Easy Indian Cooking (4 page)

Roasting Vegetables

Use fresh and firm vegetables (peppers are a popular choice). Take a sharp knife and remove any stems, cores, membranes and seeds. Cut items like peppers in half lengthwise and flatten the halves by squashing them against a flat surface. Lay the items skin-side-up on a foil-lined baking sheet and broil, 4 to 6 inches away from the heat source, until blackened all over, 5 to 10 minutes. Watch carefully and rotate the pan as needed to blacken as evenly as possible. Pull up the edges of the foil to make an envelope around the vegetables. Seal the envelope, and let it sit at least 15 minutes and up to 1 hour to soften the items. Pull off and discard the skins. Do this under running water, if you prefer.

Tempering

This technique is unique to Indian cooking. A mixture of whole spices, with or without chopped garlic and ginger, is added to very hot oil. This extracts and retains the essence, aroma and flavor of spices and herbs. This process is performed either at the beginning of cooking a dish or after the preparation is nearly complete. If done after a dish is cooked, the prepared tempering is poured, sizzling hot, over the dish to add a burst of flavor (as is sometimes done when preparing
dals
). The seasonings that are most commonly tempered include cumin seeds, black mustard seeds, fennel seeds, dried red chilies, cloves, cinnamon, cardamom and bay leaves, as well as chopped ginger, garlic and fresh or dried curry leaves. The ingredients are usually added in rapid succession, rarely together. This is to ensure that each ingredient is fully cooked, and thus its flavor fully extracted into the oil, before the next ingredient is added. This method also allows for longer-cooking ingredients or spices to be added first, and shorter-cooking ingredients or spices—which would otherwise have the tendency to burn—to be added last. The crackling of the spices or a change in their color indicates that the process is complete, unless fresh herbs and vegetables are also being used.

some helpful tools

You don't need special kitchen tools or cookware to cook Indian food at home. All you need is a well-equipped kitchen with sturdy skillets, pots and pans with lids, tongs, good knives, graters, mixing bowls, a rolling pin, a perforated spoon, a sieve, a strainer and a citrus squeezer. I like to use an Indian spice box to hold my most frequently used spices and spice blends—garam masala, cumin seeds, mustard seeds, Asian chili powder or cayenne pepper and turmeric. It sits on my kitchen counter where I can quickly grab a pinch of spice when needed. I generally use non-stick pots, saucepans and skillets when cooking Indian food at home because of the relatively long cooking time of ingredients. Some ingredients, like spices, onions, ginger, garlic and tomatoes, which are typically cooked in small quantities of liquid or fat, tend to stick to conventional pans. If you have regular pots and pans, to prevent sticking, make sure they are heavy bottomed and sturdy. Stir the food frequently, and add more cooking oil as needed.

The following additional tools are not crucial but they will make cooking Indian food a lot simpler and quicker.

Blender

When it comes to combining liquids with fresh herbs or spices for sauces, pastes or purées there is nothing more effective than a blender. Blenders with a narrow, tapered base (or basically straight sides) work very effectively to purée thick sauces and pastes, unlike the blender jars with a broader base, which are ideal for blended drinks. Ginger garlic paste can be made very efficiently in a blender. I also use it to grind large amounts of whole spices. I prefer glass blender jars in my kitchen as plastic absorbs aromas from the spices and herbs.

I also have a hand-held blender, also called an “immersion” blender, which I often use to purée vegetables, lentils or beans. This tool is ideal when preparing puréed soups or
dals
,
as you can purée the food directly in the pan. You need not wait for hot liquid to cool to use an immersion blender, and it saves you the task of cleaning up a messy upright blender.

Electric Food Processor

The traditional heavy grinding stone of Indian kitchens, which is moved manually, is now replaced with the modern food processor—a time-saving tool par excellence for busy cooks. Essential ingredients like onion, chili peppers, garlic and ginger can be made into pastes very quickly in these machines. The food processor can be used to chop or mince vegetables and fresh herbs, cutting down considerably on prep time. I recommend a food processor that has a capacity of between 7 and 10 cups. To pulverize smaller quantities of ingredients, make sure the blades sit close to the bottom. For very small quantities, use a knife.

Electric Spice Grinder or Coffee Grinder

I highly recommend investing in a spice grinder or a coffee grinder. This is one of the most important tools that you will use in Indian cooking. I use one to coarsely or finely grind dry whole spices. It grinds them in seconds and clean up is very simple.

Electric coffee grinders are ideally suited for grinding a wide range of spices, such as cumin seeds, cinnamon sticks (broken up), cardamom and bay leaves. They can grind as little as a teaspoon to as much as half a cup. Use a blender for larger volumes of whole spices. A spice grinder or coffee grinder will make your cooking process very simple and the results very flavorful. If you use a coffee grinder to grind spices, reserve it for that use only; otherwise, you will end up with cumin-flavored coffee.

Cast-Iron Skillets and Griddles

Small cast-iron skillets are ideal for dry roasting spices because they evenly brown them without needing to add any cooking fat or liquid. Always preheat your cast-iron pan before frying in it.

A large cast-iron skillet or griddle is excellent for making Indian flatbreads. Traditionally, these breads are cooked in a
tava
,
a round, concave, cast-iron griddle that is available in South Asian grocery stores.

You can cook almost any food in cast-iron cookware, but new cast-iron pans should be seasoned before use according to the manufacturer's instructions. Cast iron is a natural non-stick surface if your pan is seasoned correctly, making it a great alternative to artificial non-stick cooking surfaces.

Cast-iron can be pre-heated to temperatures that will brown meat and will withstand oven temperatures well above what is considered safe for non-stick pans—just don't put cold liquid into a very hot cast-iron pan; doing so might damage or crack the pan.

indian ingredients

The following is a description of some of the most popular and commonly used ingredients in this book. Many of the ingredients and spices used in
Easy Indian Cooking
are found in well-stocked supermarkets. These include cumin, coriander, turmeric, black pepper, ginger, paprika, cayenne pepper, cloves, cinnamon and cardamom. Some others are carried in South Asian or Indian food markets. It is also possible to order spices by mail and on the internet. Indian cuisine has always been very compatible with spices and ingredients from other cuisines and cultures. I use a lot of ingredients that are locally available and not used in a traditional Indian kitchen. Olive oil is one of them. Even though in most cases Indian recipes call for any neutral-flavored vegetable oil (for example, canola, safflower or corn oil), olive oil is a healthier alternative. I often use it to drizzle over salads and sometimes for lighter cooking.

Storage Tips for Spices and Herbs

Ideally, it is best to buy all dry spices in their whole form. Whole spices will stay fresh generally five to six months longer than pre-ground spices. It’s a good habit to smell ground spices before using them; if their smell is very faint, it’s time to replace them or grind a fresh batch. Both whole and ground spices should be stored in a cool, dry, dark place in tightly covered jars. Freshly ground spices are not the same as pre-ground store-bought spices. Freshly ground spices are far superior in flavor and aroma to pre-ground spices. Another difference is in the weight and volume: freshly ground spices have less weight per tablespoon (or greater volume per ounce), than pre-ground spices, which settle over time. You might think you would need to use more of the freshly-ground spice to compensate for the greater density of the settled pre-ground spice. But because pre-ground spices are so much less potent than freshly ground, the difference in mass is not of consequence. If anything, you might need to add
more
of the pre-ground spice.