Saag Paneer, I love you

Here's my favourite chef.......

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/chef_biogs/j.shtml


and some of her recipes......

http://www.bbc.co.uk/apps/ifl/food/showrecord?templatestyle=chef&config=chef&page=1&pagesize=15&Id=Madhur+Jaffrey

We did this one last weekend, and it was delicious....
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/tandooristylechicken_7235.shtml

....and if you're in London during September, you must not miss THIS....


http://www.visitbricklane.com/bricklanefestival/

It's 1:30 pm here.....and i'm craving for hot alu parathas with sweet-n-sour mango chutney...

With a mug of masala chai, perhaps?

My weakness is/are samosa. If there is a plateful at a party, and I happen to notice them, I will have one....and then another....and another..it's like an addiction.

I have now made up my mind to have the hottest curry I can find tonight, but am too lazy to cook it.

So....I will stroll up to The Prince of Bengal, and have a browse at their take away menu.

I'm hungry. This is nearly my favorite food in the world.

There is a killer restaurant here, Indian/Pakistani, and their goat curry is crazy good. I don't even like goat usually (except goat cheese which is mmMmm).

I love love love the fudge they make too. Little white 'sponges' of sweetness, blocks of multicoloured fudges w/ nuts and spices and fruits of every imaginable sort. The Best! Reminds me very much of the maple and sugar fudges; but even sweeter somehow.
Anyone know what they are called anyways? I have only ever seen them at this one restaurant...and I have looked and asked around.

flushd, I'm sure that there are many wonderful Indian desserts and sweets out there, but I have never found one in an Indian Resataurant.

The menu for desserts is usually a stiff plastic card, with pictures of various flavoured ice creams on it.

I have tried several, at different restaurants, but they have all arrived, rock hard frozen, complete with hammer and chisel instead of a spoon.

Mind you, I am not really a dessert type of person, so maybe I haven't put enough energy into the variety that may be available.

Maybe sakhi (the one with that incredibly sensuous avatar) may be able to help.

<mouth drooling>

I'm missing Indian food since I've been here in Prague. Actually there are a couple of restaurants I must try.

I didn't eat meat for a few years and found that the Indian vegetarian food was some of the best in the world.

As many (most?) Indians are effectively vegetarian, that's no real surprise, I suppose.

Southern Indian food (idli, dosa etc.) is very good...with sambhar.

Mmmm...

KP

Indian vegetarian dishes, although famous for making one noisily flatulent, are quite heavenly.

Palak is always Spinach , Saag can be of any green veggies including Palak (India has variety of spinachs like Fenugreek called as methi, Raddish Leaves called as Mulaa , Gongura called as Ambadi)



Paneer isn't spinach. It means farmers cheese. So Palak Paneer means Cheesy Spinach Curry. Saag is curry of any green vegetable.

Meanwhile love to see Indian foodies....

The most items discussed here are either purely North Indian (Punjabi) and South Indian (idli Dosa Sambhar) which are damn tasty and glamorized in foreign countries.

Apart from this there are few other dishes unexplored from Indian Cuisine
1. Gujrathi (famous for less spicy and more sweetness... even their curries are spicy in flavor but sweet in taste),
2. Parsi (Persian Moroccan Indian Food),
3. Malwani - Maharashtrian (The costal Maharashtrian cuisine called Malwani is just the same as Thai Food ... damn good),
4. Bengali (famous for fish curries and sweets desserts)

Nice post, vinsan!

Oooh, samosas... when I lived in London there was a vendor at the Ealing Broadway (?) tube station (I lived in Ealing, took the tube in to London most days) with the most heavenly, and cheap samosas..

Madhur Jaffrey... I have her cookbook, still packed.

The "little whilte sponges" - they are probably rosgullas (a bengali sweet). Do they look like this?

http://www.sukhadia.com/images/rasg_058.jpg

Cham-cham looks like this: http://www.moneytonepal.com/gifts_to_nepal/images/products/cham%20cham.jpg

Spongy, syrupy Indian sweets are usually from Bengal. Some popular ones: Rasmalai, Gulab Jamun (they are brown and round). Here are some more pictures with the names.
http://www.rajbhog.com/get_items.asp?cat_id=1&cat_name=Sweets&subcat_id=51&subcat_name=Bengali%20Sweets

Typically, you'd find these sweets in sweet shops and not in restaurants. Haldiram's (www.haldiram.com) sells some canned sweets (must be fairly good)...

Talk about Pharsi.... Murgh Baghdadi is my all time favorite.... also nothing can top a nice greasy stuffed paratha...

Now I have to put a bucket under my mouth, am drooling. We just had Gulab Jamun - you can buy it canned, and I must say it was pretty good. I frose the leftover syrupy rose water for gin and tonics - works out great!
Can't be back in India soon enough, hopefully this summer. And wouldn't you know it, sakhi, I just may live in Hyderabad for a few months in the coming years.

Paratha... I remember liking parathas...

I love samosas too (with the green pudina/mint chutney)...yum yum.




great!! i hope you'll enjoy the hyderabadi biryanis!!

Thanks, sakhi.

Yes, yes, rosgullas! So good and so sweet.

The 'fudge' I was talking about is burfi. I sometimes buy boxes of it like this: they have all different kinds and you can fill a box of your chosen size. I love em.

Uh oh. Those look very appealing.

You can get those online??

Sag means spinach I think.

I'm going for a curry next Wednesday with my pal.

I'll have some then.

And dal, I like the way they do curried lentils in the place we go, Malu's place.

Still remembering the excellent Indian dishes we had in the restaurant chosen by the prince at the London gathering three years ago ...

Osso, it looks like Sakhi's link is an online store. It's a lot of fun trying the different flavors with friends.