Le Crueset LOVE!!!

It’s been a while since I have jumped up and down in excitement over something, I think, becoming a wife a mother and the MD of your own company does weigh you down from such excesses after a point in life! But today I did! Because  I FINALLY received my birthday present from my DH exactly a month after my birthday . Le Crueset is the diamond of the cooking equipment world you see and when the choice is between buying that or a million other things your  fledgling company needs on a priority basis, the choice is obvious.  I cannot tell you how many times I have sighed over this lovely enamel cookware, caressed it lovingly and walked away! 

But finally I had my own Cherry Red Round Colcotte sitting on the desk near me (cos I could not bear to be parted from me) and kept wandering off mentally, ruminating over what to cook. I had a pile of work to do and 4 days of cooking classes staring me in the face from the next morning but it is not every-day that one acquires a Le Crueset and I just HAD to cook something that night. Finally I compromised on a relatively quick spiced up Bean Cassoulet based on what I had on hand and also because my vegetarian mother was coming to dinner. Its nowhere near a recipe that realises the full potential of a Le crueset but it satisfied my need to cook in for that moment in time. Soon I shall cook wonderfull dishes in it as well. Here is the recipe!

Bean Cassoulet
3 medium onions, chopped fine
2 medium carrots, chopped fine
3 green capsicums, chopped fine
1 tbsp garlic, chopped
1/4 c olive oil
2 tbsp chilli minced
2 tbsp Oregano
1 bay leaf
1 star anise
1 inch piece cinnamon
4 cloves
½ tsp peppercorns
2 cans cannellini beans
5 cups water

Make cassoulet:
Heat oil and add onions, carrots, capsicum and garlic with whole spices, cook over medium low heat, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are softened and aromatic golden (about 15 minutes), stir in beans, then water, Oregano and simmer, partially covered, stirring occasionally, until everything is cooked and smelling delicious. Serve in big bowls, with crusty bread and a green salad on the side.

Eat Pray Love

Dear Rushina,

One of the best things about coming home is eating with my family. My parents are firm believers of that commonly quoted proverb – “A family that prays together stays together”. My father has extended this to a family eating together. He credits the strong bond he has with his siblings to the meals they have shared together while growing up. So our two daily meals (in the morning and evening) are as important as our daily family devotion. And before each meal, we pray together to give thanks.

As a fellow foodie, you will perhaps understand me when I say eating (good food) can be a spiritual experience. This is particularly true for me when smoked pork cooked in axone is laid out before me. The combined sense of gratitude and awe that something could look, feel and taste this scrumptious has more than once led me to declare that partaking of this dish is an act of worship for me. Even as my devout mother prudently counseled me to “search my heart” to see if it was God or Food I worshipped.
But it is much more than a personal experience. There is something about praying together before eating that consecrates both the food on the table as well as the moment of eating. By praying together, you have entered into some more profound union with the people with whom you share the meal. And this has always made meal times with friends and family more meaningful.
So much so that I often long to say a quick prayer with friends for whom this practice is entirely alien. Few attempts have been hilarious, with one friend sincerely saying amen after each word, all of us ended up laughing by the end of my “prayer”. But with many new friends from different cultures, I can only truly experience this when I come home to our little dining table and my family of five. It is where I learnt that food is a gift from God and where I learnt to thank Him for it. It is where the foodie in me can be truly spiritual and where I can worship one bite at a time.

Pez - reaserch roundup

A story on Pez written by me was published in the Saturday (29 June) edition of Times of India, Goa.

In it I comment on how I found my perfect bowl of pez masquerading as porridge on the distant island of Singapore a few years ago!

Researching this article was fun. I already knew that Pez/ Kanji/ Rice porridge is a part of many cuisines around India as well as the world, but to verify that I sent out a mail to friends asking for a little help.

"I am working on an article on rice gruel/porridge, that is available in a variety of cuisines Indian as well at international. Called Pez/pej/ Kanji/Porrige it is a dish in which rice is cooked in lots of water and can be served with a variety of condiments. Does this sound like something you have come across in your cuisine? Would love any and all info. Recipes would be awesome!"

Friends were more than generous with their replies and my 750 word limit ould not encompass them all but here is a roundup.

Apolina Fos "We in Bassein have a rice porridge called 'kaneri'. It is had every morning as a mid-morning drink around 10am. Those working in the fields have their quota delivered. Rice is coarsely ground (even coarser than semolina). The rice is of course ground in the flour mill. Water is boiled, salted and the rice meal added to the boiling water. A little sugar is added and a little milk is stirred in after the kaneri has cooked. Kaneri like a thin soup and is served in a plate, on its own or with pickles..."

Deccanheffalump of the awesome Pune based blog "The Cooks Cottage" too time out to tell me about the medicinal pez her guru tuned her into, "When I was in Amritsar I was given a recipe by my music master (hindustani zlassical) and a local astrologer for a rice gruel recipe for dysentery/diarhhoea. In a teaspoon of ghee ( yes ghee!) fry some jeera. Add soaked rice and fry for a bit. Now add plenty of water i.e. for a tablespoon of rice about 2 cups of water. Let it cook till thick and soft. Serve. You can also add 1/2 tsp anar dana to this while cooking. I suppose this might be a punjabi recipe? The thing is it works! I gave it everyday to a guest who had viral gastro enteritis and who could keep nothing down. Well this stuck. Tastes good too."

My friend Clarajoy Alookaran of Mediascope, wrote in to share the recipe for the version, generally made for the infirm, in Kerela.

"Wash rice and dry it under the fan/sun. Dry roast the rice on low flame stirring all the while until the rice changes its colour or until you get a fragrance of the roasted rice. Allow to cool. Grind to a coarse powder in the mixer. Take 2 to 3 heaped table spoons of the rice powder, add a lot of water and keep it on low flame, stirring occasionally to a pouring consistency until the rice is soft, add salt and grated coconut mix well. Serve hot with a teaspoon of pure ghee & roasted papad."

Ammini Ramchandran, author of the stellar book "Grains greens and grated coconuts "I published an article on the topic in 2002 in the magazine Flavor & Fortune.
I have it on web site also. Here is a link to the article Hope it will be
of some help.

My food writer friend Marryam wrote " In goa, pez was the farmer's meal between breakfast and lunch, eaten with either water pickle (preserved raw mango in brine) or a piece of fried/dried fish. In Kashmir, a similar thing is called dodh vegra and is a kind of kindergarten pap eaten when someone is ill. It has none of the additions that you have asked about in the Muslim tradition: it is the opposite end of the spectrum from a gourmet dish, so by definition, is eaten when you are too ill to put down meat, spices etc.

Susan Ji young Park wrote to say that the The Book Of Rai forum has a thread on this subject.

I also caught up with a few people on Gmail chat and here is a summary of that exercise:

Mitali Kar checked with her mom and reverted that there is lei or leyee which is what in which rice and water are over boiled and created into a mishmash. This is popular in villages and the the dish is rich because the water gets absorbed by the rice. It can be had during lunch or dinner as it is highly nutritious. For additional flavour one you can add carrots, cauliflowers, beans, potatoes, turmeric and salt.



While I was working on the story, I had rice porridge every way possible. Not because I was trying recipes, but because I was assailed with cravings for the stuff every time I sat down to write! And it's usually the case, when I am engrossed in writing on a subject, I just have to eat what I am writing about which can get complicated at times. The picture above is of a concoction that turned out particularly well. It had a beaten egg added like with Chinese soups, sliced sausages and I ate it with some of the green pepper pickle I had made last year.

Dumpling Noodle Soup

This is a wonderful time to be in Bombay. The weather is just right… cool enough to encourage walks during the day and open air events in the evenings… to wave away that cold salad and give in to temptation “just this once” with that steaming bowl of cheesy pasta…

And after a marathon week of planning, cooking for and executing of my sons birthday party, with today being a sunday, I was hankering after one of my favourite meals, Chicken Dumpling soup. I like dishes that have lots of bites of goodness in them that come together into "A perfect bite" and this soup, steaming hot, with silky pasta, crunchy vegetables and tender dumplings, topped with fried shallots, chillies, chilli paste, chilli and sesame oil and shredded lettuce is a favourite.

I have many ways of making noodle soup. I do a chicken version of the vietnamese pho, a variation inspired by Kylie Kwongs White-cooked chicken with soy & ginger dressing, and even a maggi soup. The unifying factor in them all is that they start with a good stock as a base in which the noodles are cooked and are served with a variety of toppings.

Chicken Dumpling Soup

First prepare your vegetables

This time I used carrots, cauliflower, green beans, pak choy, chinese cabbage and snow peas. Layer them in that exact order (with stems from pak choy and cabbage going in before the leaves) in a large holed collander so the steam cooks the tougher stuff first.

Now get your stock base going
4 lts water or homemade stock
4 onions cut in six wedges each
12 garlic cloves, crushed
1 1/2 cups ginger slices
3 tbsp Massells chicken stock powder OR 4 cubes of any stock
Salt to taste
1/3 cup oil

Heat the oil in a large stockpot and add the onions, garlic and ginger. Stirfry briskly until the edges of everything is well browned. Add the water or the stock, bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer gently for 10 minutes to allow the flavours to infuse. Add stock powder if using water, stir well, give it a minute to dissolve. Leave on simmer. Place prearranged collander of vegetables on top of the stockpot and cover with a lid.

Now make the dumplings

500 gms minced meat ( I use chicken mince)
1 egg
2 tbsp garlic, chopped fine
2 tbsp chopped herbs (green coriander, garlic or onion)
1 tsp chilli paste (optional)
1 tbsp corn flour
salt to taste

Combine everything in a large bowl and mix well. Your vegetables should be nicely done by now. Set collander aside and bring soup to a boil again. When it is boiling briskly, start dropping spoonfuls of the dumpling mixture shaped into rough rounds in. Your dumplings will sink at first but rise up again as they get cooked. When you have gone through all the mixture, give the dumpling 2 - 3 mins more to cook and then strain out and reserve in a bowl.

Add 250 gms of noodles to the boiling stock. Allow to cook untill soft and silky and add dumplings back into pot. Serve into individual bowls ensuring a bit of everything goes into each bowl.

Place a platter of condiments on the table so diners can tweak their servings to taste.

Hot - Lee Kum Kee Chui Chow Chilli paste - a tongue twister of a name but what a kick! Just dole out a bowl full.

Also finely minced fresh red or green chillies

Sour - Pickled cucumbers - Peel two cucumbers and slice in half lengthwise, scoop out seeds and eat with a bit of salt, slice white parts up thinly, salt and leave to drain for 15 mins. Squeeze to remove juices and place in a bowl. Add 1 - 2 finely minced chillies if you want (I love a little heat), 1/2 tsp sugar and 1/2 cup of any natural vinegar (not synthetic). Adjust salt and chill untill eating time! TIP: if you have pickers around (those species that pick through everything while you are cooking so you have nothing left) then do 4 times as much. Heck do more anyway these are great in the summer.

Also Lemon

Salty - Chillies and fish sauce - This is a given with fried rice in Thailand, smash as many chillies as you can handle to a pulp in a mortar, add 1/2 cup fish sauce and allow to stand untill eating. You can also add fried onions to this and make it a chutney. I like it with my khichdi and dal rice. If you do not have fish sauce add dried jawla and salt and crush or just add salt.

Sweet - Honey Chilli sauce - the Thai one that is readily available.

Herby- finely minced fresh basil, mint and/or coriander.

Crunch - shredded iceberg lettuce, blanched shredded cabbage and or bean sprouts.