Cooking in the rain: The Mumbai Food Blogger’s potluck

Here’s a recent write up in The Week magazine on food bloggers that Shormila of Kichho Khon forwarded to me.  Some of the bloggers in this post are there and Finely Chopped is there somewhere in the middle and in this one too

Saturday evening. Rain thundering down. The porch of a restaurant two lanes away from my home. Sides covered by plastic sheets giving us shelter from nature’s fury.

Assembled were a range of folks for the Mumbai Food Blogger’s potluck dinner. The group ranged from folks who had blogged on food for close to a decade to those who started two posts back (but tweeted about food for a while). Recipe bloggers, restaurant reviewers, bricolage bloggers, photo bloggers, men women. Boys and girls too, as the age band started at the early 20s and went on to the early 40s.

I was not planning to write about this dinner.

Honestly was a bit jaded by the bloggers dinners of late. They are normally held at newly opened restaurants, often not at high streets. You don’t get to move around and chat much as you have wine companies, restaurant owners parading their wares. ‘There is no such thing as a free meal’ throbbing at the back of your head. The last couple of ones had fairly pedestrian food which would be rather stupid to offer when you are calling food bloggers over. Politeness saved the hosts I guess.

Last night’s pot luck thought up of and organised by Rushina of A Perfect Bite, coordinated by Nikhil of a Nonchalant Gourmand and hosted by Arpana, of Cooking – It’s Not Complicated, and her staff at Gostana was  refreshingly different. There was a lot of energy and buzz yesterday, back slapping, hugs, happy chatter and laughter. Pure unrestrained camaraderie with food, the common binder.

I caught up with friends whom one has made through blogging. That always happens at these dos. Often outside of blogger meets too. Yesterday was different as one got to know faces one recognised from previous meets and their blogs but had not really spoken to. If you put around twenty quasi grown ups together when its raining outside, and there is great food to be eaten and served, then you have the recipe for a very boisterous evening.

The food was bloody good. And I am not the one to be polite here. The food was consistently better than most of what I have had at the recent blogger’s junkets. I am not saying this because folks put in a lot of effort into it, many carted it in the rain from long distances. Not because of the efforts that went into planning and preparing or the expenses that went into putting the together.

The food was simply fantastic. Without any qualifiers.

There were a couple of cases where the chefs felt that the dishes hadn’t turned out as good as they wanted it to. And said so. Which is the honesty that blogging is all about. There were three dishes and a dessert which stood out to me amidst a very worthy line up.

No. I wont say which ones ;) But all I’ll say is that the creators of the three dishes had learnt the recipes, or the art of cooking, from their moms.

The smorgasbord of dishes was so consistently so good that I darted from tray to tray digging in with my fork, beaming away happily, well after I was full.

The dishes represented a range of cultures and countries – Sindhi, Agra-wallah, Bengali, Parsi, Asian, Australian, Italian, Mediterranean, Mughlai, Keralite, vegetarian, non vegetarian and some pretty good coffee and deserts too.

You had all sorts of cooks. Professionals. Folks who have been cooking at home for a while. New kids on the block. Gourmet chefs. Those who like to fool around in the kitchen.

Some put the dishes together by themselves. Some got their moms to cook for them. Or their husbands (!) Some had their domestic help acting as sous chefs to cut and chop.

But finally all put together by those who came to the dinner.

So what did we eat? Well here you go and I am lifting from Kurush’s FB page here,

“Kurush F Dalal:  the menu was a smorgasbord of starters (gostana mayo and chips, gostana fish pickle (always at my home –KK) and toast, Arpana's capsicum chaat, Sahil's glauti kebebs, Madhumita's sichuan pepper honey chicken, Kalyan Karmakar's Med style aubergine salad & Asian double cooked star anise pork, Jyotika Purwar's Agra styled aloo tikkis, Pranav's wasabi Mascarpone smoked salmon nori canapes on sesame rice crackers, Rushina Munshaw Ghildiyal's tofu with glass noodles pasta and awesome lamb on couscous & Oz gooseberries, Sankarson Banerjee's funky asafoetida taters and authentic East Bengali chicken rezala, Nikhil Merchant's bathtub full of divine stuffed pasta (could have fed an army), Masoor biryani by ankit, white wine parmesan and chorizo risotto by Anish, all rounded off by Rhea Mitra-Dalal's Payesh, Megha Goyal's cheesecake in a jar, Anisha's chilli choc cake and Sahil's (The Coffee Nazi) artisanal coffee fresh from the estates of Kerala ... all neatly rounded off with a back present of Flavoured sugars by Vinda Dravid. “Plus Kurush doesn’t mention his buckets of kid gosht which I packed and got for lunch today and K’s dinner yesterday (Slightly edited: KK)”

And here's Rushina's round up of the event with a detailed description of the dishes. And here's Nikhil's

So now you know why I am still in such a buzz.

Some of you have asked me if you can attend these dinners if you are a foodie but not a blogger. Well all I can say is that hopefully the tale of this dinner is enough to make you start your food blogs.

It’s very addictive.

Note: I entered Gostana and kept my camera aside as there were enough photography studs around. Thought I’d sit back and enjoy. So here are some pics taken by Jyotika of Follow My recipe which will give you a flavour of what the evening was like.

This is a list of some of the Mumbai food bloggers who made it yesterday. Hope I have not missed out anyone.

And hope to see your blog there in the list soon.

Pranav Kacholia    http://foodiegeek.blogspot.com/
Rushina Munshaw Ghildiyal    http://a-perfect-bite.blogspot.com/ 
Kalyan Karmakar     http://finelychopped-k.blogspot.com/
Megha Goyal    www.livetoeat-megha.blogspot.com
VGDravid    http://www.lettuce-eat.info/
Rhea Mitra-Dalal     http://euphorhea.blogspot.com/
Jyotika Purwar    http://followmyrecipe.blogspot.com/

Nikhil Merchant    www.nonchalantgourmand.blogspot.com

Sankarson Banerjee    http://lotsafood.blogspot.com/
Kurush Dalal    Eats, shoots, digs http://eatsfeedsanddigs.blogspot.com/
Aneesh Bhasin    theconnoisseur.in
Rohan Gandhy    http://foodnobar.blogspot.com/
Sahil Jatana  AKA The Coffee Nazi   http://www.thecoffeecoach.in/
Madhumita : http://theinsomniaccook.blogspot.com/

IceRocket Tags: Mumbai food bloggers,potluck,Gostana,Rushina Munshaw Ghildayal

A Bengali Bhodrolok reaches for the electric oven to make a Punjabi tandoori chicken

‘Tadoori’ chicken is one of the first recipes that I had downloaded from the net and cooked. Don’t remember the name of the site after all these years but it wasn’t a blog.

‘Tandoori’ came with a qualifier though. No hearty Loins of Punjab earthen tandoor (oven) to cook the chicken though. The Bengali in me made tandoori chicken in a microwave without feeling as if I had sinned.

Which I actually had.

Used to turn out fairly well though the micro would get messy and the chicken would not brown too well. We just have a grill function in our micro. This is the recipe for the microwave version.

Tandoori chicken was on my list of things to cook first in the new OTG.

Marinated it a couple of days back. Then Banu, our sous chef cum maid, didn’t come to work for two days. So I froze the chicken. Didn’t cook it to avoid the mess. This wasn’t required in retrospect.

This time I greased the baking tray with a bit of regular oil before placing the foil on it. The foil came off easily after cooking and the tray was clean. Washing it wouldn’t have been a problem.

he consistency of the chicken was pretty good which means that you could marinate this on the weekend, freeze it and grill it during the week to good effect.

The dish is oil free and has no artificial colours unlike the stuff on the streets.

Here’s the recipe.

Prep & Marinate:

• Pound or coarsely ground 2 green chillies, 3,4 garlic pods and 1/2 an inch of fresh ginger. You want to feel the texture and don’t want it to become a pulp
• Add this mix to a small bowl, 30 g, of curd. I use packaged curds of Amul, Nestle or Danone. Slim ones
• To this add 1 teaspoon each of garam masala powder & red chilli powder, 1/2 a teaspoon each of coriander, cumin powders & salt. Mix

• Apply the marinate on 2 chicken legs. Make slits in the skin for the masala to go in. The curd acts as a tenderiser too. One of the legs had skin on it. In such cases, slip in some marinate below the skin too.
• Marinate for upwards of an hour.  In this case it was marinated for 2 days though!

Cook:

• Heat the oven at 200 for 10 minutes
• Grease pan with a bit of oil. Put foil on it.
• Place marinated chicken on this
• Roast at 200 for 25 min
• Then grill (upper line on knob) for 5 – 10 min at 250. This will help brown the chicken and give it a nice colour

 

That’s it.

I ate it with plain chapatis. Was quite happy with the juiciness of the chicken, the texture and the colour. K approved too. Plus she got some crackling skin.

Tandoori chicken is of course a Punjabi dish and you could argue that tandoori chicken does not really run in my Bengali blood. True. But the dish was good. And it is fairly easy to make.

 

IceRocket Tags: tandoori chicken,Punjabi food,OTG,Oil free recipes,chicken

The Beijing Festival sampler at Pan Asian, ITC Maratha, Mumbai

Note: This lunch was hosted by ITC Maratha’s Pan Asian

I am a big fan of ITC hotels and their Kakoris and black daals. Known them to be a hotel chain which is serious about its restaurants. Never had been to Pan Asian, their rather blandly named Asian restaurant, before though.

Finally went there today thanks to @Arpana of Gostana, whose friend @ash_incomprendo (twitter handles all), works at ITC and invited us to the ITC Maratha’s Pan Asia. The invite was to for the Beijing Food Festival there. My love for authentic Oriental food took me there.

Food bloggers Shanky and Rushina were there too. We were hosted by the beaming,  Executive Chinese Chef of the ITC Hotels group, Chef Liang. So Hakkasan the previous night and then Pan Asian the next afternoon. This was one royal Oriental ride.

Chef Liang asked me if there was anything that we avoided.

“You are my brother he said” when I said “vegetables”.

Some of the steamed dumplings were really interesting specially the pork ones that he did for us. The pork buns, which I am normally not too fond off, worked for me here as the casing was thinner. Shanky pointed out that in China the casing is thicker as it is part of street food there and as everywhere carbs are cheaper than meat.

 

The highlight of the afternoon for me was the stir fried pork. Chef said that the pork today was so good that he didn’t have to do the usual double fried version. He made this in a Hunan style apparently. The taste stayed with me through the day.

The other mains included mince and beans and a lobster dish but I was partial to the pork and these passed by in a blur. The excess of food in buffets and organised reviews always leaves me a bit shaken. The use of beans in the mince was a throwback to the Chinese that I have eaten at Malaysia.

There was a fairly tame tom yum soup but a lovely sushi platter. Shanky and I monopolised the sushi platter and most of the pork too which worked for the girls who were not keen on either. There was a host of other starters where the steamed sea bass stood out with its demureness.

 

Couple of new discoveries. Sizzling rice crackers and then a plate of Oriental desserts which included a sticky rice dumpling stuffed with nuts and sugar. This is a popular Beijing snack according to the Chef who has now been in India for close to a decade.

Chef Liang is man with a sense of humour who at the end told us “you only talk of food and now I am hungry”. Sent us of with a promise to cook a meal once of dishes he cooks at home. He is not a hands off chef and apparently is around in the afternoons. He and his army was busy putting together this meal to us while we lapped up the perks of being food bloggers. I took the opportunity of tasting a bit of sake. Seemed like vodka to me. The much travelled Shanky said that Sake can be a lot stronger and ‘stinkier’ than this.

The food we ate today was from the Beijing food festival but I really hope that the Chef keeps up to his promise of treating us to home styled food some day.

IceRocket Tags: Pan Asian,ITC Maratha,Chinese,Mumbai,Andheri

An Oriental Dervish … Hakkasan, Bandra, Mumbai

This reads like a paid review but it isn’t. That’s how good the food was.

I stepped into Hakkasan and was immediately hit by the flavours of Oriental food courts. Followed immediately by the aroma of freshly cooked prawns wafting in. I knew I was in a good place.

I had heard a lot about Hakkasan ever since it opened next door beside the ICICI Bank at Bandra, Mumbai. A Michelin Star restaurant. All of my food gang wanted to go there.

I heard it was expensive. Found out today that it was at par with say a Bungalow 9. And a lot better.I read a DNA review just before I made my reservation which mentioned a dress code. On the phone was told about the ‘smart casual’ dress code for men including closed shoes. How British, how hoity toity, that too at Mumbai where one dines at five stars in sandals.

Well I have eaten at few of the Chinese/ Oriental five star restaurants here. Indiana Jones at the Oberoi, China  House at Hyatt, San Qi at Four Season and Taj’s Golden Dragon. I am leaving the Thai Thai Pavilion and Koh out. Well Hakkasan trumps the others on taste.

They say that the address of people who really matter don’t run beyond two lines. It was the same with Hakkasan’s menu.

‘Hakkasan

A la carte’

That’s it. No story of a farmer called Hakka and his grandmother, or the meals of the Hakka warriors who plundered across Asia nor of the restaurant’s journey from Europe down the silk route. They let the food do the talking here.

The ambience had a nice a club feel to it with its heavy use of wood and mood lighting which was bright enough to see your food and yet cosy. The bar was more neon'-like and as a separate section. The music.. club, thumping and yet not obstructing conversation. Our waiter Rajesh, after a slightly hesitant start, cheerfully answered all my questions on the food and gave me a fair idea of we ate.

We started with one of what seems to be their signature dishes. Hakka dim sums. You had steamed and fried as options. Some recent discussion on my Calcutta Chinese breakfast post about how people in China have pan fried dim sums made me go for the fried ones. Plus no Bengali would choose steamed over fried. The Bawi egged me on too.

K was hungry and she patiently waited as I clicked. Thankfully there were no ‘knives’ on our tables. Sharp ones at least.

I started with the chicken in sesame ball. A little pocket of shredded chicken in a barbecue sauce enveloped, phuchka-like in a sticky, mildly sweet sack which I later found out was made with rice. Different. Interesting. Not awe inspiring. The weakest link.

Things looked up with the crispy duck rolls served with hoisin sauce. Shredded duck, tender with the taste nostalgic in an Indian sense. As I later found out, this was probably due to the use of spices such as cinnamon. The crust was fried just right and was the perfect foil for the stupendous meat.

This was K’s favourite.

I went for the prawn sei me roll last. I took a bite and my eyes popped out with joy. This had a faint lemon grass kafir lime-like flavour shrouding the juicy prawns. Rajesh later told us that this was flavoured with ‘curry’ and hence the lemon grass essence.

This was my clear favourite.

The plate had two of each type.

For the mains we went for a seafood mee goreng.

Now I say this very rarely but this was a noodle dish I would have felt proud to serve. I am very vocal about the Singapore mee goreng cart inspired ‘Hakka’ noodles that I make.

At the risk of sounding like bloggers and tweeps who keep praising their own cooking lavishly I must say that I am very good at these noodles and the ones at Hakkasan were the rare restaurant noodles that gave me joy. Plus the ingredients were a lot better than what I got. The noodles slightly thinner and hence more delectable. And it had some of the largest and yet juiciest and most cheerful prawns in the world.

This was good stuff.

With this we chose braised pork.

The pork was so smooth. So tender. Slithered on your palate, making it dance and unwind the way your body would in the hands of a good masseuse. The pork was cooked in a honey barbecue sauce which gave it an Oriental sweetness and yet not overpoweringly so.

Rajesh explained that the pork was tossed in roasted Thai dry red chillies and a citrusy mandarin like fruit which Joanne clarified on Facebook was called kumquat. I didn’t catch this earlier when Rajesh explained it. 

Rajesh smiled and said that the sweetness of the pork, tart of kumquat and heat of the chillies were supposed to give you a varied taste experience. The combination was sublime.

K warned me about the heat of the chillies. Though this was child play after my recent Laal Maas at Jaipur and then green chillies on baked beans at Flurys, Calcutta. The chillies gave a woody taste to he dish while the kumquat darted through like an electric current.

The food was so good that I had to write about it tonight itself. The cost slightly below Rs 4,000 (100 USD) without alcohol or desserts. But then this was a good day at work and warranted a special dinner.

I had earlier picked up some twitter buzz earlier protesting against a mass media reviewer who said that the food at Hakkasan was ‘bland’.

The food was so flavourful tonight. Like an Oriental dervish which whipped up your senses into a state of frenzy and left you smiling well after the meal.

At the risk of being impolite, calling the food at Hakkasan ‘bland’ is well… moronic.

The Facebook discussion:

Joanne:  Mandarin or kumquat?

Finely Chopped I think it's kumquat...thank's couldn't get what the waiter said but he said it was 'like a mandarin'

Joanne Well, it's citrus, so I guess he's right :)

IceRocket Tags: Hakkasan,Chinese,Bandra,fine dining,Mumbai

Toasted & grilled … grilled chicken & tenderloin & baked potatoes

Kainaz got me an OTG and from then on I was out of Mumbai. Jaipur first. Then Kolkata. We bought it from this electronics chain which uses a 'consultant'' plank in their communication. I have no idea why for its like buying it from a warehouse.

The OTG was still kept in the drawing room when I returned.I got hold of the electrician, got a plug and the newest member of our kitchen was put in its place. I had always thought that the first thing that I would make when I got an oven would be to bread. Except that I chickened out, pun intended. I decided to take baby steps and begin by grilling some meat. More specifically chicken.

Now, as K pointed out, I know as much about ovens as Stewie does about sex. So all I had to bank on was K’s stories of putting cheese on chicken and then in to the oven when she was at school.

I asked around a bit on twitter and Facebook on time required and temperature. Ironically almost all the answers I got were from men.

Have women handed over the grill to men? Or are they just plain insecure?

Well bad luck ladies because barbecuing is a man’s thing. And with that bravado I launched into the first dish. Grilled chicken. Learnt from it and then the next day grilled tenderloin. This is going to be the week of grills at our house.

Here are the first two. Both oil free.

1. ‘Before sunrise’: Grilled chicken with baked potatoes

Prep:

• Chicken marinate (1 hour): I called for two chicken legs. One with skin and one without. Rubbed on some table mustard that we had bought from Indigo Deli on it. Some salt. A touch of honey to balance the sting of mustard. I topped this with about 25 g of grated Dutch Vince cheese. Don’t forget to slit the chicken skin. Slip in a bit of the marinate below the skin too. I poked a few fresh rosemary leaves through this.  Not too many. Rosemary is a very strong herb

• I placed cubed potatoes next to the chicken. Wanted a different taste so topped it with 25 g grated cheese, salt, pepper, fresh rosemary. Touch of olive oil

Cook:

Basis various suggestions I went for 25 minutes at 200 degree. After heating the oven for ten minutes at 200 first.

Kept the tray in for another ten minutes before taking it out.

Got psyched in between as smoke started coming out of the oven and through the entire cooking process. We panicked. Then folks on twitter assured me that this happens.

Apparently when it comes to OTGs the first time is smokin hot.

Results:

The chicken was cooked to perfection. Browned well. Extremely juicy. And unlike in the micro it had not emitted water. I loved the way the marinate came together. The mustard, the cheese, honey, rosemary … none out shouted the other. The flavours had spread across the meat.

The potatoes? Well they turned out to be burnt at the bum. Possibly because they were a bit too dry. However, tasted nicely baked once you scraped off the butt.

Learnings: Place the food on a cooking foil so that the tray doesn’t get dirty.

On to day 2

2. ‘After sunset’: Grilled tenderloin with baked potatoes

Excited by the previous day I had decided this to make a grilled dinner week. Alternating between red and white meats. I’d never cooked beef before.

Turned out I was at the right place to prepare for it.

I stopped at Jude’s Cold Storage, Bandra, for tenderloin. The helpful owner pointed me to Modern Stores owned by vegetarian Gujaratis to buy beef tenderiser. He also told me that curd and ginger are garlic are used as marinates for ‘our style of cooking’ and wine or vinegar for Continental. If I remember right the Catholic owner of Jude’s is actually vegetarian. I think his wife told me once at the shop. He then pointed me to his brother’s shop, Jude’s Wine, for cooking wine. Where, after much discussion with his sister in law I picked a tiny bottle of local Port. And then hot samosas and jalebis at Punjab Sweets to go with the rain.

I love Pali Naka.

Prep:

• Marinate the chicken in Port, tenderiser, salt plus Peri Peri sauce to add heat. K got this from me from SA. I glazed the meat with the Epicure mint sauce that my former partner in food crime, Ipsita, gave me before she left town
• I sprinkled some Mediterranean sumac and lemon powder on sliced potatoes and added some salt and olive oil

Cook:

• This time I lined an aluminium foil on the baking tray. Heated the oven at 200 for 10 minutes
• Placed the beef in and put it for 10 min at 200 degree
• Added the potatoes after that at one side of the dish and put it in for another 25 min and then kept it in for another five minutes

Results:

• No burnt potatoes this time. No smoke either. they had cooked pretty well. Though the cubed ones had baked better if you ask me

• The meat was largely juicy barring the odd char grilled ends. I think a total of 30 minutes followed by standing would be better than 35. That’s what C suggested to start with when I asked her

 

Learnings: The foil helped but next time I should put some oil below the foil so that it is easier to take the darned thing off. Tandoori chicken next

Here are some of the FB/ twitter help that I got. Thanks folks

Tips on time required & temperature:

Facebook

Finely Chopped
Plan to inaugurate the OTG with basic grilled chicken. any tips on how long, what temperature?

83 ImpressionsRaw number of times this story has been seen on your Wall and in the News Feed of your fans · 8.43% feedbackNumber of comments and likes per impression
Sunday at 15:54 ·LikeUnlike ·

• • 
    
    ISingCakes & more I am sure you will have a lovely meal. Do let me know when u bake a cake in it..your tips will help me.
    Sunday at 16:10 · LikeUnlike
  • 
    
    Gururaj Kulkarni ‎170-180 deg C for 20-25 mins.
    Sunday at 16:13 · LikeUnlike
  • 
    Finely Chopped Thanks Guru. Oh that's hard core Preeti, long wait before I can give tips
    Sunday at 16:20 · LikeUnlike
  • 
    
    Debopriyo Datta If it is a Philips OTG, then 35 mins in a preheated oven @ 180 C and leave the chicken to rest for 10 mins before serving.
    Sunday at 17:10 · LikeUnlike
  • 
    Finely Chopped Is smoke supposed to come out while you grill in OTG? Seems strange
    Sunday at 22:17 · LikeUnlike
  • 
    
    Debopriyo Datta Should not happen unless there is some plastics or oil in the OTG. The other reason could be that there is almost no liquid in the pan and
    your chicken and /or marinade is burning. Don't worry. It will take a few tries to get it perfect. I had exploded potatoes and veggies
    turning crisp before I could get the timing right.

On burnt tray (FB)

Rini Simon Khanna ‎...and why didn't you line the base with foil?....would have saved the burn...

When smoke came out (twitter):

R113 Rajesh
@Finelychopped ya. It can at times ...

manojnayak Mr. Postman
@Finelychopped no, it probably burning, less oil I guess.

monikamanchanda monika

@Finelychopped @saffrontrail no it doesn't make sure u don't have anything around the rods

And on FB:

Finely Chopped

Need help deciphering Morphy Richards OTG controls. Manual doesn't explain. And I bought it Croma. 1 button with a line below, 1 with line on top, 1 with both, 1 with a rod which I assume is rotisserie

Rhea Mitra-Dalal there must be a heat element above and below. So the line above indicates only the top element in use - perfect for browning and grilling. The line below will indicate only the lower element heating up and the knob with both will have both elements heating up at the same time :)

Rhea Mitra-Dalal try all settings and see..the element itself will glow red once it heats up, if it is not covered and is visible

Finely Chopped Thanks Rhea. So for the sort of cooking I have done so far I guess it must both. Line on bottom is for baking?

Rhea Mitra-Dalal Yeah, I guess so...but for cakes I usually have both on. Need a more professional opinion on this one :)

Claudia Tanna If you wanna brown something or melt cheese in a bake, you will need more or only heat from top.....if you have a heavy fruit cake that tends to burn from top, after half baking time you switch to bottom heat only etc! ;)

Naveen Bachwani Rhea is right in her first comment. You'd use only bottom element when you're basically warming. You can also switch to it periodically (from both on state) when you want the top of the dish to not overcook (eg. cheese topped bakes, etc.)

.Rini Simon Khanna All above correct...the options will be warm, grill, bake and roast...alternately use this to read the manuals

http://www.morphyrichardsi​ndia.com/manuals

IceRocket Tags: Tenderloin,grills,OTG,chicken legs