Cultivating Cultural Interest

It is an absolute joy to stumble upon little cultural events, particularly when they involve food. Last Saturday we made a trip into town to the Cultivate centre in Temple Bar for the Annual Indian Food Mela. We met up with our Indian friend A and his parents, who are over on a visit from Delhi.

There were a variety of stalls set up around the room. Having been at the mela two years ago, Iwas pleasantly surprised that this time it was better organised and more professional. Most of the stalls were run by people in the catering business. Dishes ranged from €1 for a samosa or poori to €6 for a big carton of chicken and rice. We sampled a number of the main dishes, tandoori chicken, chicken and rice mix, karahi chicken, onion bhaji, paranta, rice with kidney beans.


In the normal course of events I find Indian desserts to be far too sweet. A had some gulab jamun and jalebi, which I tried (in the name of research!) and the sweetness seemed to have been tempered slightly to suit the Irish palate - still not my desserts-of-choice though.

Soothing Supper - Indian Lentils

In this house, we are a big fan of Indian food and this recipe comes from our most-used books "India with Passion: Modern Regional Home Food" by Manju Malhi. Most of the Indian food that the Irish palate is familiar with is Punjabi (from Northern India). However this book is divided into North, South, East and West with a description of the cuisine of the region at the beginning of each chapter.

Dal Makhani (buttered spiced black lentils) is one of our favourites. On cold nights like these a bowl of warming lentils is just perfect. The quantities here are for 2-3 as a main, 4-6 as a side dish. The Doc made this tonight and played around with the published method slightly - we were lucky enough to live for a few weeks with a family in New Delhi, and one of our Indian friends made something similar then and suggested frying the dry lentils briefly before adding the water (similar I would think to frying the rice for a minute before adding the liquid when making a risotto?).

Dal Makhani (literally "Buttered Lentils" adapted from "India with Passion" by Manju Malhi)

• 1 tsp coriander
• 1 tsp cumin
  
• 115g black lentils
• 70g butter
• 1 medium onion, chopped
  
• 2 green chillis, de-seeded and chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp tumeric
• 1/4 tsp chilli powder
• small tin kidney beans
  
• 1 tsp grated ginger root
• 1/4 tsp garam masala
  
• 2 tsbp single cream (or yoghurt)
• coriander leaves as garnish

Method:

1. dry fry coriander, cumin and lentils for 1 min
2. add 600ml water and simmer until lentils are tender (about 30 mins)
3. melt butter in frying pan and add onion, chillis and garlic
4. once onion starts to brown add lentils and all remaining ingredients down to the garam masala
5. simmer until thickened, about 10 mins
6. stir in cream and top with coriander