India : Day 8 : Post 2

We're doing a repeat eatery. Original eats post was here.

Why mess around when it's this good, eh?

Dinner at Mexican "Bistro"

The CC and a friend from out of town had dinner at a local spot. The friend was vegetarian so the CC ordered a compatible meal so the friend could try everything.

The friend was in raptures. The CC says "DUH!!!"

Butternut Squash Soup (with corn)
Huitlacoche Enchiladas
Gnocchi with Squash in a Saffron-Epazote Broth

India : Day 8 : Post 1

Black chickpeas, potatoes, onions, green chillies, black salt, lime.

This shit is addictive, yo!

India : Day 7 : Post 2

Perfectly "ordinary" lunch (by Indian standards.)

Those of you are salivating (and the CC sees you there, in the corner), time for some reevaluation.

Oh, and lunch for four cost less than a typical New York lunch sandwich. And this is a "tourist town" hence "absurdly overpriced".

Capisce, paisano?

Palak Paneer

Aristocratic Banquet

From Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's only novel Il Gattopardo:

Beneath the candelabra, beneath the five tiers bearing towards the distant ceiling pyramids of home-made cakes that were never touched, spread the monotonous opulence of buffets at big balls: coraline lobsters boiled alive, waxy chaud-froids of veal, steely-lined fish immersed in sauce, turkeys gilded by the oven's heat, rosy foie-gras under gelatine armour, boned woodcocks reclining on amber toast decorated with their own chopped guts, dawn-tinted galantine, and a dozen other cruel, coloured delights. At the end of the table two monumental silver tureens held limpid soup, the tint of burnt amber. To prepare this supper the cooks must have sweated away in the vast kitchens from the night before.

'Dear me, what an amount! Donna Margherita knows how to do things well. But it's not for me!'

Scorning the table of drinks, glittering with crystal and silver on the right, he moved left towards that of the sweetmeats. Huge sorrel babas, Mont Blancs snowy with whipped cream, cakes speckled with white almonds and green pistachio nuts, hillocks of chocolate-covered pastry, brown and rich as the top soil of the Catanian plain from which, in fact, through many a twist and turn they had come, pink ices, champagne ices, coffee ices, all parfaits and falling apart with the squelch of a knife cleft; a melody in major of crystallised cherries, acid notes of yellow pineapple, and green pistachio paste of those cakes called 'Triumphs of Gluttony', shameless 'Virgins' cakes' shaped like breasts. Don Fabrizio asked for some of these, and as he held them on his plate looked like a profane caricature of Saint Agatha claiming her own sliced-off breasts. 'Why didn't ever the Holy Office forbid these puddings when it had the chance? 'Triumphs of Gluttony' indeed! (Gluttony, mortal sin!) Saint Agatha's sliced-off teats sold by convents, devoured at dances! Well! Well!'

Hot Sex in a Bottle!

Suka Pinakurat
You need it, baby! You just don't know it yet!

Thai Tricks of the Trade

Salacious title but it refers to food, you perverts!

The CC was taken to a "home-style" Thai restaurant. This was extraordinarily good cooking. What an extraordinarily competent mom (not grandmom, mind you!) would make.

If this sounds like "damning by faint praise", rest assured, it's anything but. The CC has impossibly high standards, and this is quite excellent food.


What surprised the CC was how quickly they could tailor the recipe. The owner ("Charlie") would quickly gauge the heat quotient of the tables and either amp it up or down.

What was extraordinary was that they could tailor the heat using dry chillies or Thai green chillies, on demand (the two taste nothing like each other!)

This is almost impossible. There's gotta be a trick.

It took the CC a day to figure it out.

The clue was given by the friend who took the CC there. He remarked, while eating, that the heat seemed to be on the "surface" of the noodles -- an extraordinarily perceptive remark -- the significance of which the CC didn't quite latch on to for that night and the morning after.

DOH!!!!!!

It's an old Thai cooking trick. One of the oldest in the book.

In fact, the CC has used it here (in the first dish.)

Dry rice is roasted on a skillet and ground to a fine powder. You can mix it with anything. This powder is the glue of cooking. It will stick to anything that it comes in contact with. In fact, it's hard to get this powder to unstick!

This is precisely the trick they use to get water-based salad dressings to work!

Rice powder mixed with powdered chillies!

Pan-Seared Cod with Quinoa, Roasted Vegetables, and Wild Arugula

Bitch Slap!

Diana Kennedy writes in her wondrous book, My Mexico:

The good cooks of Chihuhahua do not, of course, call the USDA food safety hotline to ask it it's okay to dry their uncooked beef on a clothesline, the way it's been done for generations.

Give it to them, Diana! Show no mercy.

Linguini with Rosemary and Anchovies

Rigatoni with Brussel Sprouts & Anchovies

Trenette with Anchovies, Tomatoes and Peas

Orecchiette with Broccoli & Anchovies

The Nectar of the Gods

These are whole anchovies preserved in salt a.k.a. pure umami.

They are much preferred to anchovies preserved in oil because they are more versatile. However, they need to be deboned which is quite easy. The salt just allows you to peel each side away leaving the skeleton behind.

India : Day 7 : Post 1

This is the hotel breakfast which was one of the great WTF moments of all time.

It's pan-Indian, and a total mish-mash. It's like having pancakes, and pasta, and pad thai in the same meal. (Clearly, they are catering to some very confused tourists!)

However, the CC is purist but not that purist. Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. That's eat breakfast. Especially if it's good.

India : Day 6 : Post 1

We drove to Agra on day 6. Started very early, and stopped at a local dhaba (trucker's restaurant) for a late breakfast.

Vegetables fried in chickpea batter. Nothing like a good nutritious meal to start the day right!

We liked it so much, we ordered a second round (pictorial proof provided below.) It's topped with kala namak, of course.

Piggy, piggy, piggy. Oink, oink, oink!

Kala Namak

This is the ultimate love-it-or-hate-it thing about Indian street food. It's "black salt" which is really purplish-gray in color.

It is basically salt with trace amounts of iron sulphide which give it the color and the faint smell of hydrogen sulphide. To put it differently, it smells like the gutter, and there's no way to put this politely, ripe farts. It's an acquired taste. To those that acquire it, it's like crack-cocaine. To those that don't, you're missing out. Big-time!

The CC is addicted, needless to say.

This is not going to be the greatest advertisement for this product but those who are addicted probably know what the CC is talking about. You can't live without it!

The Complete Meal

India : Day 5 : Post 7

We were pigs on Day 5. We skipped dinner. It wasn't missed.

India : Day 5 : Post 6

It's only the fifth day in India, and the sixth food post for the day, and we've just gotten to lunch time.

If you're under the opinion that all the CC did in India was eat and eat and eat and then just for good measure eat some more, you would only be partially right.

We did eat though.

Linguini with Mussels and Rosemary

This is such an easy dish to throw together on nights when cooking can be a chore.

Access to fresh mussels is a must. It's quite easy on the East Coast to get local mussels but the CC realizes that this may not be the case elsewhere.

The CC has shelled the mussels below but you need not. Just toss it all together. If you don't have rosemary, use thyme, or tarragon, or parsley. They all work perfectly.

Coupled with a simple salad, and some crusty bread to mop up the juices, it makes a perfect weekday meal. (You can share the rest of the bottle of white wine to go with it.)

Ingredients

1 lb mussels
1 onion (chopped coarsely)
2 sprigs rosemary (chopped)
3/4 cup white wine (substitute by stock/water.)

linguini (or even spaghetti)
salt
pepper

Recipe

Heat a tiny bit of oil. Toss in the mussels, and stir just for a bit. Add in the wine. Cover and steam them until they open (about 2-3 minutes.) Do not overcook. (The CC removes the mussels one by one using tongs as they open.)

Now, you want to keep the mussel water because it has all the flavor but it may have grit so you need to filter it.

Separately, in a large pan, fry the onions. Add the rosemary, black pepper, and then the mussel water. Reduce just a little bit not too much.

Cook the pasta just under al dente in heavily salted water. Toss with the mussels and the cooked liquid. Serve.

The CC has gotten it down so that the first two steps take exactly the same amount of time as the pasta to get done. So can you!

India : Day 5 : Post 5 : Paranthewalli Galli

This is the famous Paranthewalli Galli in Delhi's Chandni Chowk neighborhood. We are talking tiny tiny lanes which are narrow, crowded, and super-filthy.

Naturally, the food is out of the world because nobody but the locals and the criminally insane would go there (so the CC qualifies!)

They only make one thing - paratha's. Stuffed with innumerous ingredients as the first photograph shows. The second word in all the items is just paratha so the CC will just list out all of the stuffings from top to bottom: potato, lentils, fenugreek leaves, cauliflower, radish, peas, paapdi, parwal, carrots, "mixed", paneer, mint, lime, "rolled", "sweet", fruit and nuts, cashews, raisins, almonds, rabdi, "golden", banana, bitter melon, okra, and tomatoes.

The place is pure vegetarian (being run and originally catering to the Brahmins) and the food is cooked in ghee (clarified butter.)

This was breakfast which started the day off on a perfectly healthy note. Hey! The CC was on vacation.

The lassi featured below comes from a neighboring shop. They outsource! And focus on what they do best. (Ricardo lives!!!) If you order it, a boy is sent (child labor laws be damned!) and you can have a complete meal.

Please note that the cup of lassi is disposable and bio-degradable. It's just clay. Elementary, my dear fellows!