Quick Indian Cooking

It’s time for an update on the naan in the oven.

Well, I am now the size of a two-bedroom bungalow. My social life has been overtaken by ante-natal events with other soon-to-be parents, an obstetrician who can never remember my name and a pony-tail sporting pregnancy yoga instructor.

Mercifully, work and friends are saving me from a fate of endless thoughts about Disney and powder pink non-essential baby clutter. I keep getting asked if I’m tired. No. I am too busy to be tired.

In fact I am on a one woman crusade to prove that being pregnant does not relegate you to a temporary life of sack wearing, swollen ankles and sulking under a blanket. I am carrying on as normal as possible. With a few adjustments.

Like the gig I went to yesterday. I called the venue manager and managed to get a bar stool reserved by the stage. Arrived early so I could take my spot sensibly. And left just before the crowds dispersed to avoid getting walked on.

A glass of something cold and alcoholic would have been nice. But even I know you can’t have everything!

To comfort myself, I whizzed up Doodh Badam. Literally meaning nutty milk, this warm, frothy drink is like a giant hug when you need it the most. It’ll definitely keep me going until d-day.
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This week hubby, QIC’s photographic genius and investor extraordinaire, had a minor op. While he braved the NHS, I stood in a corner shaking like a leaf at the sight of gauze and tape. For all that gobby, brassy chit chat…

How appropriate, then, that I get tagged by Gori Girl for my six unspectacular quirks! Despite being somewhat quirky generally, I figured mine had to be Indian cooking-related here for obvious reasons. So here goes:

1. The only shortcut I will not use is ready made ginger and garlic paste. It tastes of nothing. Frankly, if you can’t peel and mince the real thing you might as well order a pizza.
2. I never make desert for dinner parties. After all that effort on the main savoury dishes, it somehow falls behind the agenda. Besides, what’s wrong with ice cream?
3. My stomach can’t handle chillies. Shocking and inexcusable. But goes to show that you can cook and eat Indian food without setting your insides alight.
4. My large kitchen has only two store cupboards. So I only buy a new spice variety when I run out of another one.
5. I don’t deep fry at home. My conscience and clothing will not allow it.
6. There is more frozen food in my fridge than fresh. I cook a lot, a few times a week and freeze everything apart from potatoes and rice to keep us going.

I tag the lovely Maninas, Elisabeth, Asha, Sandeepa, Smita and Nandita.

The rules are as follows:

1. Link the person who tagged you.
2. Mention the rules in your blog.
3. Tell us about 6 unspectacular quirks of yours.
4. Tag 6 following bloggers by linking them.
5. Leave a comment on each of the tagged blogger’s blogs letting them know they’ve been tagged.

PS = Hubby is making a speedy recovery and hopes to return to Indian food photography early next week.

It’s been a glorious four-day break for Easter. The sun shone bright, while I consumed enough chocolate to stuff a real bunny. And there was enough tree pollen in the air for me to wander around in a OTC drug-fuelled haze.

Amidst all this, I also found time to cook fish curry, chicken curry and dal. Perfect, really.

My last lesson before I move on to recipes is all about dal. Dal is a preparation of boiled lentils with vegetable and spices. The spices are normally tempered in hot oil first, which means they are allowed to sizzle and release their strong flavours before these aromas are trapped in the lentils.

This tempering process is also known as tarka, popu, baghara to name but a few.

There are a number of different lentils used in Indian cooking and each has its very own special tarka and cooking time. Indians can be quite sniffy about staying true to authentic tarkas. So it is inadvisable to replace the lentils used in a recipe with a completely different one.

The popular Indian lentils are masoor, moong, toor, chana and urad. There are also variations within these types, for instance you can buy moong (mung) beans with a green husk or without and urad lentils whole with a black husk or split and huskless.

Dal is normally eaten with rice or Indian bread like rotis and parathas. It is not common practice to drink it as a soup in India, although lentil soup is quite fashionable on supermarket shelves.

However you choose to have it, it tastes damn good. Here is a really easy recipe for dal, if you haven’t cooked one before. There are lot of others in the lentils category in my blog archives.

I almost didn’t notice it was Spring. The climate in my office swings from sweaty armpits to freezing my balls off.

Oh sorry, I don’t have any.

Tits off.

Oops not that neither.

Let’s just move on to cooking, shall we?

This is step two of the basic lessons. It’s all about powdered masalas. These are whole spices ground to a fine powder.

Normally powdered masalas are added after whole ones or after wet ingredients like onions, ginger and garlic. When you first add them they have pungent, strong aromas that burn the tip of your noses. You know when they are cooked when they blend into a wonderfully aromatic but subtle fragrance.

Ground masalas include:

• Turmeric: The ground root of a plant belonging to the ginger family. Yellow, warm and lovely
• Chilli: Red, sharp and hot hot. Use with care
• Cumin: Ground roasted whole cumin
• Coriander: Ground seeds of the coriander plant
• Garam masala: Ground bay leaf, cinammon, whole black peppercorns, cloves and cardamom

There are load of other ground masalas. But these are the very basic. And you can do some serious damage with a turmeric, chilli and cumin combo.

Like some added to chicken and then pan fried.

Or used with lemon juice on salmon fillets.

Yum!

The best way to use these is to buy in small quantities, store tight away from sunlight so they don’t lose their flavour and follow recipe instructions.

This is where I confess to never bothering to make powdered masalas from scratch. It’s too much hassle, especially when you can buy perfectly lovely ready ground masalas in the shops.

But if you’re aching to do this the proper, old fashioned way, here is a (very basic) guide:

4 cardamoms
4 cloves
1″ stick cinnamon
1 bay leaf
4 whole black peppercorns

Roast the whole lot on a medium over for 10 minutes and then grind in a blender/grinder. You can make lots of this and store in an airtight container for at least a month.