Pimientos de Padrón for Chilly days in Mumbai

Last month while travelling to Madrid, Alvaro introduced us to a delightful vegetarian tapas called Pimientos de Padron.

Since the Sangria that we ordered was rather mediocre, these tiny green peppers were just what we needed to add the zing to the evening as we as we enjoyed  the cool breeze that swept through the Plaza Mayor, a bustling square in the heart of Madrid.

Spaniards, like us Indians,  have dinner around 9 o'clock at  night.  After work, they like to unwind with their friends over a glass of wine. Accompanying the drinks, they have tasty little nibbles  or  "tapas"  a word meaning  to cover and which originated from the custom of covering the glasses of wine with tiny plates to prevent flies from falling in! Some ingenious bar tender began placing bits of ham on the plate which were then eaten along with the wine. Gradually, ham gave way to another nibble and soon a completely new culinary delight was discovered,  which  covers a wide range of food from fried calamari to Russian salad.

Vegetarians have a hard time looking for suitable fare especially while travelling abroad, so I was more than thrilled to discover that Pimientos de Padron was a pure vegetarian dish - and a spicy one at that, perfect for the Indian pallate. These tiny little green peppers that are mild and easy to down are deceptive because just when you begin to enjoy their piquant sweetness, you bite into a real hottie that will have you reaching out to the Sangria to quench those explosions in your mouth!

Piemento de Padron  then are the chillies from Padron,  the tiny green peppers that grow in the North West of Spain. Walking through the familiar market of Bhaji Gulli , I was astonished to find  a similar looking chilli  and I brought home some to try my own desi version of this dish. Of course, they were much fiercer than the Padron chillies and I would advise some caution and discretion while downing them. But if you can manage the fire power, go ahead and enjoy them especially now when Mumbai is enjoying a distinct chill!

Bhavnagari chilies are the closest to the green peppers from Padron.. Last week they were simply perfect, smaller and less pungent but as the vegetable seller told me, the unseasonal rains played spoil sport, making the chillies longer and spicier.

To make this dish you will need:

100 g of Bhavnagari green chillies

1 tspn of Extra Virgin Olive oil

Salt to taste

What to do:

1. Wash and pat dry the chillies

2.Heat the oil in a non stick pan to smoking.

3. Add the chillies and  let them sizzle till they are slightly browned, giving them a good stir.

4. When the skins get soft, sprinkle with salt or sea salt if possible and serve hot!

A very blurred picture of an otherwise tantalising appetizer!

What to do with Spiny gourds

Kadam came home the other day with more strange vegetables from the farm. These tiny green spiny round fruit looked quite spooky - but apparently Spiny Gourd or Kartoli ( Marathi) is one of the most nutritious and medicinal vegetables growing wild in the tribal areas of Maharashtra. It apparently also grows in other parts of India but I am not sure of where. This creeper which belongs to the Pumpkin family grows unfettered in the monsoon and its pretty yellow flowers yield this fibre rich power house of vitamins and protein. No wonder then, that this vegetable is gaining currency in our local markets and selling for as high a price as Rs.40/kg!

Like most people confronted with weird vegetables, we had our reservations about eating it  and  we only ventured to eat it since it came from our very own land. But of course we didn't quite know what to do with it. So as usual, my Walk and Talk recipe exchange came to the rescue with Abha's tips on what to do with it.

See, she told me, just slice into thin roundels and sprinkle with salt. Then in a kadhai, you take some oil and add zeera ( Cumin) and dhania  (Coriander) powder, turmeric powder, red chilli powder, saunf ( Dill) and fry well. Then add the chopped vegetables and give it a good stir. Lower the heat and cover for around 5 minutes. Then when the vegetable is soft, uncover, raise the heat and keep stirring till the vegetables become crisp and crunchy.

Of course, this sounds very vague but I reckon you can use a teaspoon of each of the ground powders for around 250 g of Kartoli.

Round off the vegetable with a pinch of sugar sprinkled on top so that the slightly bitter and sour taste is tempered.

Of course this vegetable will be hard to find now since the monsoon clouds have bid us farewell but then, you could keep this recipe in mind for the next rains when Spiny Gourds will be available once again in the market!

In search of the perfect Okra

It all started with Alvaro wanting to know how to cook okra without the slime. At first I couldn't figure out what he meant because I have never had them cooked any  way other than crisp and yummy. So in  the week when he was around we had bhindi three days in a row because he simply loved the way we made it. Finally on the last day, I showed him how it was cooked and the mystery was finally unravelled. It was all the fault of the word "cook" in Dutch which is synonymous with boiling. Hence when Alvaro cooked his bhindi, he actually boiled it, which is why it always became a slimy mess. Now, thanks to his new found knowledge, Alvaro can have the perfect bhindi time after time.

Of course part of the secret is having the perfect bhindi like ours which is organically grown. Though this vegetable is found year round, it is particularly tender and tasty during the monsoon when it literally grows wild on some farms.

Like most vegetables, this too evokes extreme reactions - you either hate it or love it. I would like to think that most people like it especially when it is cooked to a crisp with plenty of chick pea flour coating it like a delicate bhajia. All you have to do is wash and pat dry the bhindi. Cut into fine strips lengthwise. Then mix some salt, turmeric and chili powder in chick pea flour and sprinkle generously onto cut bhindi to coat well. Heat up some oil in  a kadhai and deep fry in batches till the bhindi is all used up.

I can assure you that bhindi cooked this way is bound to please even the pickiest vegetable eaters

Bye Bye, Ganpati

Ten days of hectic festivity finally came to an end. Yesterday evening almost the whole of Mumbai was out on the sands of Chowpatty to bid farewell to Ganpati. From around two in the afternoon people began their trek to the sea. This wonderful idol of the Lord came striding down Marine Drive escorted by revelers dancing and singing in his wake.

The entire street was crowded with TV channel vans waiting to get a ringside view. Normally the buildings lease out their terraces for astronomical amounts but this year, they were discouraged from doing so by the police. Which is why the TV crew had no option but to line up the streets and check out the action.

As always the Mumbai Police actively participate in this festival including playing the drums and the traditional horn when the processions pass by their stall under the Beach side Police station.The traffic is surprisingly very well controlled and even though there are hundreds and thousands of revelers on the street, there are no disturbances and the traffic moves smoother than it normally does!

All through the evening the Ganeshas march on with truckloads of eager followers enthusiastically dancing and singing in his wake.Of course this does not always look dignified with several women actually jigglling and wiggling in the style of the latest Bollywood idol . While critics of this vulgar "pop" culture may frown on , you cannot deny the pleasure that they are deriving from this display of "devotion".. 

This little boy and his big brother wait alongside the Police Station on the beach and were busy dancing crazily to the beat. The glee on this young lad's face is uncontainable as he gets a ringside view of the Ganeshas. (Of course he is more than thrilled to be photographed by me)

While the rest of the family sits on the wall, this little girl dressed in her pink shiny best, finds her own way of enjoying the Ganpati festival by looking for shells in the sand.

Ganpatis are kept in every lane of Mumbai, sometimes two or three in a street with every housing society having its own unique idol. The majestic Khetwadi Ganpati makes its way towards the sea.

But amid all the big idols, there is still place for the small ones like these ............. brought along by worshippers with much devotion and care.

The beach offers lots of tiny entrepreneurs an opportunity to strike it rich.

Like these balloon vendors.







This little girl is waiting to sell her baby balloons . Once her mother fills up the big ones, the two girls will be off to make some money.

The spirit of the festival is exemplified in these colourful pinwheels.

And ultimately, the coolest of them all, the unperturbed sadhu who continues his drug induced rest under a bus. Completely unmindful of the noise and hullaballoo.

What to eat after a week of modaks

Now that the Ganesh festival is over ( well almost!) I am thankful that I won't have to eat any more sweet stuff.

Frankly, I think we overdo the sweets in our home: every celebration automatically revolves around eating and the sweeter it is the better. Which is why after any  festival or extended periods of festivity like a wedding or a family get together, I look forward to eating something different from the traditional food that we'd been seeing on our table for the past few days. Yet, after days of rich food, it is hard to get back to the basic daal roti, which is why I feel  my version of Paneer Makhanwalla,  is a great way to wean one's sweet buds away from a week's indulgence. This recipe, which is creamily sinful, has just the right amount of sweet and sour and a hint of spice .

You will need

• 500 g paneer
• 1/2 cup cream
• 2 tbspns tomato puree
• 2 tbspns oil
• 2 tbspns ghee
• 1/2 tspns kalonji
• 1/2 tspn turmeric
• 1 tbspn sugar
• For the masala paste
• 4 -6 almonds/cashews
• 1 medium onion chopped
• 1/4 tspn methi seeds
• 2-3 curry patta leaves
• 2-3 cloves garlic
• 1" piece ginger
• 1 -2 red chillies
• 1 tspn garam masala

What to do:

• Soak the almonds and remove skin. Also soak the methi seeds.
• Make a fine paste of almonds, methi seeds,red chilly, garlic ginger onion and curry patta leaves.
• Heat the ghee and oil in a non-stick fry pan.
• Cut the paneer into thick wedges and lightly fry . Remove and keep aside.
• In the same pan, add the masala paste, turmeric, kalonji seeds and saute well till the masala turns gets a shiny glaze. ( on low heat to avoid burning)
• Add the tomato puree, sugar and salt to taste. Continue frying on low heat. Dilute with water if required.
• Add the fresh cream and cover and let simmer for 2-3 mins.
• Add the fried paneer and leave covered till ready to serve. Heat gently to warm up. Serve with chopped corriander.

Sometimes I even add wedges of tomato and leave them slightly under cooked.

I also put in slit green chillies if I want it more spicy.

You can vary the amount of red chillies, sugar, cream and salt,as per your taste. 

I even use this basic gravy recipe to make chicken makhanwala for which I fry pieces of boneless chicken made into cubes or left over tandoori chicken.

I also use this gravy to make vegetable makhanwala where I add steamed green beans, carrots, peas cauliflower and potato.

Hope you enjoy making this dish!!

Guests for Dinner

After a long time really, I will be entertaining formally at home.


I have planned a sit down dinner for 6 , proper Indian style with thalis. This can be a bit cumbersome for our foreign guests who are reluctant to use their fingers and happily use their knives and scratch the smooth, unblemished polish of my thalis. How it breaks my heart, when I hear the screach and I resist the urge to grab the knife and tell them "Use your fingers for God's sake!"


However, in true Indian tradition, I have to accept my dinner guests as "God who comes to my home" and keep my ungodly thoughts to myself.


This morning was spent shopping for the ingredients and as usual, I find it impossible to get all the stuff in one place. 


To begin with I needed to replace my 20 year old gas tandoor and spent the better part of the morning at Lohar Chawl looking for a shop that was open!  Most of the shops here were just about opening their shutters for business at 11.15 in the morning and that was irritating me quite a bit. I remember the good old days when I could finish all my shopping and get home by 12. These days it is well nigh impossible.


Then I went to Crawford for the veggies and fruit and was quite surprised to find some of the prices much lower than what they were last month. Of courseI am not complaining, but I wonder how long this blissful period will last.


In the afternoon my meat man delivered the meat and thankfully followed my instructions. So I marinated my lovely leg of lamb and slow cooked it in the evening while I went for my evening stroll.


While the lamb was marinating, I made a quick chicken curry with ground almonds and saffron, pulverised the mint, chillies, coriander and garlic to make the spiciest of chutneys - so spicy that the spice went up my nose! 


Now I just have to wait for the Baby Pomfrets  which I am going to stuff with mint and lime and grill in a banana leaf on my new gas tandoor. 


My guests arrive at 6 tomorrow evening and I will give them tandoori prawns and chilled beer while they continue with their business discussions till 8. 


Dinner of course will be the grilled fish, Lobster thermidore, smoked aubergine salsa, zeera rice, potato bhaji and ice cream.

Saluting the Beasts of Burden

I remember many, many years ago when my little daughter was interviewing for her kindergarten, she was asked where milk came from and she promptly replied "bottles"! Of course the teacher had a good laugh but considering the fact that my daughter had never seen a cow in her life, there was no way she could have made a connection between the animal and her beloved food. Children today will probably substitute bottle with a plastic bag or tetrapack for that is how milk is packaged these days!

Looking at the vegetables and fruit in the market neatly stacked in supermarkets or  in the fresh vegetable markets, one hardly gives a thought to their cultivation let alone the poor beasts of burden whose labour is used to help them grow.

So when I heard that the day after Ganesh Chaturthi the people of Maharashtra honour the beasts of burden by eating food that is not cultivated with their labour, I decided to at least go along to the market and see what could be eaten instead.

Even though it was raining cats and dogs, the market was full of vendors selling an assortment of leafy vegetables that go into this dish called Rishichibhaji. There was quite a bit of stuff too : tubers like yam, colocasia and sweet potato, red amaranthus, colocasia leaves , red pumpkin,  bits of boiled corn, okra and  drumstick that went along with the leafy veggies.

After I bought a whole heap of bhaji, I realised I didn't know what to do!

So I called up an aunt in Pune who told me that I should just wash everything well and then chop it into bits. Then, she told me, take a huge big kadhai or pressure cooker and heat up 2 tablespoons of oil. To this, she advised I should  add a teaspoon of mustard seed and after they had popped, a quarter teaspoon of asoefetida, some turmeric, chopped green chillies and then the tubers, pumpkin and okra ( one by one making sure that each one is partially cooked before adding the other ingredient), then topping off the whole lot with the leafy vegetables. The pot should be coverd and the leaves allowed to cook down. Then, she told me, you should add the pre-boiled bits of corn . The vegetable should be given one big stir and allowed to simmer for a few minutes more so that all the tastes mingle well.When I asked her for exact quantities, she laughed.

Then she said, the vegetable was ready to eat. I forgot to ask her with what? After all aren't rice and wheat flour cultivated with the labour of the beasts of burden???

Modaks for Ganpati

Today is modak eating day, thanks to the presence of Lord Ganesh in our home.

We got up late in the morning since we were going to have just a small puja and got down to making the modaks all 21 of them.

Yesterday evening we put together the ingredients for the stuffing, freshly grated coconut, strands of saffron, powdered cardamom and of course the main ingredient - sugar. We let it sit for a bit till most of the sugar dissolved, then left it on low heat with a cover to simmer for a while and let the sugar melt completely.

Then this morning we made the dough with Basmati rice flour got specially from Vanita Samaj's outlet at Shivaji Park. The trick to great modaks is to knead the steamed dough before it cools down. This is quite a toughie as you have to be particularly thick skinned not to feel the heat as you knead and pummel the dough to a smooth elastic.

Then, the dough is quickly portioned into tiny balls, each ball flattened and filled with a spoonful of coconut filling. The sides of the pastry are pinched together and fluted and brought together to close the mouth. The resulting Onion shaped pastry is then put in a steamer to get the most divine modak.........

Khasta Kachori at Shegaon Station

This strange looking brown lump is actually a very yummy snack known as Khasta Kachori.

These yummy things are not normally for my tummy being excessively over-spiced and hence almost always avoided. However, a chance visit to Akola almost thirty years ago introduced me to this delicacy. At 8 in the morning, the train stops at a sleepy district town called Shegaon which is renowned for its kachori. Somehow train journeys always make me hungry and since it was almost 12 hours since my last meal, I was ready to deviate from the norm and try Shegaon Station's Kachori with my tea. One bite and I was hooked. Unfortunately, no other kachori matches up to this and , I have tried in vain to get the recipe for this simply divine kachori.

Yesterday, I found a recipe of sorts , in my mother in law's book which had all the ingredients without any measurements! When I asked her how she could write down such a recipe, she said that you should vary the spices to your own individual taste!

So I have made my own recipe which I must say can do with a bit of alteration but before I come to the final and authentic Shegaon Station Khasta Kachori recipe, I will share what I did yesterday.

You will need for the filling :

1/2 cup of chick pea flour ( besan)

1 tspn of oil

2 tspns of fine fennel seed ( saunf)

2 cloves

1 Bay leaf

3 fat round red chillies

1 tspn of dried mango powder ( aamchur)

salt and gud to taste.

For the outer coating

1 cup of flour ( maida)

1 tbspn of hot oil

salt to taste

The besan should be lightly roasted in the oil . Gradually add the rest of the ingredients ( except for the mango powder and the gud). Keep roasting till there is a fine aroma of roasting spices and chick pea flour. Remove from the fire and allow to cool a bit before pulverising in the coffee grinder. Add the gud and aamchur till the mixture is a blend of sweet and sour.

This masala can be kept in an air tight bottle till required.

To make the outer covering, the flour should be sifted with salt . The oil heated separately and poured into the pile of flour. Knead into a dough with water and set aside for around 10 minutes.

To make the Kachoris, the dough should be made into tiny balls and rolled out into thickish roundels. Put a generous amount of the masala into each puri and close up the mouth to make a ball. Again roll out and deep fry in hot oil, lowering the heat after adding the puris. The puris should be turned over till they are evenly browned . Drain off excess oil and serve hot with sweet tamarind chutney or just plain.

One cup of Maida will make around 6 kachoris. The left over masala can be used to stuff another 6!

You can do what I am going to do ......make kachoris everyday, till I get the taste just right!

But, if any of you do have the original recipe............please please do share it with me.

Welcome to my table

My first experience with cooking was with old Miss Samson when it was compulsory for all the girls to learn Home Science. Most of the time was spent in the Cookery Lab as it was called, with the fan whirring in the back ground while Miss Samson droned on and on about culinary terms. Starting from A is for Acetic Acid till Z is for Zest. I can't remember how many pages of such terms we wrote and what purpose it all served for none of us as far as I remember went on to become master chefs or even gourmet cooks.

All that we were really interested in was the fact that we could escape from Quadratic Equations and the flying chalks of Mr. Lewis which we faced in the period just before Home Science. That and the fact that once in a month, we would actually be able to try our hand at cooking!

Little did I know then, that the knowledge learned in Miss Samson's classes would eventually be all that I would carry with me throughout my life.