Street Food: Jalebi near Masjid station

The effect of time on jalebis is telling. The best jalebi is the one that is still warm crunchy and yet dripping with sweetness.
With jalebis, when left to their own devices, the crunch trends to soggy and a while later sweetness ferments to sourness, completely turning you of the treat.
I discovered this just-in-time jalebi walla not so far away from a regular haunt.
Traveling on the Harbor line to Crawford Market, I alight at Masjid station and am immediately in the midst of an avenue of street food vendors as I get off the railway over bridge.
A little ahead is the jalebi shop that produces these warm and indolently crispy treats!

Jalebi needs a batter of just the right viscosity. Squeezed out into smoking hot oil, the interconnected jalebis sputter excitedly till they've been turned off an inspected to see if they're done. Once of the oil, they're dunked into a large cauldron of thick sugar syrup to absorb sweetness to balance the deep fried crunchiness. Voila! The jalebi is ready!

Street Food: Malpua and Rabdi in Mumbai

The malpua that I grew up eating in Kolkata is a different creature from the one that I encountered in Pune and Mumbai. 

The malpuas of the east were akin to an appam, soft in the centre and a tapering crunchy edge--almost shaped like a flying saucer. 

The ones that I have had in Pune and Mumbai are akin to a deep fried pancake.

For a change I was struck at the lack of information in Wikipedia compared to http://www.ifood.tv/network/malpua. (Mental note to myself to update the Wikipedia article.)

So, I'd just come home after a gruelling session at office when I wandered away from my quest to buy chappatis and chanced upon the aroma of fresh malpuas in Tawakkal. 

Now this is not the Tawakkal of much fame and glory in town. This is smallish sweet shop in Mahim in  the lane that connects L J Road to Cadel Road and the Baba Makdum Shah Dargah.

The interesting part of the pricing is the jump of Rs 20 if add an egg. In my experience it changes the texture of the batter and makes it a little bit more fluffier. So I went ahead and before I could pay and fish out my phone, the eggs were cracked into the mixture, whisked and spread into the smoking hot oil.

Here is a video that shows how it is fried and then generously slathered with Rabdi. 

Very yum and all umami inducing!

Tomato Porar Chutney

I'd decided to make something with panch phoron after digging in and deciding to write about it.... So...

Here is something very easy (it took me around 15min). I made this yesterday night for dinner. Had it along with Begun Bhorta and chappati.

Although you can just chop the tomatoes and throw them in the pan, I like the slightly charred flavours that come with things cooked directly on a fire. Much as I would prefer wood, I had a gas oven at my disposal at 10 in the night when I decided to make this for dinner after playing with the cat.

I put a bit of wire mesh on the oven to char and cook, since it does not mess up my gas oven. You can see the tomatoes happily cooking here... It took five minutes. I did not have tongs (or chimtay as we say in Bengali) so I used chopsticks to turn the tomatoes over after the part on the fire was done.

While the tomatoes were cooking, I added the panch phoron to some smoking hot mustard oil.

Soon the tomatoes joined the party in the pan with  the panch phoron. Be careful not to burn the panch phoron. You can see the ideal colour of the spices in this photo.

Then I added a wee little bit of sugar. You could too, if you like a sweet and tangy chutney like me (although my origins are more bangal (east bengal) ghotis or people who origins lie in the western part of Bengal would prefer this).
  

Tada! I'd some warm comfort food (that was surprisingly healthy!) to eat for dinner.

Try this out and let me know how it turned out...

Kheer Kodombo

This is one sweet that is a rage when it comes to taking it back from Kolkata. 


The kheer kodombo has a sweet little surprise hidden under the outer covering of dryish channa (sweetened paneer/soft milk cheese) of sandesh like consistency. As soon as you bite into it, you will encounter a rosogolla steeped in sugar syrup just below the surface. :) 

After all these years, I finally discovered that the true origins this sweet is not really 'Benagli' per se since Bengali sweets use channa-almost exclusively instead of mawa and kheer. Although the rosogolla inside is channa, the outer covering assimilates sweet making  traditions from other parts of India.


I am always pleasantly surprised to see how eco friendly the bengali sweet shops are still. Notice the degradable recycled cardboard box sans plastic lamination. Sadly they are losing out to the more industrial sweet makers who give a more durable but more plastic box these days.