I love to eat. Food rejuvenates and nourishes, and sometimes reminds you of the cloying sweetness of "Ode to Autumn".
This is my little paradise where the little whiff of heaven or tastes of Valhalla gets recorded...
Silent and cold is the morning in Kolkata. Fixating oneself to the comfort of the bed and within the warmth of a কম্বল (blanket) is a natural reaction.
Crisp, piping hot, deep fried dal puri from the nearest neigbourhood কড়াই (kadahai) is one of those things that can draw one from the womb (perhaps) or at least the কম্বল (blanket)...
Dal Puri
The dal puri from the muslim eateries around my place in Ripon Street is a creature distinct from similar species from the Bengali or any other part of this nation, separated by the taste of the filling and the texture of a deep fried concoction. The Jaipur kachori comes closest to the texture.
It is had in winter with copious soup plates of piping hot Nihari and Paya during winter mornings.
I decided to cook something simple at home for lunch. So I made some Aloo Methi and Aloo Karela... (I hope to put the cooking experience up in a separate post)
Karela... করোলার তরকারি
Aloo Methi...আলু মেথির তরকারি /आलू मेथी
Lunch done and a little siesta later, my dad wanted to visit an old friend of his from his office days. So, we hopped onto a taxi and landed up in Lake Garden.
Enroute, across a railway crossing the তেলে ভাজা (telay bhaja) stall beckoned like a siren from the rocks. So we had to try the piping hot fare that invited us so :P
তেলে ভাজা (telay bhaja) stall
ধনে পাতা ভাজা (Dhania patta fritter)
আলু বড়া (Aloo fritter)
আলু বড়া (Aloo fritter) being devoured
The delights of a nourishing road side economy in early evening is beset with tempting fare. So. Next it was a ফুচকা ওলা (Phuchka Wala) who started his evening with us as his first customers.
Beware! This is NOT the paani puri or gol gappa! Growl and Grr just in case you decide (and dare) to get mixedup between these!
A ফুচকা in hand
A beautiful গন্ধরাজ লেবু (Gondhoraj Lemon) makes things aromatic
তেতুল জল, আলু সিদ্ধ, মটর সিদ্ধ, মশলা এবং কিঞ্চিত লঙ্কা গুড়ো ... আর একটু বিটনুন (Tamarind water, boiled yellow peas, mashed boiled potatoes, and phuchka masala... With a dash of red chilly powder and rock salt
Here we go...
Then of course there was some ভাড়ে করে চা (tea in earthen kulhads) from the nearest stall followed by Tamilian home cooked savouries and excellent filter coffee. The latter of course was at the home of the people we visited.
Once back home, the left overs from lunch got rejected for dinner owing to typical Bengali-esque idiosyncrasies that I have escaped for the last 15 years (রাত্রে তিতো খাইলে অম্বল হয় !)
So I got my dad some Sino-Nepali clear chicken soup (though I was looking for the Chinese made Maida Surua (that is now extinct in Ripon street)), while I settled for an egg chicken kati roll...
Kolkata style Chicken Kati Roll in the making...
Presenting... The Egg Chicken Kati Roll
Presenting... The Egg Chicken Kati Roll
Within the Egg Chicken Kati Roll
Clear Chicken Soup... A valid contrast...
Then I decided to have a look-see at the decked-up-for-Christmas Park Street...
No festivity in Bengal. Let me reiterate. Nothing festive... is possible sans food... Hence the crowds thronged the music arena at Allen Garden and of course--the plethora of food stalls doing brisk (and insane) business...
One was spoilt for choice between authentic chinese, anglo-indian, muslim, and bengali cuisine. Apart from the adapted (and hence not so authentic) Thai, Japanese, and of course the ubiquitous Momos!
Of course there was confectionary from Flury's and a host of interesting places and even the humble candy floss!
Kolkata feels more or less the same every time I come back to the city of my childhood. Perhaps a few more fly-overs, a different and newish airport and the buses and taxis are coloured and built a little different...
Approaching Kolkata to land... 6E 327
And ... EVERYTHING become more expensive with each trip that is separated by time... Indigo works like clockwork. Kolkata proved to be as predictable. I landed in the middle of another strike... A taxi strike. After an expensive and providential journey back home, Baba decided to eat in Azizia... Well, now it is way sootier and is called Beeru's hotel.
Baba and Uncle Raymond at Beeru's Hotel, aka Azizia, Ripon Street, Kolkata
Nothing quite like good old Muslim cuisine :)
Naan Roti
Crisp and piping hot naan rotis
চাঁপ
A dash of chaap (চাঁপ )... Fragrant with rosewater and keora paanin blended in with a bouquet of spices. Just the same way for years on end.
Kheema (কীমা )
And then there was a dal gosht cross over kheema that had dal in it... and a boiled egg for good measure.
Paya (পায়া)
Baba gravitated towards paya.
Tea (চা )
And of course, nothing works as well as a piping hot cup of tea that washes away the grease on the palate. ... The trip begins well...
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!
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.
I have Titin to thank for discovering FabIndia's Burnt Chilly and Garlic salad dressing as a marinade. This is an interesting concoction with heat, an piquant Indian 'spicy-ness' along with a nice tangy from the coconut vinegar.
I had bought some chicken thighs to cook for people who I'd invited one weekend. All of them had microscopic appetites so I still had the thighs sitting around in the refrigerator since even the drum sticks had not been consumed. Chicken thighs, I realised, are a better deal than drumsticks since you get a large slab of meat with a little bone to trap the juiciness (drumsticks have lesser meat per piece) or even boneless meat (which tends to be less juicy since it lacks a bone).
Such realisations alert kitties about meat emerging from the freezer, and soon I was ankle deep in swirling cats and kittens. Ignoring the yowls of half a dozen always hungry kittens I plopped the dressing on the thighs. Then I pacified the hungry felines with some milk before settling down to read the newspaper while the marinade did nice things to the meat.
As hunger struck I whipped out my trusty non-stick pan...
... and added oil with generously and put it on the fire...
The oil warmed to the occasion and soon the chicken sputtered happily in the oil...
A quick turn browned the other side and voilà! I had chicken ready for lunch.
This is very easy to cook and difficult to go wrong with. The chicken cooks quickly and leaves the core nice and moist while the marinade tastes awesome as an enrobement.
Childhood memories of the sausages I've had in Kolkata are a permanent aroma in my brain. Unlike the ones that I now get from a cold storage shop, the made-to-order early morning sausage experiences are etched fondly in some nice places in this cranium.
These sausages have a strong and aromatic song of their own. They start in as sides of pork in a shop in Taltolla Bazar or in New Market... Perhaps earlier, even in Tangra. Baba lifts, prods and inspects before selecting a section of meat and specifies how much meat is needed and hands over the spices we mix and grind at home and some mint and parsley to the sausage maker. He then proceeds to ritually insist that some more fat be added. While a chap sitting at a corner quickly minces some onion and green chillies the the pork rind is dextrously sliced off, the meat and a little extra fat is coarse ground while some more hard belly fat is diced. Then all of this is mixed together with the spices, the mint and parsley, the onions, a little green chilly mince (and often some red chilly powder... that we omit). Squelched together dextrously into a rich, even and glutinous goodness.
Here's a video I found on YouTube that shows how the mixture is pushed into cleaned animal guts and braided into sauages
Once home, Baba pricks the sausages with a think needle to make sure they do not burst while they are cooked. Then a little water is added with a wee little salt and the sausages are simmered in a covered pan. The sausages soon release their own juices, seep liquid fat, and some very heavenly aromas! This hurried shot video does no justice really... You've just got to be there...
Once cooked some of the sausages end up with split skins, this is providential, since they release tasty goodness into the liquid that swaddles them and also because I use this as a neat excuse to quickly gobble them up :)
While most sausages have a singular unified taste, I love the granular texture of the meat in these ones, seeped with a bouquet of (very Indian) spices, the sweetness and bite from the onion, parsley and the hint of mint hiding somewhere while the little cubes of pork fat goodness induces umami.
While one can make a curry out of these sausages, I like having them with bread, plain rice or naan... Just with the fat and juices the sausages produce while they cook.
These freeze and keep well in the fridge. For rather extended periods of time. Contrary to what people may tell you, they travel quite well. Else I would not be having them in Mumbai :)
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