Indian Cookbook

[Peter B Wolf]

A very good friend of ours from India visited us last year for a week. She insisted to cook every day. Very happy to get authentic Indian food, especially since she even brought all necssary spices with her. We had a feast.

As she left she gave me an Indian Cookbook (in English) to keep: "Mrs. Balbir Singh's Indian Cookery". What are your comments about this book?

[Suvir Saran]

Peter,

What can I say... My mother took classes from Mrs. Balbir Singh.  And actually, most women from her time who grew up in a certain section of Delhi society were lucky enough to have done the same.  

Mrs. Balbir Singh has infulenced my own life.  My mother has her diaries from the cooking classes still that she refers to for occasional reference.  

I have a cookbook of hers as well.  I find it tedious to understand even though this is what I do for a vocation.  For some reason, her brilliant work in the kitchen never made it to well written text.  I have not seen her books in Book Shops in NYC.  So, maybe there is a book that is easier to grasp.  

If you are able to cook from her recipes.  Please rest assured that you are getting a good variety of Indian cooking and also some dishes t hat were left over from the Raj.

You are indeed lucky that your houseguest introduced y ou to Mrs. Balbir Singh.  She is a legend.

[Suvir Saran]

Peter is this the cook book in paperback?  Size of a novel and with deep red as one of the two colors on the cover page?  I seem to have given out my copy.. or else I woud have described it accurately.

If it is the paperback, I have never used her recipes, but certainly have scanned through them.  An interesting and very well rounded assortment.

If you can understand how to find recipes and use them, you will find her book a delight.

[Simon Majumdar]

Mrs Balbir is the equivalent of Mrs Beeton in England or even Julia Childs in the US.

The book is the centre point of all ( or much ) Indian home cooking and while people develop their own recipes, they will often, if reaching a sticking point, say " I will consult the great Mrs Balbir"

I don'y have a copy and I am ashamed to say it is out of print in the UK ( I think )

S

[yvonne johnson]

I have a few questions for the group. Here's the background: After reading this discussion I ordered what I thought were two different used (but in new condition) copies of Mrs Balbir Singh's books from amazon.com. Around three weeks ago, the first arrived, "Indian Cookery", hardback (brown, white and orange cover) and in good condition.

From it, I have made  Shahi Korma (Mutton Curry) which has almonds, yoghurt, saffron, red pepper, garam masala and other ingedients. Bear in mind, I cannot get mutton in NY, and the butcher gave me "butterfly leg" cut in small peices. My main finding, and my spouse agreed, was the dish was not  very flavorful. The nuttiness was evident, but I found it a little bland, but not in a subtle nice way.

I also made Pork (as it should be, I believe) Vindaloo. This was more successful. Generous quantities of garlic, onions, green chili but I coudln't find the brown cardamoms--must go and find them.

Q1: Does the above seem strange? For example, are green chilies hotter in India than in US?

Q2: Is it possible that Ms Singh, by writing for Westerners, altered the dishes in some ways?  The meat dishes in Madhur Jaffrey's, Invitation to Indian Cooking which we've used for many years are much more satisfying as is the Vindaloo in Charmaine Solomon's Asian Food.

Something I do like about the book is the listing of all the ingredients and the Hindustani equivalents.

Now to finish the story, the second book I ordered was I thought titled "Mrs Balbir's Indian Cookery" and by Balbir Singh (and different from "Indian Cookery"). Turns out this is the paperback version (red picture and white print on cover) of the first. It arrived in an envelope that looked like it had been round the world twice, hardly looks new on the outside, but it's quite presentable inside. If anyone would like it it's yours.

[Sandra Levine]

I would like it -- and, I have some brown cardamom to give you in exchange.

[yvonne johnson]

Agreed! What can be better than bartering? Sandra, let's exchange our addresses on the messenger. This must be faster than eBay (not that I've tried it).

[Suvir Saran]

The chilies used in India are much hotter t han the jalapenos we see most often used in  the US.  Actually we often use what some call Thai hot peppers.  They are very small and have great heat.  But we use many different varities of chilies.  Some have more heat than others.  SOme are used for flavor more than heat and others for color.

As for the recipe being Bland... I do not know what to say.  But many of the nut based sauces can often be more subtle than what most people associate with Indian cooking.  IN fact, many Indian restaurants incorrectly have made these very subtle and almost bland sauces fiery for lack of knowing better.  

Madhur has lived overseas for most of her life, I am sure her recipes will work much better in the American kitchen.  I will let her know.  She is a passionate and wonderful cook.

[yvonne johnson]

I’ve used Jaffrey’s books, one mentioned above as well as her “Eastern Vegetarian Cookbook”, both in London and New York, and have had wonderful results with both. We’ve tried a few recipes from Julie Sahni’s “Classic Indian Cooking”, but I keep returning to Jaffrey.

I believe that Jaffrey was involved in the creation of the menu at Dawat (which I haven’t been to in the last five years, as on the last couple of visits I felt the restaurant had lost its spark, but around 10 years ago I enjoyed several excellent meals there). I was wondering whether Jaffrey offered cooking classes and had any links to other restaurants in New York.

[Suvir Saran]

Yes Madhur was the sould behind the food at Daawat.  I am not sure what the relationship is anymore.  The food is not what I think Madhur would call hers.  But I could well be wrong.  To me Madhur is the force that made it possible to so many others from India to find a home in the Indian food business.

As far as cooking classes, as far as I know, Julie Sahni and I are the two I know of in NYC.  She gives them in Brooklyn and I teach from home in the village, at NYU and also travel to homes and teach.

Will write more later.  Just got back from my travels.  Am tired and jet lagged.

[jhlurie]

The chilies used in India are much hotter t han the jalapenos we see most often used in  the US.  Actually we often use what some call Thai hot peppers.  They are very small and have great heat.  But we use many different varities of chilies.  Some have more heat than others.  Some are used for flavor more than heat and others for color.

Mark Stevens could probably wrote a novel-sized reply on this, but I'll keep it short.  

Thai hot peppers are indeed on a far different heat scale than what we call "hot" around here.  More subtle than Habeneros, if you've had those, but far above the anchos, jalapenos, cayenne\tabascos and similar breeds we are used to.

Of course, "Thai pepper" is just a broad category.  There are thousands of varieties.

[Suvir Saran]

Thanks for your illuminating answer.  And yes you are correct there are many varieties of Thai peppers.  In India and Singapore I had several that beat Habaneros in heat by a long sum.  So maybe we do not see those varieties here.  In fact I was eating this Pommelo salad the other night and a very tiny piece not much bigger than a grain of sand bit my tongue more ferociously than any pepper has in a very long time.  I had forgotten lately how potent peppers could be.  But in everyday cooking in some of these Asian countries one is reminded daily of these wonderful and potent ingredient.  

And yes the Habaneros in the US are far hotter than the small Thai peppers one finds in Asian stores.

I make pickles with no less than 25 odd pounds of habaneros each summer.  The sales person at the Union Square Green Market was tickled the first year, but now knows when I am coming his way that I want all he has that Saturday in the Habanero selection.  I stuff them with a mélange of toasted and ground spices in a mix of mustard and canola oils.  They are then given in the fall as gifts to friends and family.  In fact my mother has taken these pickles back to India.  

While chilies came from America maybe you know already or would be surprised to know that India is the largest grower and exporter of chilies in the world in terms of production and exports.  Curious but true.  

In fact chilies have become a staple of Indian cooking for the last hundred odd years.  They now have Indian names and there are many varieties found in markets there that I have never seen here.  There are hybrids I am told t hat are native to India now and only found there.  How the world grows and changes.

Similarly even though Tomatoes come from the Americas I tasted the most flavorful and delicious tomatoes ever in Singapore from Laos.  They were called Laos tomatoes and were little bigger than the cherry tomatoes we find here but much smaller than the plum tomatoes.  They have the shape of Plum tomatoes.  The color was a deep red with purple hues.  They were mixed into the ever so wonderful Papaya salad I ate at Indochine restaurant.

Every so often the Indian stores on Lexington Avenue carry these chilies that are skinnier than Habaneros, much hotter than Jalapenos and unlike any I have seen described in books.  The owner of the store I checked with for information simply called it "Hot Indian pepper".  It was not much help, but certainly added to t he mystery of hot peppers.  It would be great to have Mark Stevens or someone else with knowledge of hot peppers to share some insight into this world of heat-laden gifts.  

And thanks to you for ensuring that I did not over play the potency of the tiny Thai peppers.  I was not in any way trying to undermine the much greater heat of many other peppers.