Tempered Potato

It is a dry potato curry with a really nice texture.

Ingredients: Potatoes, mustard seeds, chopped onions and garlic, dried chili pieces, chili powder, curry leaves, rampa, Maldive fish chips (optional) or Tiny dried shrimps [kunisso/koonisso (Sinhala)] (optional) and salt.

Method: Peal and chop the potatoes into cubes of about 1 inch. Deep fry the potatoes until they well cooked and a thin crust forms outside. Let the oil drain well from the fried potatoes. Add oil to a pan and when heated add mustard seeds, curry leaves and rampa. Let it fry till the mustard seeds start to pop. Add the Maldive fish chips or tiny dried shrimp, chili pieces, onions, garlic and a little bit of chili powder. Let it fry till the onions are golden brown. Add the fried potato and mix well. Add salt to taste.

Notes:

A variation of the texture can be obtained by frying boiled and cubed potatoes.

Another variation could be by adding boiled and cubed potatoes without frying. If so it is important that the amount of oil used during tempering should be increased.

Lentils or Dal or Parippu

Masoor dal and Gram dal (Chana dal). These usually mixed into many other dishes, which is very frequent in India since a lot of people are vegetarian. They are most commonly cooked alone is Sri Lanka, where the curry is referred to as Parippu. Gram dal can also be deep-fired and sprinkled with salt and chili powder to make a nice snack (extremely good when you're watching a close cricket match, since it gives an alternative to finger nails).

Dal Curry (Parippu in Sinhala)

Ingredients: Masoor or Gram dal, onions, garlic, mustered seed, green chili, turmeric, chili powder, curry leaves, rumpa (Pandanus leaf), coconut milk and salt

Method: Wash the dal well (if you are using Gram dal soak it in water overnight). Put into a saucepan and add the chopped onions, garlic and green chili, curry leaves, pieces of rampa, mustard seed, a sprinkle of turmeric to give colour and flavour, chili powder to give that little tinkle to the taste buds and cover with water till about 1 inch above dal. Let the dal cook really well, adding water if required. Next pour the coconut milk and mix well. Do not boil for long after adding coconut milk, since the milk tends to curdle. Finally add salt to taste.

Notes:
Do not add salt till end since most types of dal or as a matter of fact the bean family or pulse family do not boil well in salty water and takes ages to boil.

Additionally some may "temper" this:

• Pour a little bit of coconut/vegitable oil to a pan. When the oil is hot add some curry leaves, rampa, mustard seeds and let it fry (watch out when the mustard seeds start to pop ;-)). Add some chopped dried red chili and onions and let it fry. Add a little bit of chili to give colour. Pour the dal curry into the hot pan and mix well (else you could pour this mix into the saucepan with the dal curry.

If you do not like the pasty dal curry, you can try adding some salt when boiling, it is a variation of cooking Parippu.

The art of Tempering

Tempering is used in many forms of South Asian and specially Sri Lankan cooking. It may be a compliment to some other curry like dal, or may be the base of a curry, for example like tempered onions or egg-plant.

Ingredients: Coconut or vegetable oil, mustard seeds, fenugreek seeds, chopped onions and garlic, curry leaves, rampa (Pandanus leaf), chopped dried red chili, chili powder

Method: Pour a little bit of oil into a pan. When oil is hot add mustard seeds, fenugreek seeds (optional), curry leaves, chopped rampa. Fry till mustard seeds start to pop. Add onions, garlic (optional) and dried red chili. Let fry until onions are golden brown. Add a chili powder and let fry for a few 30 seconds. Watch out for your eyes and nose – better leave a window open when tempering :-). It is important that you constantly mix the ingredient throughout the tempering process.

Godamba Rotti with Chicken Korma

Godamba Rotti

Ingredients: Flour, salt to taste, Oil (coconut or vegetable), little bit of sugar (NOT to taste but to make it soft) and water

Method: Mix the flour, salt and sugar well. Add water and knead until the dough has an equal texture and does not stick to your hand. Add just that little bit of extra water to make the dough just that little bit softer and stickier. Make small balls of the dough (a little larger then a golf ball). Coat them with a considerable amount of oil and leave to rise (in a warm place) for one to two hours. Oil a smooth flat surface and stretch the small balls of dough as thin as you can. Note: A special technique exists to throw godamba like an Italian chef has a technique to throw a pizza, but I find it challenging to explain (It's not as easy as explaining to ski).

Heat a pan with oil and bake the godamba as it is. If your pan is small like mine, fold the godamba into a rectangle and bake.

If you want to make a variation of a godamba, put the unfolded godamba on the heated pan, break an egg onto the centre of the godamba (break the yolk too) and fold the godamba over the egg to form a square, Voila! you have an "Egg Rotti".

PS: If you are married, please make sure you remove you ring when kneading the dough to avoid having to un-knead the dough or worse avoid an unpleasant visit to the dentist.


Chicken Korma

Ingredients: Chicken, garlic, onions, tomatoes, ginger, curry leaves, turmeric, ground pepper (or chilli powred), oil, cloves, cardamoms, cumin, cinnamon and salt.

Method: Cut the chicken into 1 1/2 - 2 inch chucks (I presume you have cleaned and washed the chicken and most importantly that its dead). Chop the onions, garlic and tomatoes. Cube the ginger into 1/4 inch chunks (chunks so that you can take them away before eating and avoid the unpleasantness of munching a piece of ginger, which can be a terrible experience and could ruin your meal). Put oil into a saucepan and when hot add the curry leaves, cloves, cardamoms, cumin and cinnamon and let fry for a minute. Add the onions and let it fry till golden brown. Add the garlic, ginger, turmeric, salt and pepper (to your taste). Add the chicken and turn them around so that the chiken is coated with the mix and allow to cook for two to three minutes. Add water to cover the chicken. Cook till half of the water has evaporated and you have thick gravy (most important check if the chicken is cooked please..!)

NOTE: The best way is to grind/blend the garlic, ginger and cumin but there is a risk of getting you quantities wrong.

PS: Some say presentation matters, to me taste matters more. If you need to present this well pick some leaves form you garden (preferably poisonous), slice a tomato and decorate the chicken and offer it to the person you hate the most.

Please read the license agreement before using this recipe - note that I do not bare any responsibility for any consequences of your use of this recipe :-).

Tips and Thoughts

Before trying out these recipes there are some thoughts I’d like share;

• Rule No.1, DON'T COOK BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO COOK!
• Rule No.2, THERE ARE NO MORE RULES! (Break all rules except rule No.1)
• There are no quantities mentioned - mentioning quantities is like old school, we need cooks not robots (how can someone a million miles away on another planet may be, who has never met me know how much chili I like in my beef curry). My mom never followed quantities, she trusted her instincts and experience and she is the best cook I know. Mentioning quantities kills the natural cook in you. Try out and see what you come up with, if you don't like it change and retry until it tastes good. The world was not built in one day, so... don't worry about not getting it right the first time.
• Cooking tastes best when you constantly meddle with it. If you put it on the stove and comeback in 15 mins, Oh! I can imagine what it will taste like (grrrr… shivers down my spine). Stir and mix frequently. Taste once in a while and see what is missing, add more salt or chili or pepper or cream... etc. etc.. Ahhh and then you get the real taste. (If you want to watch your favorite TV program while cooking, sadly you will not enjoy either)
• Don't worry if your cooking does not taste like Alain Ducasse au Plaza Athénée, it is more likely that Alain Ducasse can't get his cooking to taste like yours. Do not worry of what others think of your cooking, but with three exceptions 1. Your mother-in-law, 2. Your children, and 3. Your spouse’s friends (note the order of importance)
• EVERYBODY IS A GREAT COOK ... the only difference is whether they can eat, let alone whether someone else can eat their cooking. So don't worry about others if you can eat, so can others. The best chef in Korea would make a delicious "monkey brain", but will the world majority eat it?... most... not even in their dreams. But that does not make him a bad chef? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, taste is in the tongue of the eater :-)
• The best taste cooking is COOKING GONE WRONG!

All are welcome to add to the list. Enjoy your cooking, that is what is important.

Let the "Experiments" Begin..!

Interesting thought... food, arts & crafts, song & dance, architecture and traditions are probably the key features that define a culture (I'm no social scientist so don't argue). If one visits a second culture, nothing would be more embedded in ones mind (other than a very .... hmm.. imaginative experience) than the food one ate. Sometimes so delicious that one would long for it and sometimes so terrible one tends to ask oneself "how do they eat this s***?".

Being in Sweden for a month and a half it seems a pretty funny thing that I seem to enjoy cooking for others, it makes me wonder whether I'm in the right field, or whether some where down the line I made a wrong choice on not becoming chef. On the other hand I may enjoy cooking, but others may not be enjoying eating what I come up with... hmmm another interesting thought.

Well any way I thought I'd document my experiments (experience) in creating edible (inedible) things, which I call food (you may call them what ever you please). People with milder taste buds may call my food "Hell fire" .... any way so my journey begins to experiment what no man(woman) has experimented before.