pav "butter" bhaji!

i am a "small town" girl and will always be. but moving to mumbai made me want to blend in - immediately. the energy, the bustling cars and the ever-running local trains....the city was magical for my small-town mind. thankfully, blending into the mumbai crowd isn't very difficult - you get transformed within weeks, its almost like the city takes over your soul and turns it into this practical, street-smart, ready-to-do-ANYTHING-to-succeed vortex of strength.
one of the most obvious things in mumbai is the street food - while my small-town parents have always rescued me from eating any street food at all - WHAT? YOU WANT THAT BACTERIA INFESTED DELICACY? no, come back home and i'll cook something wholesome for you! Yes, that was my childhood. this sudden freedom of eating whatever you want made life surreal for me. street food in mumbai was my favorite part of living in the city - every nook has its flavor, every suburb has its speciality and every vendor his own special touch (yes, pun very much intended!) and most importantly, every time you think that you've tasted it all, up comes something new and exciting!
my very first foray into this street food was perhaps my second week in mumbai, my mother having just gone back after ensuring that life would be ok for me without her. the new freedom, the scant money in my shallow pockets and the bracing sea air got me super advernturous and there i was - ordering pav bhaaji at the street corner where i now lived. while i made faces at how unhygenic the whole process looked, i could not help but feel embarassed at the unabashed groans that my stomach was offering up for all in the near vicinity to hear.
soon enough, heaps of bhaji (medly of mish-mashed and deliciously pan fried veggies) and a couple of pav (dinner rolls, the likes of which only a mumbai baker can make!) made their way into my plate. garnished with coriander and fresh cut onions, this whole thing just was pure heaven. my trials into making this pav-bhaji have been many and finally i have chanced upon a combination that yields - EVERY SINGLE TIME!
i now use this magical combination everytime i want to cook my way into my mumbai-ya man's heart and earn the look of - oh, i love you for making me taste this again!
so here goes.

true and authentic pav-bhaji needs a ton of butter - please, oh please keep your diets at bay. if you want taste, just don't think and bring on that whole stick of butter. yes, the whole big, entire stick of butter.
once it starts swimming in ur pan, add 2 chopped green peppers or as we call them - capsicum! (for a change, i am going to add measures of food - it makes a lot of difference how much of what you add here. but of course, my measurements are going to be very authentically mine - metric and other systems, please excuse my kitchen!)
when these become softer, add grated (yes grated!) ginger (1 cube of ginger ought to do - well, 1 cube about an inch long) and then grate in 5-6 cloves of garlic. there, you already have most of the important bits cooking away.
meanwhile, get some potatoes (5-6 medium sized - now this is the american medium size! indian sizes are 2 sizes smaller when you compare to american veggies - i can feed a family of 4 on half a dozen american oranges!!) and boil them till they are soft as mush. meanwhile, the green peppers in the pan should have now turned translucent and pale...this is the time to chop up one head of cauliflower and 2 big carrots and add them to the pan.
let the veggies cook for about 5 minutes and at this point, already add in the pav bhaji masala. i use everest and now for the second important part after the butter - ADD A TON OF THIS MASALA!! don't please be skimpy on taste.
i don't add peas to my pav-bhaji and never will. i find that they give a sweetish taste that i really don't call authentic. no peas! and definitely no onions - for similar reasons.
once the veggies look almost cooked - you may need to stir frequently and add a bit of water to cook these through, add in the peeled & boiled potatoes.

now comes the part where my muscles take over - use a potato masher and mash all the veggies together till they are a close mish-mash and you can't recognize one from the other! you may now add salt and taste. yes, big important factor still missing - where are the tomatoes, you ask! well, they are too expensive to get the right taste, so i find that adding a whole tin (the small 12 oz one) of hunt's tomato paste does just the right thing for me. let the tomato paste and the masala cook in the mash for a good 15 minutes. if you use a different kind of masala or a different brand of tomatoes, you may want to taste every so often to balance the tanginess from the 'matoes with the spice and zing from the masala.
and there you have it.....bubbling and boiling in front of you will be a big happy pot of pav-bhaji.

the thing that adds the most authentic flavor to this dish, is the crustiness of the pav. get laadi pav (so called, because they are baked in slabs - ready to sink your teeth into) and without adding any butter to these, grill them on a grill pan. let these get nice and brown and crispy. now break into these bits and sink them down deep in that delectable zingy-tang of the bhaji and your mouth will suddenly explode with the thoughts of ---- ahhh! mumbai again!

PS: pictures to come soon. promise! but i do have a video from an actual-rekdi cook who shows you how he makes his pav-bhaji. my version is a dedication to this artiste! the guy hosting the video also gives us an interesting take on the history of this dish.

ata kothe dhave man

paying my respects to pandit bheemsen joshi

ata kuthe dhave man
tujhe charan dekhli aaj

bhaag gela sheen gela

avadha zala anand!!!

food is not your enemy!

i'm on a writing frenzy today. everytime there is a crunch situation at work and my mind goes into overload, i find that writing helps....like re-organizing and cleaning up a cabinet.
speaking of which, i am trying my best to lose these last 25 pounds in the next couple of months - the workouts are working and so is the healthy eating...hahahaha, i know. my cooking has been most unhealthy with butter and oil showing up every 3 minutes. but wait, food is not the enemy. as i prepare myself to an evening of pav-bhaji swimming in glorious, smooth, delectable butter....i remind myself. its not the food that hurts you, but what you do with it. as with everything else, the ultimate enemy is your brain.

cook, but eat in moderation. exercise and still, eat in moderation!

that shall be the mantra as i prepare to send out another entry into this blog of which i am the sole reader ;) pav-bhaji it is tonight, the likes of which you can find only on a "rekadi" in mumbai.

groaning yet, hungry tummies ;)??

the chicken and its "taaang"

on winter evenings, i am transported back to childhood days when my parents plunked us in the backseat of the trusted old fiat and drove to A-ONE chicken! it was our neighborhood drive-through chicken place. no amount of KFC or hooters wings will ever be able to get close to the experience of all those hearty flavors wafting through the air when we rolled down the car windows. the earthy smell of the tandoor, the red (brilliant red, i might add) chicken legs and whole chickens hanging on iron skewers and the scent of onions wallowing in the acids of vinegar and lemon juice.
note to readers: if you see an incomplete post, it might just be me leaving work and post mid-way to run home for some of what i plan to cook tonight. yum!

(oh, note on this yum! this is the food-bell that goes off in my brain every time i can almost-smell and almost-taste the goodness that i am planning for dinner and as i mentioned earlier - that's all i am doing in my mind all day.)

tandoori chicken has always been a big hit with atul & me. true to our indian roots, we detest the red flavorless chicken legs that most buffets in the US serve up on weekend lunches. shame be to those who deny us another taste of what was an integral part of our childhood. for those who will salivate at the look of these so called tandoori chickens in indian restaurants these days, beware! these are devoid of all flavor and oh, also of any juiciness that tandoori chicken stands for.

So when a dear friend, Amit, cooked some tandoori for us (resulting in a net gain of almost a pound over that weekend!!! what? don't raise your eyebrows at me - you CAN gain weight if you eat a TON of chicken), I decided to get in on the action and develop a recipe of my own. Amit, thanks to your instructions, I already had a good base ready. Tweaked it a bit to make it my own.

it is really simple, u know. all u need is some drumsticks with slits made upon them so that the marinade can sink in (of course, if u end up buying them from shoprite like me, they will look more like ostrich legs and most hens would be very offended that their offsprings could have thighs so fat!)
then grab some of that trusted yogurt and Everest Tandoori Masala. Yes, yes yes...i use boxed masala for most of my dishes - trust me, with a toddler who hates the sound of my spice grinder, i would have it no other way. Everest Tandoori Masala has a nice earthy taste to it - very spicy (so use it sparingly if you tend to tear with heat) and very tangy. just the right balance of all things tandoori. now here we go - 3 more things are really needed - fresh ginger/ garlic paste, chaat masala and a good big dash of lemon juice. now here it is: lemon juice and yogurt together? people raise brows, question my sanity and then tell me, there's enough acidity in your marinade to add more! mais non monsieur. how can one rely on chaat masala to do its bit without adding a catalyst to make it work? lemon juice brings out the best in this masala - a marriage made definitely by the gods of food.
and of course, don't forget some olive oil. adding oil to any marinade will of course bring about meat tenderization and juiciness that you will never be able to forget.

marinate this not for long, as usual, i have no patience to wait. if you are a heat lover like me, you will go ahead and add a big heaping spoon of red chilli powder to top any heat from the tandoori masala - i am cookey, yes!

of course at this point i have pre-heated my oven at 400 and have ensured that enough windows and doors are open for the smoke to escape - lest you want the smoke alarms going off every 3 seconds (this is another thing that freaks out my little toddler, and i try to stay away from such eventualities)

i now proceed to hungrily await as i spread the marinated drumsticks on a baking tray and ensure that there is some aluminium foil to catch any drippings! but hold on, the end is not in sight yet. there is a good wait of about 35 minutes if you want succulence. these are the times when i walk about the house like i await news from a critical medical procedure.....or i switch on foot network, because i absolutely must be distracting myself with more thoughts of food. sigh, the link between my stomach and my brain will be the end of me.

but wait, do i see the clock telling me that its halftime? run run run to the oven dear chef and turn over those beauties. they need to be done from all sides, no? by now, i am salivating and have tasted the marinade a 100 times - oh, don't laugh. i'll see how dignified your waiting can be when you get there.

in about 20 more minutes, i am finally rewarded, but the good child that i am, i wait some more. when i take the chicken out, i instantly cover it with some more aluminium foil - this trick i've learnt from the grillmasters on foot network.  if you cover the meat as soon as it is out of the heat, the juices go right into the depths of that succulent leg awaiting your teeth to sink into it - and then we get DRIPPING GOOD CHICKEN!

here's what it looks like when it is done. you can make a very healthy meal of it if you roll some of the forked out meat in a thick roti with onions and tomatoes and you've got (yes, another ding in my head) YUMMMM!!!

try it, you won't regret this one.

for the love of INSTANT

for people like me, food should be now. i know i love to indulge in long hours of cooking, slaving over a pot of chicken curry till it turns succulent. but most days, after a hard day's work, i want home-cooked awesomeness now! more importantly, i don't like to indulge in frozen varities or packaged goods. this makes the word INSTANT very difficult for me.

but when you are married to someone who loves, lets say idlies, things start getting tough. i've always been on the lookout for the quick and easy way to make soft fluffy idlies that can cure the question of CAN I HAVE SOEMTHING TO EAT - NOW?? I have been trying these rava idlies for a while now and they always turn out good - well, more OK than good. Beginning the blog with a post that encouraged experimentation, i just had to add my two cents of yumminess to the regular rava idli. here's how i managed it. so instead of soaking the rava in yogurt at all, i just did a total INSTANT on this dish. i took a cup or so of rava (sooji if you must!) and added an equal amount of nice thick yogurt. after the usual additions of salt and hing, i wanted soemthign extra. so i channeled dosa express (our favorite weekend takeout joint) and thought of those yummy chana daal bits in the rava idlies he sent home. the pantry gods produced not only chana dal, but some washed urad and methi seeds as well. this was definitely going to be yum.

so i heated up some oil, added the trusted companions on any southern indian journey - green chillies and curry leaves and lo presto! the kitchen smelled awesome. the addition of the 2 daals and methi seeds brought out the fragrances even more. but i wasn't done experimenting. just because there was the addition of daal, this time, i had to add hing for aiding digestion - and i did. turning off the heat, i added this tempering to my rava+yogurt mix and it instantly felt like a home run. i also added a dash of ginger - ginger has always proved so helpful while making chef sanjay thumma's rava dosas and i wanted a similar flavor going for me this time.

the batter, inspite of adequate water additions seemed just about right, but very heavy. one batch of idlies was good, but it wasn't EXACTLY what i had in mind. and while rummaging through my spice cabinet, i was inspired - yet again! there is something about the cabinets in this house i think. when i feel less than happy about things and rummage through my stocks, i always chance upon things that make a lot of sense once i do chance upon them. yes, i was looking at ENO fruit salt.
before i added any, i thought to myself. really? my brain kept telling me, go ahead, its like making instant khaman. but i wanted to be sure. so i googled fruit salts and here's what the mighty internet had to tell me:

fret not o'hungry idli seeker. a loving dash of fruit salt will make ur batter instantly lighter.

my feeble voice (needing glucose badly now, but not letting go of the yearning to learn): but pray o' might lord, how will that happen?

the lord repli-eth: o'hungry one, fruit salts cause instant effervescence which will afford your batter the overnightness of fermentation without the mess.

convinced now with the big words and chemical compositions that this website enlightened me with, i added a big heaping dash of fruit salt and stirred. the hissing goodness of effervescence greeted me and belive you me, the spoon suddenly felt lighter and easier in the batter!

these idlies, when steamed, came out soft and sooper fluffy, with small pockets of chana dal, urad dal & methi seeds that made for little bites of nuttiness in the middle of soft indulgence.

for a change, i ran to my camera (so delighted was i, that i actually gave up the thought of eating for a change) and clicked a couple of pictures of a heaped plate of my rava idlies.

note to the mummies: toddlers will fall in love with these "rice-cakes" specially if you serve them with some ghee.

note to those suffering with gout/ arthritis: fermented foods are a no-no if you are ailed by too much uric acid in ur blood. these instant idlies and dosas are a big help for those of us plagued with this condition.

the invictus and her victus - simple daily food

waking up from a bad bout of flu, the likes of which can only be found under the 20 odd inches of snow in the tri-state this year, i heard from Atul that in my delirium i was asking for my mother. naaah, i would never. at 30? my grumbling stomach reminds me that it was probably her simple everyday food and its complex flavor pockets exploding in my mouth that i was craving after the tasteless abyss that my tongue had been punished with. venturing into the inner depths of my fridge, i notice i have a whole cabbage awaiting its dreaded fate into the plates of: i don't really like cabbage THAT much!

i decide that since this is the year of sheer perfection (aha, you didn't expect THAT to be my resolution, did you?) i shall turn this swirl of green into something no one shall be able to ignore.

i closed my eyes, prayed to the god of all things food - Ron Weasley, who else. i was rewarded the minute i opened my spice drawer. there sat in front of me, the oft ignored hing. hing or asafoetida as the shoprite label calls it, is the powder of a herb root. with its pungent smell and tasteless identity, it gets introduced only when cooking troublesome (read: for digestion) food. i have seen it work wonders when introuced accidentally - so why not!
so i heat up some olive oil, add my regular dash of mustard seeds and slit green chillies. note to self: never, never ever listen to people who want to de-seed green chillies. yes, they have a ton of heat. they also have a ton of acid that helps the oil seep into food resulting in brilliant flavor every single time. as soon as my green chillies turned to a light green softness, i added a heaped teaspoonful of our pungent friend. the kitchen smelled awesome already and the cabbage was still just sitting on the chopping board.

it decidedly had to jump in - which it did (ahem!) i was patient this time (remember the resolution??) and added a good teaspoonful of turmeric. another note to self: this is not just a spice that you use for color. the flavor that haldi or turmeric can lend to most veggies is irreplacable. not covering the cabbage and letting it sweat with some salt and brown sugar, i began chopping coriander. WHAT? no coriander in a dish of cabbage? i'm sorry, maybe i wasn't clear earlier. there is ONE rule to this kitchen, there are no rules before the basic rule of uncompromised flavor. after 20 minutes of cardio time in the wok, my light yellow colored cabbage (thanks to the haldi) was following all the proper ettiquette that a vegetable should and i was beginning to see what i call moisture.
i reduced the flame, added a big dash of cayenne and finally sprinkled a good handful of chopped coriander.
it is at times like these that i have no resolve and the term LADY or even WOMAN does not apply to my being any more. i HAVE to eat and eat we did.
in glorious heaps on our plates was the kobhi bhaji looking pretty in its yellow and green-ness.

i regret to say that i did not make good use of the brilliant phone camera to caputre this moment. i shall cook this again over the weekend, and not just because i want to post a picture. it is almost time to go home and guess what my stomach is questioning me about!