Shameless Self Promotion ;-) ™ © ℠ ®

You order a plate of fried rice and the waiter give u fork and knife, along with spoon. Now spoon is ok. But knife and fork???
I am a convert. There was a time I was crazy about Chinese. Then Pizza. But at the end am again back to North Indian stuff. Same dal roti and Tanduri stuff. I wont order any other dish in restaurants as I know I will never find authentic stuff. Chinese noodles are normally boiled and fried noodles. Just with added dash of Soya sauce. Then dumplings, more commonly known as momos, they suck. Crap. Then come to dosas. Order any dosa. No change. Same story is with Uthapam. And sambar. All south Indian food joints serve sambhar as it is some kind of substitute for water. No offend to any Mallu, Telugu or Tamil frend but am really amazed to see sambhar with everything. I still don’t know is sambhar taken separately or is it eaten along with the main item, say uthapam or dosa. The story is far worse with Punjabi stuff. The Dal is same. Order any kind of stuff that comes with gravy, gravy is same. Still I see lot of rush in Sector 35 in Chandigarh.
I have sampled many eating joints and I am still searching for a joint that serves authentic regional food.
I have learned a super duper hit formula for cooking any thing that needs gravy. Its bit painstaking job but the result is really delicious. So let’s get set and go.
Ingredients for this wonderful gravy
Onions, finely sliced onions. Don’t use mixer. Slice them. Finely.
4-5 cloves. Laung.
3-4 an inch-long Cinnamon sticks. Dalchini.
Cumin seeds. Jeera. Half spoon will do.
Salt according to taste.
Turmeric Powder. Haldi.
Green Chillies. Finely sliced. Hari Mirch.
Tomatoes. Again Finely sliced. Tamatar
Ginger and Garlic too. Adrak and Lehsun.
Black Pepper seeds. Kali mirch.
Cardamom pods. Adi Ilaichi.
Coriander. Half spoon. Sukha Dhania
Red chilli flakes. Lal Mirch.
Curry leaves. Tej pattar.
I don’t like using powdered spices. Spices loose their aroma while grinding. So to fill the kitchen with aroma I prefer using whole spices instead of grinded or powdered.
Oil. Now this is an issue. Mustard oil tastes good and is good for health also. But normally it’s hard to find good stuff. Nearly all the stuff is refined and the oil looses the aroma.
Heat sufficient oil in pan that can cover the onions you have. Fry onions in this oil till they turn golden brown. All this is to be done on mild flame. Mild flame and think base of cooking pan do wonders. Now, when the onions are brown enough add cumin seeds, cloves and cinnamon sticks. Keep frying. This is the toughest part and this decides what will be the result. Add green chilies now. Keep stirring the paste in pan. Otherwise paste will stick to pan and you will end up cooking charcoal. Keep adding a spoon of water. This will prevent the paste from sticking to base of pan. What about ginger and garlic paste? Add this too. One after another keep adding the spices and add turmeric at the end. Now keep moving a spoon in pan after regular interval so that paste is not sticking to pan. This is the climax. Add sliced tomatoes. In fact tomatoes are optional. But if you add tomatoes you need to keep stirring so that the tomatoes juice is properly mixed up with the paste. Keep stirring occasionally. After 5-10 minutes of cooking a very aromatic paste will be ready.

UMMMMMM!!!

Now this is the base for

a) Chicken/Paneer dishes.
Add marinated chicken/Paneer to this paste add some water and keep stirring. Cook for 15 minutes in this paste. Masala Chicken/Paneer ready.

b) Dum aloo.
This is not the right way to cook dum aloo. Add marinated potatoes in the paste. Fry for a while. Add skimmed curd and cook for a while.

c) Rajmah/Kale Channe
Use pressure cooker to make the paste. Add Rajmah/Kaale Channe to this paste. Add enough water. Wait for 4-5 whistles. Rajmah/Kaale Channe must be soaked for at least 12 hours.

d) Mutton
Use pressure cooker to make the paste. Add marinated mutton to this paste. Add sufficient water. Wait for 2-3 whistles. Not a proper way to cook mutton but works for me.

To make things tastier cook jeera rice along with any of this dish. Jeera rice is so simple to cook. We need soaked rice. A spoon of Jeera or cumin seeds. One tablespoon oil. Not mustard oil. Heat oil in pan. Add cumin seeds. As soon as you see the seeds turning into black add soaked rice to pan. Mix the rice and cumin seeds properly. Cook as you simply cook he rice. Simple dish but the aroma is wow.

Enough of cooking. I must go and have my dinner.