Tomato Curry

All my Sundays are spend with my family and it’s a day of feast. My sister makes delicious lunch and we all get together and have tasty meals. At night, we have something light. Sometimes I help in the kitchen and get chance to try out new recipes because family is eager to eat something different. The problem with my cooking is that I cannot reproduce the taste. So it’s always ‘enjoy the present meal and don’t ask for repeats.’

For me cooking is a creative activity but it is difficult to reproduce, even if I follow the same recipe. Many times people think that I am hesitant to share the recipe but they don’t understand that I cannot repeat. Maintaining this blog has helped me a lot. I jot down the recipe that I make and ask them to go to my blog to read my recipe.

Sista wanted to have tomato curry. I promised her that I would cook the coming Sunday, but I forget. But promise is the promise, so I made in the mid-week and sent it across.

Sista loved it.

Its easy but too much time consuming. It took me at least an hour to make.

Ingredients:

4 large tomatoes

2 tablespoon of tomato soup powder

1tsp cumin seeds (jeera)

1tsp fenugreek seeds (methi seeds)

1 pinch of asafetida (hing)

1 inch grated ginger (adrak)

2 sprigs of curry leaves (curry patta)

4-5 green chilies (mirchi)

1 tbsp chickpea powder (besan)

1tsp turmeric powder (haldi)

1tsp salt (namak)

1tsp sugar (shakkar)

1tsp red chili powder (lal mirchi)

dried tamarind flowers (imli key phool)

1 medium size brinjal (beygan)

1 medium size carrot (gajjar)

5-6 okra (bhindi)

4tbsp shelled peas (vatana)

2 medium size potatoes (aalloo)

2tbsp tamarind paste (emlee)

2tbsp coriander leaves (dhania)

Method:

Step1

Tomatoes are boiled in pressure cooker.

Step2

They are removed, peeled and made into puree.

Step3

To the liquid left over after boiling tomatoes, 2 tablespoons of tomato soup powder is added. Mix it well.

Step 4

In the pan, heat oil

Step 5

Add cumin seeds, fenugreek seeds, asafetida, grated ginger, curry leaves and green chilies

Step6

Add 1tbsp of chickpea powder

Step 7

Mix it well on low flame till the chickpea powder is roasted well and is light brown in color.

Step 8

Add tomato soup

Step 9

Mix well to clear all the lumps and let it boil

Step 10

Add tomato puree

Step 11

Add turmeric powder, salt, sugar and red chili powder

Step 12

Add dried tamarind flowers

Step 13

Add mixed vegetables like brinjals, shelled peas, okra, potatoes, and carrots.

Step 14

Soak the tamarind in water for 10 minutes, mash the tamarind and squeeze out the pulp leaving behind tamarind water. Add this water to the curry

Step 15

Taste and adjust for salt, sugar and sourness.

Step 16

Garnish with coriander leaves.

Serve with white rice.

Cocktail Making Competition

I took part in cocktail making competition at Mogamoto (Fort) and was surprised when my team  bagged the first prize.

We were the team of food bloggers grouped into 3 persons for each team and the idea was to create an innovative cocktail. Since I like spicy stuff, I decided to add black pepper.

It was a relaxing afternoon at the Mogamoto at Fort, restaurant done up beautifully with drapes on the ceiling and art on the walls. A flight of 10 wooden steps separates the restaurant into two levels giving it a cozy touch.

Each team went behind the bar at the cocktail station to play around with the ingredients. There were drinks, juices, syrups, garnish and exotic ingredients. The temptation to make an innovative cocktail was strong. Initially, I wanted to be just an audience, watching all the teams perform, but at the last moment, I was inspired too and decided to make something different by playing around with the ingredients.

It was fun watching team prepare the cocktail. There was lotsa discussion on what to add, with little prompts from the bar tender, who were always willing to help. The crew of ‘Food Food Channel’ were all set with their cameras, shooting the session for their program, while the judges asked questions after every drink, discussing the ingredients used, and then passing around to everybody to taste and pass the verdicts.

Team A

Team B

Team C

Team D

 I am not much of cocktail or mocktail person. If left on my own, I will just sip plain water. But in a company of friends,( so as to not stand apart), I will have a small glass of fresh juice. Lately cocktails and mocktail have made remarkable appearances at the parties. You feast on finger food and sip your drink. To go with a flow, I drink whatever is available. I normally take just one small glass and it stays with me as an ornament after few small sips.

So, what is cocktail?

A cocktail is kind of a salad, mixing of hard drinks, fruit juices, herbs, water and whatever you fancy. It normally consists of three different classes of ingredients.

The first: the base.

Base is normally some sort of spirit like gin, whisky, vodka, wine, brandy, etc.

The second: The modifier.

This is used to bring out the aroma of the base and to modify the taste. The main flavoring is normally different fruit juices.

The third: The flavor

Flavor is added to enhance the taste of the base and also adds color to the drink. Common special flavoring are basil leaves, kafir leaves, lime, lemon, ginger and other garnishes.

Most cocktails are also decorated with fruit slices like orange peels, cocktail sticks, mint twigs etc.

Off the track, a friend asks 

‘Why did cocktail bleed?’ – 

because it was bloody Mary, 

another Q- ‘Why did cocktail not marry? – 

because it preferred to be virgin Mary……

Family Dinner At Baan Toa

It was an evening out with my large family at Baan Toa in Hyatt, Pune. There was a kind of festive mood but I couldn’t decide on which cousin to favor and choose my seat. Finally, the decision was made to separate the veg family from non-veg one, and I quietly squeezed in-between non-veg cousins to spend a lovely evening with interesting conversation and delicious Pan Asian food.

But what really impressed me was the décor. The water cascading against the tiled walls into the pool filled with cluster of red and green Dragon fruits, the sound of the dripping water and the dim lights gave a very romantic aura, and I was not surprised when I saw a young couple slicing a chocolate cake to celebrate their wedding anniversary.

We occupied the large dining room

The tables are already set with a plate of micro greens and three accompanying dipping sauces: hot garlic, shezwan and a cucumber relish. There were two more sauces on the side, one with coriander leaves and other with lemon grass.

While we waited for the order, we rolled the greens with sour n chilly sauce and played the game of guessing the ingredients.

The starter, an IceBerg salad was perfect; crunchy Ice Berg coated with Japanese peanut dressing, melt in the mouth, it was simply delightful.

We ordered just three different types of Dim Sums, mixed vegetables, chicken and prawns. The prawns were the best, succulent and sweet. I am told that this is the place that serves a special set brunch where there are variety of dim sums, some 15-16 different types of vegetarian and non-vegetarian, with salads and desserts.

I didn’t like the wanton soup at all, it was bland and even though I added sauces and chili vinegar, it was not satisfying. That’s when I heard some loud voices from the kitchen. The kitchen was too close to the dinning area where we were sitting and any commotion in the kitchen could be heard. Was it chef or were there some other cooks? but emotions in the kitchen was affecting the quality of the food. The Vietnamese rolls tasted raw, rice noodles too sticky, soup very bland.

The chefs have to be calm or the food may not taste good. Service was excellent with waiters apologetic about the loud noises from kitchen. The devil in me wanted to walk to the kitchen to see the commotion.

Maybe, had I gone in, the calm would have returned and I would have some really tasty cuisine that the restaurant is normally known for.