Indian Pavilion or Gobbling our Income

Indian food is really, relatively easy to make. At least according to my neighbor who is from S. Africa by way of Gujarat State. But she has something like 200 different spice powders on a rack from Ikea hanging by her stove. I have six or eight plus some garlic powder I bring in from Italy when I can. I do love Indian food though. This causes me to resort to the Indian Pavilion in the supermarket shopping center.
A medium sized restaurant tupperware container of Tadka Dahl will set you back about 21dhs. or $5.72 This is, in point of fact, a wholly outrageous price for what amounts to mostly lentils and some onions. So I learned to make my own.
In a heavy bottomed sauce pan, cook one cup of split red or yellow lentils with one liter of water and two teaspoons turmeric. Add a sprinkling of mustard seeds and methi (fenugreek seeds). In a separate frying pan, sautee one onion, 4 or 5 cloves of garlic, a thumb of ginger and a green chili until the vegetables are soft. Add a tsp. of garam masala, stir well and continue to cook on low until fragrant. Add your cooked vegetables, 1/2 of a veggie stock cube and about 1/2 cup of chopped tomato (canned are ok), to the lentils. If the water has cooked off, add another 1/2 cup. Continue to cook this on low for 10-15 min. Season with salt and pepper. Serve over brown rice.
I added about a cup of finely chopped zucchini just to up the veg content. But this left T. shaking her head in disgust at me... I couldn't really taste much impact from the zucchini.

Sri Lankan Spaghetti

My feelings about spaghetti are well known to my readers (you three...) But we are fortunate enough to share our home with a small Sri Lankan superhero who is faster than a speeding toddler, more powerful than a door-to-door rug salesman and able to navigate bur Dubai in a single bound! And she makes spaghetti. The Sri Lankan version.

She does not like sharing her recipes with me, she just laughs at the depths of my ignorance on vegetables, spices, masala etc. etc. She shakes her head wondering how it can be possible that I write this website on food, when I do not even know how to properly gut a fish. She's right, of course, but by careful observation I can tell you how to make the spaghetti...

4 red indian onions (price of onions going up every day!)
4 large carrots grated
2 sri lankan green chili peppers (they are short and pointy - thai pepper ok here too...)
2 tomato
1 clove garlic
1 thumb of ginger (Sri Lankan food doesn't really use ginger but she has lived in the non-melting pot a long time and likes to use "ingredient from other people food"...)
1 pinch of indian chili flakes
a bit of asafoetida and some fenugrek seeds
2 or 3 tsp. turmeric
2 eggs
1 lb of spaghetti

Cut up and in about 1-2 tbsp. safflower or other neutral oil fry fry fry (she always says this) your onions, garlic, tomato, chili pepper, and ginger until onions are around 1/3 the volume you started with. Ok if onions get a little brown, if you are worried about the garlic burning, you can add it at the end.
In a large bowl toss the carrots, turmeric, asafoetida and fenugreek (you could skip these and use some shaved fennel with your carrots if you cant find them). Scramble and fry up your eggs. When cool, mix these, and the onion mixture with the carrot mixture.
When the spaghetti is cooked, toss it all together. Now you can eat it like this (cut coriander & green onion over it to serve) or you can refrigerate it for a day (making it good party food...).
On day two, place the spaghetti in a frying pan. Top it with some fresh coriander and green onions and any leftover vegetables you have around. Tonight we had broccoli, string beans and a bit of yellow pepper. Cook the pasta covered in the pan until the veggies wilt a bit and you hear it crackle, be patient. The idea is to let it get a little brown and crispy on the bottom.
Voila! acceptable spaghetti.

Chicken Biryani

Chicken biryani, it's what you have, Indian, Sri Lankan, or Local Arab, when you are having a bunch of folks over.
I've made it only once myself, but I've tried my fair share. I think the key is to make sure you have enough of the sauce so that the rice is not dry, but also to be careful about oil so it isn't greasy either. Here's something akin to the process, step by step... It should serve about 4, although it's a lot of work no matter how many people, so go for a big dinner party.

Take a chicken, cut it up.
Wash it well in warm water and a bit of salt.
Dredge your chicken lightly in flour, some turmeric, black pepper, a bit of curry powder or what have you, and fry just until its crispy on the outside, in oil or ghee. Chicken does not have to be fully cooked at this point, because it will get cooked again. Set chicken pieces aside.

In a different pan cook together, 1/4 cup vegetable oil. 5 small onions, 5 green chilis, 5 red chilis, 2 tomatoes, 4 or 5 cloves of garlic. Now here is where it gets tricky and personal. Everyone seems to have different ideas about what spices go into the biryani. I'd go with ginger, cumin, cardamom and cloves. But some people also use cinnamon, caraway seeds, and bay leaves too. When you have a nice thick spicy onion mixture, add the chicken and cover on low heat until it is cooked through. Finish with a generous amount of fresh coriander and serve over basmati rice. More authentic Biryani calls for par-cooking the rice and letting it finish in the sauce mixture, but I cant taste the difference, perhaps because it is quite spicy.

SriLankan Spicy Hot dogs.

1 package of hot dog (8)
4 small indian red onion
4 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tomato
1 or 2 red or green chili (red is hotter...)
2 cloves garlic

In a medium size saute pan, cook the onion, tomato, chili and garlic in the oil until well browned and soft. Onions should be about 15% of their original volume Slice the hotdogs on the diagonal and mix continuing to cook for another 10 min or until they are warmed through. Add 1 tsp. Sri Lankan chili powder.
Serve with rice or any astringent green vegetable.

I know this sounds weird, but they are delicious.

Chicken Tikka fantastic....

Mornin' or is it evening? I have no idea. The older I get, the easier shifiting time zones ain't...

In addition to several very frightening bananas, some garlic, and a thoroughly stunning quantity of cured meat, my dear husband left me with Chicken Tikka made by the affable godsend who is our maid.

As near as I can tell, it consisted of fried chicken thighs, and a sauce of onion, chiles, garlic, green onion, bay leaves (or kaffir lime?- something inedible...) and something she's calling 'tikka spice' with a giggle and no further explanation...

Anyway, its firey and succulent, especially at 4am when I cant sleep.

I think it might help me sweat out the swine flu I picked up from the miserable, hacking, coughing, wheezing person in seat 34H. Thanks lady, gift that keeps on giving.

Chicken Biryani

Ok, I have a maid. I'm a horrible person. No, not really. Actually having a maid is very very very nice. I wont pretend I do anything so special that having a maid is 'necessary', its a luxury. The maid herself is extremely nice and pleasant to have around the house (for as much laundry as we produce this in itself is a miracle...) and happens to be a terrific cook. She's not a fan of arabic food, and thinks western food is just plain unhealthy (ahem!), but when it comes to Indian and Sri Lankan (home country) cooking; Oh! the smells that waft around my kitchen...

She made us a chicken biryani that was absolutely delicious. Stunningly good. As near as I can tell, she diced up and fried the pieces of two chickens. Then she cooked down about six onions, six cloves of garlic, three tomatos, at least a dozen small green chili peppers (HOT), a large chunk of fresh ginger in a good bit of oil until it was all soft and carmelized.

To this, she added a vegetable stock cube, some water, three or four sticks of cinnamon, some cardamom pods, a generous handful of fresh coriander and "Chicken Masala" spice. Which is where things get murky. If I ask her what goes into "Chicken Masala" she just laughs at me, and I'm guessing I aint getting the ingredients anytime soon.

She reminds me of my dad in the kitchen. Sort of secretive, slightly grouchy, a bit bossy, lots of fun. The whole thing was served well blended into some biryani rice and was a hearty, lovely meal for me and the DH (and a neighbor). Not the munchkins - too spicy.