Vegetable chop-ped, the Bengali way or may be Bhejittebil chop

I almost forgot about the glorious Bengali evening snacking ritual of chop-muri (deep-fried croquettes and puffed rice) until my parents came to the US last month. My evening snack is pretty much limited to the yogurt-fruits-fruits-yogurt routine. In West Bengal, my home state in India, it was a completely different story, at least when I lived there. I would love to believe that this is still true, so the rapid change in snacking style from chop-muri at the local choper dokan (roadside tea stall) to falafel at the latest Western-style coffee shop is very upsetting for me. I know societies change and I should accept it, but it still upsets me. In my heart of hearts, I still hope that for many years to come, as the sun sets on my native Chandernagore, chop-muri finds its way into many home and the saucepan sits on the stove ready for the daily ritual of watching horrendously trashy, ill-produced and overdramatized Bengali serials before dinner.

The chop in West Bengal can come in a hundred different flavors, a few of which will be sold by every roadside choper dokan (chop shop).). There is a specific way of eating chop muri…you take a handful of muri, throw it in upwards into your mouth from a distance, bite into a green chili and then eat a small portion of your chop. Then, with your cheeks swollen with all of these, you start chewing with a vengeance. At first you can barely move your mouth. Then quickly the airy puffed rice vanishes and you are ready for your second portion. It’s not as gross as it sounds, but it’s not a dainty affair either.

The vendor sells the chops in a thonga (packets made out of old newspaper) and by the time they reach home, the packets have a typical oil-soaked look. The oil (actually dalda or vegetable shortening, pure saturated fat in case you were wondering) used to fry the chops is at least a couple of days old and almost black but still the chops came out super tasty. You can try cutting down on the carbs and fats some other time…but not while eating chop muri.

My favorite chopper dokan food was singara (Bengali samosas) and then a few others tied closely for second. These were machher chop, bhejitebil chop and deemer chop (chop made with fish, vegetables and eggs, respectively). Although samosas have gained a prominent spot in Western culture, other chops didn’t quite make it. I really wish they did. Vegetable chops are best in winter when beets (or beet root, as Bengalis call it), carrots and peas are in season. Peanuts are mixed in to add a little bit of bite to the vegetables. This chop is supposed to be slightly sweet in taste with a crispy shell outside. Below is my mother’s vegetable chop recipe which is pretty close to the one from the roadside shops. Muri and green chillies can be found in your local Indian store.

Recipe:

Here I am again with my Maa’s recipe and without any measurement. If I ask Maa for proportion, she will say “Oshab janina…chhobi tobi tolar dorkar nei…khaa toh” (I don’t know all these, you don’t need to take a picture, just eat it). So, no table spoon or tea spoon here…just eye ball it. J All she could say is, she used 2 large beet roots, two smallish potato and four small carrots. Peas are optional.

Ingredients:

Vegetables: Beet root, carrots and potato.

Spices: Roasted and ground together: Cumin, coriander, red chili, cinnamon, cardamom and cloves.

To make a paste or grated: Ginger

Turmeric powder

Salt

Green chilies

Raw peanuts

Cilantro (optional)

To fry:

Bread crumbs

Cornstarch

Baking powder

Oil for deep frying

• Peel and boil the vegetables. Do not over-boil them…they will be super mushy.
• Drain and let them cool. Mash them together and try to make a smooth dough sort of thing.
• Add everything above ‘to fry’ list. Mix well. My mother cooks the mixture on the stove top for a while just to make sure there is no extra moisture left (but this is optional).
• Form balls or any other shape you like.
• Make a batter with the cornstarch. Add a pinch of baking powder to it.
• Dip the vegetable balls into it, coat nicely and roll them over the breadcrumbs.
• Finish making all the balls.
• Start heating up enough oil to deep fry the balls. You can start the oil while making the balls.
• Deep fry them. Do not over crowd the pan while frying.
• Once they are medium-darkish brown color, take them out and drain them on absorbent paper.
• Enjoy them with puffed rice/mamra or Muri or just itself.

Please let me know if you do not understand anything in the recipe. Again, the whole thing happened on my absence, so no first hand knowledge. If you need any other information, I’ll try to get it from my Mother.

 

How We Teach Our Sons To Rape

Reblogged from The Belle Jar:

I have a son.

He is two years old.

He was born into a universe where time happens to be linear, which means that he is growing older with every passing minute. In a little over ten years' time, he will be a teenager.

When my son is a teenager, he will almost certainly go to parties. He will drink. He might experiment with drugs.

Read more… 1,448 more words

I don't know if I'll ever be able to write things this way....but couldn't help myself from sharing it. No, it's not food...but it's something worth reading.

Plantain/knachkolar kofta made by Maa

No, I am not going to give you another lecture on the origin of koftas and how we adapted it. You already know it. Some years ago I used to live with a roommate who was a vegetarian. I wasn’t though, but I didn’t want to go through the trouble of making fish only for myself and also bothering my non-fish eating roommate. As I love vegetarian food, I used to cook mostly vegetables. One day I made knachkolar/plantain kofta curry. I tried it for the first time in my life. I didn’t go gaga over it, but for some reason my roommate really liked it. Plantain not being one of my favorite vegetables, it got wiped out from my memory after a while. Never made it again as I never craved for it.

A couple of months ago when I visited her, she said she still remembers my koftas. I was truly surprised. I would never have guessed. I totally forgot the recipe and even the taste of it. All I remember is that it didn’t taste excellent. But I promised her that I’ll make it and post it on my blog.

Couple of weeks ago when my Maa came to visit us, the first thing I asked her to make was knachkolar kofta. I know I do not have the patience to go through the entire process and I was guilty of postponing the whole thing for a long time. The whole cooking happened in my absence, so I do not have any first hand experience of how to cook it her way. Maa just told me the recipe and I am writing it. Trust me, Maa’s koftas tasted really good. I mean real real good. She made it very differently than I would have thought. As with any other koftas, they tasted way better after a day or two. We had it the day they were made and they were still a little hard inside. We had it again after a couple of days and they had absorbed all the goodness from the gravy and tasted awesome.

It was a weekday and I didn’t have time to photograph this dish extensively. I’ll update this post if Maa makes it again and will surely post more photos.

As I said, I wasn’t at home when it was cooked, so cannot give you any proportion. Go with your instinct and experience.

Recipe:

Ingredients: 

To make the koftas:

Plantain: Try to get the Indian variety; if you cannot find them, use the American ones. Actually Maa made it with the American plantains and she said they were very hard.

Cumin-coriander powder

Crushed black pepper

Raisins a handful

Chopped green chili

A little bit of ginger paste

Oil

Salt (not too much as the koftas will be absorbing the salt from the gravy as well)

Little bit of garam masala (cardamom-cinnamon-cloves powdered together)

For the gravy:

Whole cardamom, cinnamon and cloves

Bay leaves

Whole dry red chili

Cashews

Poppy seeds

Garam masala powder

Turmeric

Cumin-coriander-red chili powder

Ginger paste

Green chili

Salt to taste

Oil

Soak the cashews and the poppy seeds in the water for 10-15 minutes and then grind them to a paste.

Making the koftas:

• Cut the plantains into one inch pieces and boil them until soft.
• Drain the water and peel the skin (you can reserve the skin to make khosha bata, my Maa made it and it was very tasty)
• Mash the plantains with the back of a spoon until very smooth. If your plantain is not very sticky, you can add boiled potato too.
• Add all the spices (except raisins) and mix them with the mashed pulp. It should form a dough like consistency.
• Form small balls and put 2 raisins inside them. Close the balls again or reshape them.
• Once all the balls are made, deep/shallow fry them. Make sure you keep an eye on the heat/flame. The koftas might get burnt if the heat is too high. Roll them gently while frying for even browning or cooking.
• Drain them on a paper towel/absorbent paper/cloth.

Making the gravy:

• Heat up the oil and add the whole cardamom, cinnamon and cloves.
• Once they sizzle, add the bay leaves and the whole dry red chilies. Let them release the aroma.
• Mix the cumin-coriander-red chili-turmeric powder with the ginger paste and add it to the oil. Cook it until oil separates.
• Add the cashew-poppy seed paste and sauté them again for few minutes. You can replace the cashew poppy seed paste with melon seed paste. Or add cashew paste but not poppy seeds. It’s upto you.
• Once the spice paste looks well cooked, add warm water and few slit green chilies and bring it to a boil.
• Lower the heat to a medium high and let the gravy get cooked.
• Once the gravy is done and reaches it’s desired consistency, add the garam masala powder and cover the pot.
• Arrange the koftas on a tray and pour the gravy over it. Let the koftas soak the gravy for several hours before you serve.

An ode to the Hindu widows with mulo chnechki/stir fried grated radish

You can probably do anything in the name of religion. The Hindu religion is no exception and among others Hindu widows especially became the victims of religious discrimination. They were not allowed to attend any auspicious event even in their own family They had to fast several times of the year and even when they could eat, it was only vegetarian food and that to with absurd restrictions on high-protein lentils. For the rest of their lives, the only clothing allowed to them was a piece of white cotton fabric. Having incurred the intangible but very real stigma of daring to outlive their husbands, it became their inescapable societal and religious responsibility to attain purity through sacrifice and deprivation. Contemporary social reformers have suggested that the actual purpose of these dietary prohibitions was to shorten the lifespan of these unfortunate women through chronic malnutrition. Of course, a convenient early death meant that her husband’s property had one less claimant. The unbelievably cruel aspect of the whole business is that often it would be her own sons and daughters-in-law waiting like vultures for her death. One really does get amazed at how cruel human beings can be.

With time, things changed little bit. After becoming widows, my thakuma and didima (paternal and maternal grandmother, respectively) both ate non-vegetarian food but still wore white cotton saaris. They neither had to fast on every ambubachi (the three day period in the Bengali month Ashar that, according to the almanac, marks the beginning of the rainy season) nor were they forbidden from eating masoor daal (red lentils). Despite this relative liberalization, overall they still lived a simple life and resisted every temptation to transgress the puritanical rules of socially imposed purity.

 

Within the confines of their wretched existence, Hindu widows nevertheless found ways to keep going. As we all know, necessity is the mother of invention. Having faced centuries of dietary restrictions and being denied all animal (and some plant) proteins, these resourceful ladies responded by creating a mouthwatering array of vegetarian dishes which continue to be cherished as delicacies today. So, the common misconception in some parts of India that fish-loving Bengalis are unappreciative of vegetarian cuisine is completely wrong. On the contrary, the culinary legacy of many generations of unfortunate widows persists in our many Bengali vegetarian delicacies that have outlived the unfortunate historical circumstances of their creation.  Of course, not being free from inane societal strictures, we have cynically adapted many of these dishes to add non-vegetarian ingredients. For example, the same dish that widows of yore would have cooked with bori (sundried lentil) is now often cooked with shrimp or fish heads.

Mulo chhnechki (dry stir-fried grated radish) is one such dish where you can add either shrimp or fried and crushed bori according to your liking. Its best eaten in winter, when radishes are in season and taste sweet and crunchy.

Recipe:

Ingredients:

Radishes: three 10-12” pieces (the white long variety)

Coconut: ½ cup grated

Cumin seeds: 1 tsp.

Cumin powder: 2 tsp.

Whole red dry chili: 2nos.

Bay leaves (preferably the Indian kind): 2 nos.

Turmeric powder: ½ tsp.

Red chili powder: 1 tsp.

Ginger paste: 1 tsbp.

Oil (mustard or any other oil): 2 tbsp. (or oil 1 tbsp+ghee 1tbsp.)

Lentils drops/bori: 8-10 (optional)

Cilantro: a handful

Garam masala (cinnamon+cardamom+cloves ground): ½ tsp.

Sugar: 1 small pinch

Green chili pepper: 3-4 nos. (depending on your tolerance)

• Grate the mulo/radish very fine. I grate it in a food processor.
• Sprinkle salt (around a tsp.) and let it sit for 15-20 mns.
• Heat up the oil and fry the bori to a light brown color. Take them out and drain them on a paper towel.
• Temper the oil with the whole cumin seeds. Let them sizzle a little bit.
• Add the bay leaves and the dry red chili. Sauté for few seconds until turn a shade darker.
• Mix the ginger-red chili-cumin powder.
• Add the grated coconut to the oil and sauté it as well. You can smell sautéed coconut.
• Add the ginger-red chili-cumin powder paste and sauté until oil oozes out.
• Squeeze all the water out of the radish and add them to the spice paste. Sprinkle the turmeric powder, mix well and stir frequently to incorporate all the spices for several more minutes. Keep it on medium flame.
• Cover the pot and let the radish get cooked.
• Remove the cover and stir for few more minutes. Taste a little bit and check it tastes cooked.
• Add a pinch of sugar, garam masala powder, ghee, chopped green chili and cilantro and cover the pot for 5 minutes.
• Crush the boris over it just before serving. 

Variation:  instead of boris, you can add shrimp to the dish as well. Marinate small shrimps with turmeric and salt for few minutes. Shallow fry them and keep them aside. Add the shrimps when the radish is almost cooked and let the flavors mix with each other. You can skip both and it still taste good.

 

Celebrated holi with tilanno/rice and toasted sesame seed pudding made by Maa

Who doesn’t know about holi? It’s the most exciting festival to me. It’s very well known all over the world now. It’s a festival of color and love. It breaks the boundaries of poor and rich, known and unknown, friend and foe. Westerners or anyone who is not familiar with the occasion might get intimidated by the thought of it. But to us Indians, it’s just fun. We don’t get scared by unknown people approaching us with a bucket of colored water. We smear red-blue-yellow-green abir on each other. Faces become psychedelic canvases, to the extent that we cannot recognize people even our next door neighbors.

This is exactly how we look like.

Maa at ISKCON ground

Holi is also the first festival of spring, heralding the advent of the season. In Bengal (where I am from) it’s also known as ‘doljatra’ or ‘basanta utsav’ (literally, spring festival). In my region, the night of the full moon is celebrated by burning dry leaves and woods. It’s called “nera pora” (burning of the bald guy). I have no idea why the name though. The purpose was to burn all the dead and dry leaves and start the spring with fresh and green. A childhood memory that sticks is of roasting potatoes in the fire and then eating them with a sprinkling of salt. It tasted heavenly. All the kids from the neighborhood gathered around the fire, we played, danced and then waited eagerly for the potatoes to be roasted. We used to chant a poem:

“Aaj amader near pora,

Kaal amader dol,

Phete gyalo, phete gyalo

Kaali raamer dhol.

Bawlo hori bole, hori bole,

Bawlo hori bole

Phete gyalo, phete gyalo

Kaali raamer dhol…

Bawlo hori bole”

I am not even going to translate the poem; it makes no sense in English if I do so. The only lines that make sense are “today is near pora and tomorrow is holi”…that’s it.

Holi brings back so many childhood memories. Wearing the clothes which you will not mind throwing away, cleaning and brushing vigorously to remove horrendously toxic colors off our skin all through the afternoon, drinking sidhdhi (a drink made from cannabis leaves) and going to the neighbors house to sprinkle a little bit of aabir (powdered paint) on the elderly people’s feet and asking for their blessings…the list goes on.

This year my parents are with me, so I have something very special to share. It’s called tilanno (til=sesame and anno=rice). It’s basically rice pudding with toasted sesame seeds. It’s very fragrant and delicate. I loved, loved and loved it, so did my friends and my husband (who does not have a sweet tooth but appreciated the delicacy of the flavor).

Recipe:

Ingredients:

Whole milk: ½ gallon

Atap rice (preferred)/any small grain rice: ½ cup

Sesame seeds: ½ cup (more or less according to your preference)

Cashew nut powder: 2 tbsp

Mewa/khoa kheer/milk powder: 2 tbsp. (optional)

Sugar: to taste (you can mix half n half sugar and gur/jaggery)

A tiny pinch of salt

• Start boiling the milk. Keep stirring constantly on medium high heat.
• Wash the rice with several changes of water and soak them for minimum 30 minutes. Drain the water. Let the rice become completely air dry.
• Grind the rice to a coarse powder (do not make a fine paste, say half broken kind of)
• Toast the sesame seed to a shade or two darker. You will get the nice toasted sesame aroma.
• Let it cool down and then pulse it to a coarse powder as well. Do not make a fine powder.
• Add the rice to the milk and let it get cooked. Add sugar. Stir frequently.
• Once the whole thing comes to almost the desired consistency, add cashew nut powder and mewa/milk powder/khoa kheer and the ground sesame seed powder. Stir and turn off the heat.
• Let it cool down and then refrigerate it.
• Sprinkle some whole toasted sesame seeds on top of it.
• Serve chilled.

If you add gur/jaggery, add it at the end and then turn off the heat, otherwise the milk might get curdled.

The whole thing will be much thicker after it cools down, so keep it a little more liquidy and it will come to a thicker consistency after it cools down. If you se ethat it became too thick, add a little bit of luke warm milk.

I am sending this recipe to Sukanya of saffronstreaks who is guest hosting for Jagruti.

Note: The name ‘Holi’ came from the name ‘Holika’ who was a demoness and the sister of the demon ‘Hiranyakashipu’ (a mythical character). You can read the Wiki article here and know more about the festival. Long story short, the festival is the celebration of good over evil (as most Hindu festivals are), symbolized by the dahan or cremation of Holika and the salvation of Prahlad (son of Hiranyakashipu).  Funnily, Holi lost its religious side a long time ago. Everyone plays holi now…doesn’t matter who you are.

A modern day Holika waiting to be burnt.

Bhaja mug daal/roasted mung daal and the Bengali wedding

Indian weddings in general are overwhelming. Sometimes fun, sometimes extremely frustrating. The thing which bothers me is the wastefulness of it. Many things are done based on blind observance of ritual without any semblance of rationality. Nobody knows why but still they get done. The Brahmin priest pretty much has the final say in determining the ‘shoulds’ and ‘should nots’. Of course the parents on either side can chime in, but who’s going to risk their own daughter’s or son’s marriage? In a Hindu Bengali wedding, you are supposed to offer rice, vegetables and fruit to fourteen generations of your forefathers. When my dad asked our family priest of how much rice he should buy, the priest said “one kilogram” for each forefather. Are you kidding? Isn’t it outright robbing? Who among my ancestors had that appetite? Of course, the priest takes it all home anyway after the wedding, so my forefathers would have gone hungry anyway.

Floor painting: Fish is considered to be a sign of fertility and hence the design.

Among other nonsensical things in the wedding process, there is something way funnier than the rest and that is the pointy Bengali groom hat or topor. It’s the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen a human being wearing. No one looks good in it. It’s one size fits all in theory and in reality one size fits none. It’s annoying, period. Thank goodness I wasn’t supposed to wear any such funny thing. That hat should be eliminated from the whole wedding process. I am sure there are people who would love it, but sorry, stay away from me. I severely doubt your fashion sense (I am not a fashion icon but you don’t have to be one to dislike that hat – my husband, the single most unfashionable man I know, hates it even more than me). 

The groom with the funny hat

BUT, not all things are bad in a Bengali wedding. When it comes to food, we are the best. No argument please. We Bengalis can beat anyone. If you ask me, I love the lunch menu more than the dinner menu…almost always. The dinner kind of gets iffy sometimes. With lachcha paratha (layered flatbread) and Kashmiri dum aloo paired with pathar mangsho and tomato chutney, I get all confused. During lunch it’s all pure Bengali…to be precise it’s delicious. The bhaja muger daal with lomba begun bhaja (moong lentils and fried eggplant), machher jhol (fish curry), chatni, papor (pappadam), mishti doi (sweet yougurt)…pure bliss. I am drooling. The memories are gradually fading but I don’t want them to fade away completely. A staple on the menu of the many biye baari (wedding ceremonies) that I’ve gone to, (believe it or not, including my own), this bhaja moong daal is something which I’ll cherish forever.

Recipe:

Ingredients:

Yellow husked mung daal/mung lentils: ½ cup

Ginger: around 1” piece

Green chilies: 2-3 nos.

Turmeric: ½ tsp.

Sugar: ½ tsp.

Salt to taste

Tadka/phoron/seasoning:

Cumin seeds: ½ tsp.

Bay leaves: 2 small

Whole dry red chilies: 2 nos.

Ghee/oil: ½ tsbp. 

• Roast the lentils in a heavy bottom pan on medium low heat. Stir very frequently. Try not to burn the lentils. It takes a little bit of patience but well worth it. Roast it until the lentils change to a darker shade and release a nice aroma of roasted lentils.
• Cool and wash with two-three changes of water.
• Boil 1 ½ cups of water in a pot. Once the water starts boiling, add the washed daal. Bring to a boil and lower the flame to medium. Add turmeric.
• Take the white foamy stuff off as it starts coming to the top of the boiling daal.
• You can either chop the ginger fine or grind it to a paste. Add the ginger to the daal when it’s half cooked.
• Stir the daal either with a wooden lentil stirrer (daaler kNata) or any other spoon. Do not make it a mush. You should be able to see the grain a little bit. I do not like thick mushy daal.
• Add the green sugar and salt to taste once the daal is completely done.
• In a separate pan, heat up the ghee (preferred) or any other oil and add the jeera/cumin seeds. Let them sizzle a little bit and then add the bay leaves and red chilies. Let them release the aroma and darken a little bit.
• Immediately add the seasoning to the boiling daal and cover the pot. Turn off the heat as well.
• Uncover right before serving and mix the seasoning well with the daal.

Note: You can pressure cook the daal if you want. I don’t because I cannot control the consistency of the lentils. It always ends up being too cooked. It’s my limitation but if you can control it, go ahead and cook it in whichever way is convenient for you.

Adjust the water according to your liking. Some people like it very thick, some light, so it’s up to you. I like it medium thick for mung daal.

Goan pork vindaloo and the spice connection

Who would have thought that spices can change the whole world? Personally, I never did. But that doesn’t say a whole lot. Spices were very precious and not only used in cooking, but also as medicines. The Spanish and the Potuguese were the first to set out on pioneering voyages to the Indies to find spices at their source rather than as astronomically expensive commodities that oriental traders brought to their countries in small amounts. It’s a different story that Columbus ended up exactly on the opposite side of the globe. All I can say is that he was much better than what I am now, after 521 years and WITH a GPS attached to my car. When my GPS says “head southwest toward such n such street”…I am like “Southwest?” I have no idea which way is Southwest.

After Columbus came back from America claiming to have found the Indies and got a royal rap on his knuckles from the Spanish throne, it was Vasco Da Gama’s turn to take a shot at it but luckily for him he chose a different route, starting on 8^th July 1497 from Lisbon, Portugal and reaching Calicut on 20^th May 1498 via the Cape of Good Hope. Calicut back then was the main port for the global spice trade, although the main cargo was black pepper, the so-called “king of spices”. The discovery of India acted as a catalyst for a whole new era of world history. It opened up a route to reach India from Europe. Blood was shed, ships were drowned, seamen died from scurvy but that didn’t stop the Europeans from coming to India.

Photo taken from: http://ambassadors.net/archives/images/dagamamap.gif

After many years, Portugal attacked Goa and took hold of the whole island. Goa remained a Portuguese colony from 1510 to 1987 when it returned to being Indian territory. Needless to say, 500 years of Portuguese rule led to a very different population and culture in Goa compared to the rest of India. Among other things, their food was highly influenced by the Portuguese. The Goanese food item most commonly known (or rather, stereotyped) in the West is vindaloo. You’ll get hundred different varieties of the vindaloo often with tastes so removed from the original that a Goanese might ask which continent the dish came from.

The vindaloo comes from the Portuguese Carne de Vinha d’ Alhos, that is, pork with wine and garlic. As wine was not readily available in India, it was substituted with palm vinegar and Kashmiri chilies. It does not contain tomato. A vindaloo is not supposed to be fiery hot and does not contain aloo (potato), as is commonly assumed. I have tried to stay as close possible to the authentic one. Any recipe can have variations I must stress that just as my husband has no place in my kitchen, tomatoes and potatoes have no place in a vindaloo.

Recipe:

Ingredients:

Pork shoulder: 4 lbs

Onion: One large chopped fine

Kashmiri chilies: around 12-15 nos.

Garlic pods: 3 big fat ones/ 4-6 small ones

Ginger paste: 1 ½ tbsp

Red wine vinegar/regular white vinegar: 1/3 cup

Turmeric: 1 tsp.

Red chili powder (the hot variety)/Cayenne pepper: 1 tbsp.

Salt to taste

Oil: 2 tbsp

To be roasted:

Whole cumin seeds: 2 tsp.

Black peppercorn: 1/2 tbsp.

Cinnamon: 2” piece

Cloves: 4-6 nos.

Fennel seeds: 1 tsp.

Black mustard seeds: 1 tsp

Bay leaves: 2 nos.

• Roast the spices under ‘to be roasted’ list in a dry skillet.
• Soak the Kashmiri chilies in vinegar for 2-4 hours.
• Grind the chilies with the roasted spices along with the vinegar. You should not need water while grinding, but if needed, add a little bit of water (just enough to help the blender motor).
• Make a paste with the ginger and garlic.
• Marinate the meat with the red chili powder-turmeric-chili-spice-ginger-garlic paste for 6 hours-overnight. Mix the meat once or twice while marinating.
• Heat up the oil and add the onion.
• Sauté until translucent.
• Add the meat and cook on medium flame until all the moisture is absorbed and oil starts oozing out.
• Add enough hot water to cover the meat. Add salt to taste, mix it well and cover the pot with a heavy lid.
• Turn down the flame to medium low. Cook covered until the meat is cooked and it reaches the desired consistency.

Cook’s note: If you do not find whole Kashmiri red chilies, add Kashmiri red chili powder or paprika to the vinegar and let it soak for an hour or so. Then mix it with the roasted spices and grind.

Vindaloo is like pickled pork, it tastes better after a day or two in the fridge. Served best with plain white rice.

I buy the pork shoulder with a little bit of fat in them. Otherwise pork gets dry very quickly while cooking. If you buy lean pork, add a little bit more oil.

Try to pat dry the pork pieces a little bit in the beginning to avoid the release of water from the meat while cooking.

You can adjust the chilies or the chili powder according to your preference. Vindaloo as I said should not be very hot. It should be a little bit hot and tangy.

The pork can be substituted with lamb if you do not eat pork.