Feasts of friends and food - Ross’s Momos

With everything that has been happening especially through July, I did not get around to posting an extremely important event in my life and the life of this blog. I have mentioned Ross AKA Roshan Tamang on this blog. But for those who might have missed it I am going to introduce him one more time....

On my CV, it says I am a blogger before all of the other things I have added to my skill set over the years; writer, stylist, author, consultant... When I began blogging almost 9 years ago, I had no idea where it would take me. And the man that got me blogging was Ross. 

On a sabbatical from work, we were posted in Chandigarh, a strange new city and a small baby. I  would spend hours surfing the net, looking for something to engage me in, in the hours until my husband came home from work. At the time, chatting was a new phenomenon (this was the time of ICQ for those of you who remember it.... and unaccompanied by the baggage of suspicion it has today). In my online explorations, I happened upon someone who was interesting to chat with. Intelligent, he made interesting conversation and indulged me by spending hours chatting almost every day. This stranger and I became great friends. So much so that it got to the point, that I would harrow him by typing in CAPITALS until he dropped whatever he was doing to chat with me!

So, in what I suspect was a move to give me something to occupy my mind my mysterious friend suggested I try my hand at blogging. The rest as they say – is history. We are still friends and his name is Roshan Tamang. Every time I achieve something - no matter how big or small - I have what I call a Ross moment, a moment of remembering him, and thanking him, for taking the time out to give me attention all those years ago. And the most fascinating thing about our friendship was that we had been friends for more than a decade but had never met!

Untill the 9^th of July 2010. 

I was travelling to Delhi for one of my demos at Nature’s Basket and happened to chat with Ross on Gchat (where we meet these days). I cornered him on never having time to meet me. So we made a date for me to finally visit him at home for a meal of Momos made by him and something made by me. Momos is something Ross had taught me how to make over the internet all those years ago and had always said he made well. By the time I landed in Delhi it had evolved into a full fledged feast with the slaughter of a fatted calf... well pig in this case. 

"I am making momos" He messaged me, and I have a lot of friends who want to cook for you so you don't cook, we will just chill with a few drinks and good food and talk." Well I was not going to complain about what was turning out to be my idea of a fabulous evening! And I have no idea how I got through the day, I was so looking forward to FINALLY meeting him.

I arrived late after I was done with work and the party was already happening. After initial introductions in which I met a whole bunch of Ross’s friends, (who instantly became friends for me having heard about me from him forever!) we rolled up our sleeves and got down to making Momos, led by the expert, Ross. And then once a towering steamer was cooking away a humungous amount of motley shaped momos, Ross showed me how to make a potent chilli paste to dip them in once they were done.

Here is his recipe.

Ross’s Momos

“The recipe I will share is of meat Momo, something I picked up from my mom as a kid and improvised over the years. You may want to improvise it further, but do remember traditional Tibetan momos do not have fancy ingredients in them”

Ingredients for filling:

250g mutton, beef, chicken or pork finely minced
250g onion finely chopped
2-3 cloves of garlic finely chopped
1 inch of ginger finely chopped
Salt to taste

Ingredients for dough:

White flour (maida)

Ingredients for sauce/chutney:

2 ripe tomatoes

Bunch of coriander leaves

5-10 red chillies

Salt to taste

Method:

Mix meat, onion, cloves, ginger and salt in a large bowl. If meat is lean add a tablespoon of vegetable oil, this prevents the meat filling from becoming too dry when cooked. For vegetable fillings, butter is added. Let the mixture marinade for a while. Mix the white flour with water and knead into a smooth and consistent dough. Don’t make it too hard or too soft. Once done, cover the dough, do not let the surface dry.

Now roll out the dough into small rotis, like mini-pooris. Try and keep the size and thickness consistent. Remember: too thin and the filling will poke out, too thick and the floury taste takes over. Take the rolled-out dough in one hand, add a spoonfull of the filling pinch the edges of the dough to give it a curved shape or a rounded dumpling-like form.

Bring the water in the momo cooker to a boil and place these dumplings on a well-oiled container and steam it for 15 minutes.

For tomato sauce/chutney, boil tomatoes in water till well cooked. Alternately, poke tomatoes with 4-5 tooth picks and char them over gas stove till the peel burns and the flesh gets cooked. Peel off the tomato and put it in a grinder with red chillies (pre-soaked in hot water) and make it into a paste. Garnish with chopped corainder leaves. 

Arrange the momos amd chutney on plate and serve hot.