A series of homely feasts

I have hardly been food-blogging but that doesn't mean I haven't been eating. In fact, for the past three or four days, I have been relishing the most amazing food - all home-cooked, healthy and simple, but so soul-satisfying. I have literally been pigging out on the fruit of my own labour, which is rare. Usually when I cook something, I can't really tell how it tastes and have to depend on the palates of others! All I can do is to taste during the cooking process and ensure the flavours are as I like 'em.

So it started with an experimental saaru on the weekend. I have always loved the flavour of garlic. And years ago, one of my aunts served us the most delicious tomato-infused saaru that I have ever tasted. Going through the cookbook dakshin, I came across a recipe for tomato saaru and since we had bought a large quantity of lovely, ripe red tomatoes, I thought the time was right. Of course, I didn't follow the recipe at all!

I diced 4 tomatoes and sliced two green chillies lengthwise. Then I decided to add garlic to the mix - 8-9 cloves of skinny Indian garlic. I sauteed the tomatoes, the garlic and green chillies in a tsp of home made ghee. I added this to the regular mix of tamarind extract and dal ( whizzed in a blender along with 1 cooked tomato) and saarina pudi( rasam powder), skipped the Mysore touch of jaggery and topped it all with a tempering of mustard seeds and curry leaves in ghee. Divine!

One day we had Zuni stew made with pumpkin of just the right stage of ripeness and sweetness. So simple and so deeply satisfying.

A couple of days ago, I had a great craving for Moollangi huli ( Radish/ Daikon/ Mooli Sambar), a traditional favourite during winters. We had bought the first moolis of the winter a few days ago so they had been calling to me! Mom suggested adding methi( fenugreek) leaves to the sambar to add even more flavour. green-leafies junkie, I was only too pleased, thugh having no methi on hand I made do with kasoori methi( dried methi). That adds the bitter flavour but is much less flavourful than fresh methi, so I guess this dish will have to be made all over again as soon as methi hits the market. The sambar turned out every bit as delicious as my fantasies, so I ended up gorging on it. ( Made the same way as any sambar - cut the mooli into 1/2 cm slices, boil in water until just tender, add cooked arhar dal, tamarind extract and sambar powder and top wth a tempering of mustard seeds and curry leaves).

We had also brought home a copious harvest of brinjals (eggplant/ aubergine) of various kinds - the long, slim purple ones, the small purple ones, the big purple ones and so on. I read a delicious sounding recipe for Rasavangi ( eggplants in gravy) in Dakshin and decided to give my favourite veggie a new twirl. Fab, fab, fab. Reminiscent of Gojju - the tamarind-jaggery-spice mix which we have with khichdi, yet with much more body ( green chillies, fresh coconut + coriander seeds, ground together; + a bit of arhar dal). Yum, yum, yum!

Yesterday, for Bojjandi's 2nd birthday lunch, I decided to make pooris with vegetable korma. My grandma has a recipe for korma eschewing onions and using cashews, but since we love onions, I decide to go for the hotel version. Easy to make, and wonderful!

Ingredients:
1 cup diced carrots
1 cup beans, cut into inch long pieces
2 potatoes
Half cup green peas
2 tomaoes, diced
1/2 fresh grated coconut
2-3 green chillies( depending on degree of hotness)
Handful of coriander
1 inch fresh ginger
1 small onion
1 tbsp poppy seeds
2 inch piece of cinnamon
6 cloves
1 tbsp fennel seeds
1 tsp oil
2-3 bay leaves

Cook the rest of the vegetables in salted water until cooked through but still firm. Add the tomatoes and simmer for 1-2 minutes. Meanwhile, grind together the coconut, chillies, ginger, coriander and onion with a little water to make a smooth paste. Dry roast the poppy seeds, cinnamon, cloves and fennel seeds and blitz together into a fine powder. Add the paste and the powder to the cooked vegetables and let simmer for a few minutes. Heat the oil in a small wok. Add the bay leaves and saute for half a minute. add to the vegetables.

The Korma tastes fabulous with pooris, dosais, idlis and especially set dosais.

Chatpata Salad

Recently a health-conscious colleague started bringing this in as a snack when we were working seriously late on some deadlines, and I loved it. It's healthy but doesn't taste like it, and keeps you coming back for more! What could be better?

Ingredients:
Handful Sprouts - mung beans, garbanzo beans ( kala chana/ chholey)
1 onion, diced
1 tomato, diced
Juice of 1/2 - 1 lime
Coriander leaves, chopped fine
1 tsp chaat masala ( available at Indian stores, for US readers)
Rock salt to taste
Fresh-ground black pepper
Just mix everything together, adjusting the seasoning and serve. If you want to serve it chilled, which makes it taste even better, skip the salt and lime juice until just before serving. You can also add a handful of soaked raw peanuts for extra sweet crunchiness!

Indian food

This is a rambling post because I'm trying to knit several different ideas together, and it seems to have turned into a patchwork quilt rather than a woven spread. I was just reading a food blog I stumbled upon ( anything but work, right?) - A mad tea Party - and came across a post about the western standards and knowledge on food and how we should not apply it blindly to ourselves. One of the conclusions I have come to in recent times is that plain old home cooked Indian food can beat any other cuisine hands down in terms of both taste and health.

Our diet has a large quantity of vegetables - green and colourful, raw and cooked - at every meal. The dals are cooked with a minimal quantity of oil. We use whole wheat and therefore higher fiber flour for our bread than the maida that westerners use. All the spices that go into our food are recently being investigated by the West as health-enhancers, be it turmeric or cloves. Our recipes, particularly the traditional ones, have an innate balance between the ingredients for taste and health - rare is the potato bhaaji or chana daal dish that does not have ginger, for instance. Cultured yoghurt is a staple of every meal too.

I found out recently that different vegetables will taste different to people because of their genetic make-up. It would be only natural to assume that food also acts differently on people because of their DNA, so while I think basic common sense should apply to food choices ( i.e. if you eat fried food all the time you're gonna fall sick/ become obese, whether it's indian fried food or not!), we are broadly ok following our traditional food habits.

I also came across some research about cultural attitudes and how they are shaped by our Stone Age past - cultures which were based on hunting and gathering have very different attitudes to cultures which were based on farming - the former tend to be more individualistic and independent while the latter tend to be more socially oriented and interdependent. If our cultural attitudes are still shaped by something which happened so far in the past, isn't it likely that our reactions to food are also shaped by our past? That would explain why the west, particularly the Northern part of the West, would have health problems with a carb-rich diet whereas the east and the Southern part of the West (Italy?) - would lean towards more vegetables and carbs.

I'm off to have my healthy indian lunch now - sprouted moong salad.

Ingredients:

half cup sprouted green moong
1 cucumber, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1 tomato if you like, chopped
Juice of 1/2 - 1 lime
salt to taste
Black pepper powder or chaat masala

Just mix everything up and let chill for an hour. If you're a garlic fan and not in office ( as I am unfortunately), you can add a bit of crushed garlic too. Enjoy on a hot summer's day along with a glass of majjige ( double-toned home made dahi blended with coriander leaves, salt and a green chilli, and water if you like it thin, and garnished with kari patta and mustard seeds tadka ).