rice in India. Puffed rice is used in the making of tea time snacks like munmure in eastern India and jhaal mooree in Bengal. Both are spicy and tickle the taste buds and open them for more spicy foods to follow. Munmura was eaten at our home around dusk. It was just a spiced rice puff trail mix. The rice puffs were mixed with crunchy chickpeas and some gram flour noodles and spices. Very crunch and light, this was a snack we could feast on as we drank our long glass of milk. Jhaal Mooree was the wet and crunchy Calcutta version. It was street food that I feel moves the soul into a much deeper consciousness. Poha on the other hand is the word for the beaten rice. Popular all over India, this is an Indian Paella. The beaten rice is very easy to cook with. All it needs is some water to rehydrate and no cooking. Simple and fast, recipes that call for this are a favorite with all ages. This is another tea time favorite and also a common dish found in tiffins of school children. In the winter I remember coming back from school, eating lunch and then heading to the veranda, where I would sit in comfortable cane chairs and munch on Moa. This is a cake made with puffed rice, honey, jaggery and some spices. Crunch and sweet, this is very similar to the puffed rice cakes that are now showing up in many neighborhood bakeries in America. We could never have enough of these. I remember my mother always telling us that too much sugar was bad for our delicate teeth. Not even the fear of a dentist visit would stop us from overeating these tasty Moas. As one visits homes in India, one sees many different ways of rice preparation. A great way of telling a home where the cooks have steady hands is their rendering of plain steamed rice. Simple to cook, often most people have a hard time preparing this plain recipe. In most homes one sees a designated pot for cooking rice. Most often this is a wide and shallow pot as the shallower the depth of water and rice the better the results. A tall pot would result in little steam and then the grains of rice could remain too hard. Thus all a perfect pot is needed for daily cooking of rice. Indians love to eat steamed rice just perfectly cooked. Perfectly cooked rice must have distinctly separate, plump and cooked yet gently firm grains. The rice must be served steaming hot and imparting its subtle yet priceless aroma. Ghee must always accompany rice. Most Indians sprinkle some ghee over steaming rice and only then pour the curries that will complete the meal.

Pasanda (Would traditionally mean Fillet) (courtesy of Suvir) I have most often seen pasandas made with lamb. There is one version where the sauce has yogurt and or cream in it. The other is made with just an onion and tomato sauce. I have found the yogurt based one more authentic and also tastier. Pasandas are a classic Moghul preparation. The lamb is braised in a yogurt based sauce spiced with whole garam masala. Some recipes use almonds while others do not. Gosht Pasanda 1.5 lbs. boneless lean lamb, cut into 1/4 thick pieces that are 2 1/4 x 1 inches Spice Rub: 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon garam masala 1/4 teaspoon ginger powder 1/4 teaspoon black pepper powder 1/4 teaspoon cardamom powder juice of half a lemon 4 tablespoons oil 1 medium onion, finely chopped 1 tablespoon poppy seeds 2 tablespoons almond, blanched and slivered 6 small cloves of garlic 1.5 inches fresh ginger root 2 tablespoons warm water 2 black cardamom seeds 1 inch cinnamon stick 2 bay leaves 6 cloves 1 cup yogurt, whisked 1/4 cup water 1/4 cup cream 1/4 teaspoon cayenne 1 teaspoon garam masala 1/2 teaspoon cardamom powder 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper powder 1. Preheat the oven to 275¢ªF. Rub the lamb pieces in the spices for the spice rub and the juice of the lemon. Set aside for an hour to marinade at room temperature. 2. Heat 3 tablespoons oil in a heavy bottom pan. Take half the chopped onions and fry them in the oil for 15 minutes until light brown. Use a few drops of water every time the onions are sticking to the base of pan. Remove from pan and set aside. 3. Add the fried onions, the remainder of the raw onions, ginger, garlic, almonds and poppy seeds into a blender with 2 tablespoons of water and blend into a smooth paste. 4. Add the remaining tablespoon of oil into the pan and to the oil add the cardamom, cinnamon, bay leaves, and cloves. Fry for a minute over med hight heat. Add the blended paste and cook for 5 minutes. Add a few drops of water if the contents stick to the pan. 5. Add yogurt to the pan a tablespoon at a time. This keeps it from curdling. Once you have added all the yogurt, continue cooking for another 5 minutes. Some of the moisture from the yogurt will get reduced. 6. Add the lamb pieces and cook for another 5 minutes. The lamb will have some color to it and some of the fat will start to separate. 7. Transfer contents into a casserole. Add the cream and water around the sides of the dish. Sprinkle the cayenne, cardamom and the garam masala over the contents of the pan. Cover tightly and cook in the oven for 10 minutes. 8. Garnish with juliennes of ginger and serve hot with naan, parathas or even pita bread.

any ideas on how to make it? fresh coconut? what is it ususally served along with? what purpose to chutney's serve? calm down spicy foods? mike

Papadam ( Papad) are round lentil-bean wafers. These are made with the flour of lentils or beans and have spices in them. These are a great "finger food" as they were called in the British style clubs. As one lounged around these clubs in the evenings, sipping Gin and Tonic, papad would be the munchie of choice. What we see in restaurants today, the service of papad with condiments, is not truly Indian. I am not certain where it began, but certainly not in India. Papads are available in most Indian stores. You get them dry in packages. Either plain or spiced. Some are large discs, other very small. Some of the very small ones are meant to be deep fried. In the North of India, we most often roast them on the stove top, or in restaurants over a grill placed atop a tandoor. They are eaten with Indian meals to add a texture and new flavor to the complex meal. The crunchiness and savory taste provided by Papad to even the most humble meals is a winning addition. Papad were traditionally made at home. It is easy but a very laborious method I am told. And also requires large hours of sunshine. The doughs made with the various choices of flours are very soft when being rolled but become brittle and dry as they are left out in the sun over muslin sheets to dry before being packaged. If you are deep frying papad, make sure you have at least 3-4 inches of oil in the deep fryer. The entire process of cooking a papad in this method takes no more than a few seconds. You must heat the oil to 375?F and then fry the papad. Remove using a slotted spoon and drain on paper towels. To dry roast papad, use flat tongs and hold the papad with them over the flame. Turn the papad quickly and frequently to cook them evenly. Always rememebring that there should be few if any black spots. Thus the frequent turning. As soon as the papad changes color and begins to curl at the edges, it is done. Make sure t hat the center of the papad is also cooked and has changed color. I have had reasonable success with cooking Papad in the microwave. The time it takes depends on your oven. It can take anywhere from 30 seconds to a minute. But it requires a lot of careful watching and errors before you figure out the best timing and way to do it.

Fenugreek (Trigonella foenum-graecum) Fenugreek is one of the most respected spices and herbs found in India. The seeds are used as a spice. The leaves as herb and more often as a green. Indian mothers are given fudge like desserts (laddoos) with fenugreek seeds in them. It is believed that they are great for a lactating mother. And also provide healthful benefits for the child. Mothers are traditionally fed these "laddoos" for 40 days. It is an annual that grows in the milder climate Indian regions. The leaves are beautifully oval shaped. They have a prominently pronounced vein in the back. The plant has small pods that contain tiny seeds. I have often found it at Balduccis. It is an easy plant to grow. The seeds are small but pungent in a bitter and lingering way. The flavor lasts and will exude the potency of its inert oil long after the initial bite. The seeds are beige-ochre in color and have a tiny groove running across them. They are most often used in Southern Indian cooking, but have been adapted across the Indian landscape for their healthful properties. In my pantry I always keep whole seeds. For some recipes I use powdered or coarsely crushed seeds. But I do that to recipe, using my Oster spice grinder. This ensures great flavor all the time. If you cannot find fresh fenugreek leaves, you can always buy "Kasoori Methi" (even Qasoori or Kasuri) at the Indian grocery stores. These are dried fenugreek leaves. In India it is believed that Fenugreek aids in digestion and relieves flatulence. Hence it is given to lactating mothers. The anti-flatulence properties help the baby that will have flatulence easily. It works wonders. My sister's son who is now 2 years old, was lucky to have been a guinea pig with this experiment. He reacted positively and it helped my sister a lot since he cried less. The other Indian belief is that fenugreek contains a chemical that promotes lactation and helps a lactating mother express with ease. In fact Indian farmers even feed the seeds to cows for increasing the production of milk. In India fenugreek was also used as a contraceptive. But I have only heard of this procedure. Never known of anyone having used it in these times. Fenugreek seeds are an essential Pickling spice in the world of Indian cooking and pickle making. The leaves are used in several curries and vegetable stir fries.

Hi, I am looking to host a BBQ. For meat-lovers it doesnt seem all that complicated. Kebabs and Tandoori-style chicken seems to win the day. However alot of my friends also are vegetarians. This always seems to cause a big problem for me. They end up eating oven cooked Jacket potatoes ( which dont even originate from the BBQ). Paneer Masala. Again which isnt even cooked on the BBQ. The only dish I can envisage cooking is veggie kebabs ( paneer and other vegetables on skewers). There must be some other choices we ( I ) can offer these poor people. Dishes that are spicy and cookable on the BBQ Please could somebody help by giving me suggestions. I am stuck! Thanks so much Hasmi