Tiffin Dabawallah System? Yes, please.

Now this is really genius. I think it’s obvious that I am of the “live to eat” variety, but there is nothing more dreadful and than figuring out what to do about lunch during the work week (or school week). There are really so many days in a row you can eat a turkey sandwich (or spinach salad) and it’s never high on the priority list when you’re busy to come up with an alternative that doesn’t take much time to prepare, is more cost effective than buying lunch and actually sparks some enthusiasm. So, if you’re like me, it’s easy to fall into the trap of buying your lunch – which can get expensive, unhealthy and is never quite as good as something homemade.

Enter the tiffin dabawallah system of Mumbai. I first was introduced to the concept when Gordon Ramsay, one of my favorite celebrity chefs, implemented a tiffin system during an overhaul of an Indian restaurant on his show Kitchen Nightmares. Although it appears the tiffin system was ultimately unsuccessful in that instance, its Mumbai origins prove the concept can flourish.

Tiffin box

So, here’s the idea: you pay a modest fee for your lunch and a dabawallah (a tiffin carrier) brings you a hot, freshly cooked and delicious meal to your workplace during lunch. When you’re done, you place your tiffin box outside your home that night, where it is picked up and reused for your lunch over and over again.

OK, this is a vast oversimplification of a lunch delivery system that is complex but whose genius lies in the simplicity of the concept. This system has served Mumbai’s city workers for over a century and has been praised world-wide for its “astonishing” efficiency. After some quick research, it is apparent that some attempts inevitably have been made to bring this concept to the U.S., but with mixed success.

Iain Aitch of The Guardian describes what a typical Indian tiffin box may hold:

The traditional Indian tiffin box consists of several stacked aluminium boxes with a carry-handle, each box containing individual portions of meat and vegetable curry dishes, bread, rice and, usually, something sweet. In your tiffin box you might find dishes such as daal, roti, paratha, yoghurt and sabji, or takes on the roadside “tiffin” of India, such as aloo papdi chaat – potatoes, chickpeas and onions with yoghurt, tamarind sauce and chutney.

Sounds good to me!

West Indies Curry Chicken Roti and Rice & Peas

Last night my friend cooked us an authentic West Indies dish with a clear “curry” influence: curry chicken to go inside made-from-scratch roti and Caribbean rice and peas (where the “peas” are pigeon peas).

Roti is a soft, round flatbread – akin to a tortilla but with some rise to it – that is often filled with curried meats. Roti originated in India, but is a clear staple of West Indies cuisine. Sadhana Ginde explains:

The Indian flatbreads can be divided into three basic categories: deep fried breads (such as pooris and bhaturas), pan or shallow fried breads (such as parathas) and lastly, dry breads (such as rotis, chapathis and naans). These breads are found typically in northern Indian cuisine. They are made mainly of wheat and can be served either plain or stuffed. The possibilities are endless!

South Indian cuisine also has its version of flatbreads known as dosas, uttapams and idlis. These breads are often made from combinations of rice flour and lentils and are equally just as delicious as they are nutritious.

Here is the recipe we used:

West Indian Roti
Adapted from Emeril Lagasse

4 cups all purpose flour
2 tbs. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1 rounded tbs. shortening (or vegetable oil)
1 cup water
Oil, for cooking

Place first four ingredients in food processor and pulse until a coarse meal consistency forms. Add cold water to the mixture and pulse until the mixture has a crumbly consistency. Form the mixture into dough balls or “patties” with your hands and roll out onto a floured surface. Brush one side of the roti with oil and place in a heated, dry cast iron skillet on medium high heat. Cook until golden brown on that side, then oil the other side and flip. Repeat until you have used all your roti dough.

The key here is to oil the bread, not the skillet.This keeps the roti from getting soggy or becoming “fried.” The finished product should resemble a tortilla.

The curried chicken my friend made somewhat resembles this recipe but he used a West Indies curry powder, thyme, allspice, ground cloves to coat the chicken, then sauteed the onions in a skillet and added the chicken. When the chicken was almost done, he added diced potatoes (skins on), coconut milk and chicken stock. This mixture simmered for an hour (until potatoes were cooked).

Fill the roti with the curried chicken and top with mango chutney.

This was a new way for me to have curry – very tasty!

Mango Chutney

I have mango chutney simmering away on my stove right now and my house smells divine!

This is my first time making mango chutney (I have, though, made a cantelope chutney to go atop proscuitto on bruschetta for an Italian meal once before, also delicious) and I really like this recipe. I chose it because 1) it packs some heat with the hot pepper and I don’t like chutneys that are overly sweet 2) it is somewhat Carribean and goes with our meal for tonight and 3) I have a newfound love for golden raisins ever since I had golden raisins soaked in honey with fried goat cheese balls (from a tapas place called Arpa in Charlotte, sadly now closed).

Overall I found this recipe to be very tasty: sweet, hot and tangy!

Mango Chutney
Adapted from Robert Pickens’ recipe (author of Carribean Cuisine) featured in Paula Deen’s recipe collection

2 1/2 cups diced mangos (I used 2 medium mangoes)
1 (1-inch) piece peeled fresh ginger, minced
1 habanero pepper (I could not find a Scotch bonnet pepper anywhere!)
1/4 tsp. kosher salt
1/2 cup cider vinegar
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup golden raisins
Freshly ground black pepper

Directions: Place all ingredients in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer until thick, about 25 minutes, stirring often to keep from sticking. Let cool, and store in an airtight container.

A note about the mangoes: I saw several mango chutney recipes that called for unripe, green mangoes. This one did not specify, so I compromised and used one ripe and one partially unripe. I used mangoes from Mexico, but if you can get the legendary Indian “King of the Mangoes” of course use those! I have yet to try one myself.

As far as cutting the mangoes, I learned a nifty technique in a cooking class a couple years ago: cut the mango in half using a sharp knife and twist to open. Hold a mango half in your palm and score it with a paring knife (if it’s the half with the seed, remove that first. This can get messy). Once scored, flip the half inside out and then cut off the chunks. (See below). Pretty handy! I did discover, however, that this technique does not work as well with not-ripe-yet mangoes, it may or may not lead to a hard chunk of mango flying off and hitting your dog in the face (oops).

Also, when cutting the habanero (or Scotch bonnet pepper, OR any hot pepper for that matter) PLEASE do yourself a favor and either wear gloves or use plastic bags over your hands when handling them. I learned this lesson the hard way one summer when I was working on Ocracoke Island and casually chopped up a habanero to put in a rice salad. I got about 3 seconds in when my hands started feeling like they were on fire! Truly, it felt like someone had ripped off my skin and poured acid on my hands. After many failed attempts at cooling them down, the only thing that stopped the burn somewhat was Solarcaine spray that basically just numbed my hands completely. Somewhere there is a picture of me, in agony and feeling like a fool, trying to get rid of the heat. And, whatever you do, for godsakes don’t rub your eye if you do touch the pepper!

Oh, I also removed the seeds and membranes of the habanero. (Very carefully of course. Although I swear even through the plastic bag I could still feel my fingers burning a little bit…. maybe it is just the phantom pain from that one summer!).

Enjoy!

Who was Major Grey?

While researching this question, I came across this priceless little poem from The Winterline Journal entitled “Rank Injustice”:

All things chickeny and mutt’ny
Taste far better when served with chutney
This is the mystery eternal:
Why didn’t Major Grey make Colonel?

According to Crosse & Blackwell, the company that makes one of the most popular commercialized Major Grey’s chutneys (though I typically buy Patak’s version), Major Grey’s chutney consists of the following:

“a sweet, highly spiced mango chutney . . . reportedly created by a British Army officer stationed in India during the early 1800’s. Major Grey’s is now considered the definitive British chutney variety.”

Major Grey’s is also reportedly just a milder type of mango chutney (not a brand itself) that was imported to England during the colonial era – although I tend to find it, as Crosse & Blackwell term it, more “highly spiced” than regular mango chutney you can buy off the shelf.

This question was inspired by a dinner party tonight in which I’ll be making mango chutney from scratch (not from From Curries to Kebabs – sadly no mango chutney recipe included) and perhaps some other savory relish to accompany our main dish of “Chicken Roti,” a delicious Caribbean interpretation of chicken curry wrapped in Indian-style roti flatbread.

Will post recipes and comments on this dinner later!

A basmati rice revelation

It’s amazing how a small change in methodology can produce drastically different results. For the first time, I prepared my basmati rice according to Jaffrey’s method: place desired amount of basmati rice (ratio of basmati to cooking water should be 1:1 1/3) in bowl and wash in several changes of water to wash off all milling powders. Then soak the rice (totally submerged in water) for at least 30 minutes prior to cooking.

The result is basmati rice in which the grains are well separated. Really, MUCH better than my usual method of just dumping in the pot and steaming away with results that are clumpy and somewhat gooey. I always thought in order to produce properly cooked rice I had to first cook the rice, then steam the rice over boiling water as my mother does. And yes, that works as well, but it takes for-ev-er and I really just can’t bring myself to go through all that effort for rice. This method is much easier!

I’ll never go back to my old method (or my old mop and broom! Swiffer joke, get it? Crickets…) again!

PS – also added three cardamom pods for aroma as Jaffrey suggested, although I think I was really supposed to add cardamom seeds, since the pods really didn’t add much.

I blame Madhur Jaffrey

… for introducing me to the fascinating and delicious interpretations of “curry” dishes around the globe and along the spice trail – what I’ve termed the Curry Trail. For me, there is nothing more comforting than curling up on the couch with a large bowl of hot, spicy curry atop fragrant Basmati rice and with the necessary accompaniments: mango chutney (Major Grey’s) and sambals (or, my quick version – raw onions and fresh tomatoes chopped and mixed together). Of course, what I generally whip up for a quick curry fix is light years away from what any true “curry” master would ordain as authentic. My quick fix consists of chicken and kidney beans simmered in Patak’s Hot Curry Paste (concentrate for sauces) thinned with water. Hey, it’s not exactly worthy of any gold medals but it does satisfy my cravings for that beautifully pungent (for lack of better word) combination of spices and flavors.

While I probably won’t entirely let go of my ever-present jar of Patak’s Hot Curry Paste  in my refrigerator, my recent re-discovery of Madhur Jaffrey’s esteemed cookbook From Curries to Kebabs: Recipes from the Indian Spice Trail has inspired me to expand my culinary horizons. I’ve had the cookbook for three years now (a gift from my mother) and only last night tried my hand at recipes from it.

Admittedly, I did start with what could be considered the LEAST authentic of “curry” dishes: Chicken Tikka Masala, or as Jaffrey calls it “Silken Chicken ‘Tikka Masala,'” a dish created by Indian restauranteurs in the UK to please the UK palate. That aside, the recipe was phenomenal – a far cry from the heavy cream-laden gravy-consistency type Chicken Tikka Masalas you get at your local everyday Indian restaurant (at least around here). The result was a thinner sauce, seasoned with crushed garlic, grated ginger, smashed tomatoes, yogurt and a wonderful blend of spices.

And with that one success, I decided to embark on a journey to learn new culinary techniques and experiment with authentic recipes from the Curry Trail that incorporate different cultures’ interpretations of Indian flavor combinations and techniques.

My goal (somewhat in the vein of the Julie & Julia project) is to try all of the recipes in From Curries to Kebabs. I will post my notes from those trials here, as well as share with you any revelations I have or interesting related tidbits I come across.

And with that, here we go!

First: a definition of “curry”

Since there is no single definition nor recipe of “curry,” I will follow Jaffrey’s designation:

“. . . I have designated as a curry any Indian or Indian-style dish with a sauce; just as the British colonialists, who controlled India for centuries before I was born, defined it. It is not exactly my definition. Indians tend to call dishes by their individual names when speaking in their own languages and serve wet (that is, with a sauce) and dry (those in which the sauce is non-existent or reduced) curries. But the British definition seems to have stuck . . . .”

With that, perhaps some background on my culinary idol (obsession?) Madhur Jaffrey is in order.

Madhur Jaffrey is a Delhi, India native whose first passion (it would seem) was acting. Jaffrey was a noted Indian actress and appeared in a multitude of films, TV shows, and theatre productions beginning in the 1960s. Ironically (and a sign that there is hope yet for all us late-culinary bloomers?), Jaffrey reportedly did not cook as a child growing up in Delhi. Wikipedia (did I mention I only use infallible sources?) reports:

“She had almost never been in the kitchen and almost failed cooking at school.^[12] It was only after she went to London at the age of 19 to study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art that she learned how to cook, using recipes of familiar dishes that were provided in correspondence from her mother.^[13] In the 1960s, after her award-winning performance in Shakespeare Wallah, she became known as the “actress who could cook” and was hired by the BBC to present a show on Indian cooking.^[14] After an article about her and her cooking appeared in the New York Times in 1966, she received a book contract that produced An Invitation to Indian Cooking, her first book.^[15] The recipes in that book came from her mother, although she adapted them for the American kitchen.^[16] During the 1970s, she taught classes in Indian cooking, both at the James A. Beard School of Cooking and in her Manhattan apartment. In 1986, the restaurant Dawat opened in Manhattan using recipes provided by her.^[17]“

And so, a star – and culinary master – was born.

I was introduced to Jaffrey by my mother, who always held Jaffrey in high regard. In fact, I owe my culinary enthusiasm to my mother – I grew up standing in as her “sous chef,” along with my sisters, in the kitchen. We grew up on curries and food that, as my mother says, “is not afraid of flavor.” Though I think everything she cooks is absolutely delicious, my mother’s true culinary passions are Indian and Thai cuisines. Before we were transplanted to the U.S., both my parents were born in bred in South Africa and undoubtedly were influenced by the continuing strong Indian physical and culinary presence in the country, a stayover from British imperialism and the days of indentured labor.

While my mom’s standby curry dish is in the vein of a Korma, she has put all manner of curry dishes on our plates. In fact, such is her love for curry that we even had an Indian Thanksgiving last year, in which literally every dish was an Indian curry or Indian-inspired.

But that’s deserving of another blog post altogether.