Tangra Machher Marich Jhal/Tangra Fish in Black Pepper Gravy

It's well known to all Indians that "Machhe bhat e Bangali" (Fish and rice are staple and favorite food of Bengali). My favorite food is any kind of fish, specially small fishes. My son just like me is also fond of fishes and loves to eat small fishes. I help him taking the bones out of the fish, and he enjoys his favorite item. In this regard he has added one word to his dictionary by himself and often uses it when he seeks my help for getting bones off the fish. He says "Mamma can you bechh the machh?" In Bengali we say "Machh bechhe dao". In his comfort he has added a new word "Bechh". The first day when we heard it, I could not understand at first the meaning of this strange word. Later realized the meaning of the Khichuri (Bengali-English mixture) word. I try hard to make him talk in Bengali and that's how the result is mixing up some bangla words with English. 

There is a sweet story associated with this particular preparation of Tangra fish. My mom being a perfect ghoti (West Bengal) used to make this fish mostly in a mustard sauce gravy or onion-garlic sauce. But during my marriage she hired a cook (mashi) who was bangal (East Bengal Origin) and was generously good at every item she cooked for us. I can still remember the taste of Tangrar marich jhal she cooked. That was the first time I tasted that preparation and was in love with that. We had a sleepless tensed night the day before we had this item. When my marriage was fixed I used to work in Delhi. My mom was in Kolkata. My jijaji (brother-in-law) made a big mistake while booking the tickets for us. Instead of booking the ticket for 2313 Sealdah Rajdhani down (Kolkata bound), in hurry he booked the ticket for 2314 :Sealdah Rajdhani up  (Delhi bound). So the day of the journey, me super exited and happy inside, when boarded the train was  totally fuzed to discover the seats assigned to us are actually possessed by others. Then with those passenger's help we found that we have booked the wrong ticket. That was a traumatic experience. Only 3 days were left for my marriage and me still in Delhi made me feel totally disheartened. I felt like I won't be able to reach to my wedding function. That time telephonic conversation with my hubby consoled me a lot and helped me build up my confidence. We did not return to our didi's home that night. We have returned those useless tickets and also re-booked the ticket for Kalka Mail next morning with the help of a travel agency.  We stayed that night in a hotel in Pahar Ganj, close to the station and boarded the train next morning in time. We reached exactly 24 hours after we were supposed to reach originally. My mom was super tensed at her place as she was only alone managing everything by herself. Me and didi reached just like guests one day before my aiburobhat (feast just before the day of marriage). After the long journey and so much tension, the lunch served to us cooked by masi comprising  Tangrar morich jhal was so much inviting and tasty, it boosted high up my spirit and made my smile back again on my face.

Now after all this bakwas (nonsense talk)  let me me share the recipe:

Ingredients:

1. 500 grams of Tangra Fish
2. Salt for marinating the fish and also for the gravy as per taste
3. Turmeric: 2 teaspoon
4. Mustard oil: 4 tablespoon
5. 3 teaspoons of Onion seeds/ Nigella seeds/Kalo jeere/Kalunji
6. 2 teaspoons of Cumin seeds/Jeera
7. 10-12 whole black pepper
8. 2 teaspoons of tomato paste
9. Green chillies: 3/4 slit
10. Sugar: 1 teaspoon (optional)
11. Garlic clove 4/5

Steps:

1. As I got the frozen block of fish it took time to defrost the fish. Easy way of defrost is to keep the frozen packet in sink for 3-4 hours. The ice melts by itself  and you get fish easily ready for cooking. If you don't have that much time in hand, cut the packet, take the block out of the packet and run hot water over the block for 10 minutes. The fishes will come off the ice easily. Wash the fish and then rub them with salt and turmeric powder and a drizzle of mustard oil. This oil while marinating helps less splutter while frying the fish.  I have learned this from Zee Bangla Rannaghor. 

2. Heat Mustard oil in a non-stick Kadhai. When you see smoke, reduce the heat and then throw the fishes in the kadhai slowly. Once one side is cooked golden brown, fry other side as well.

3.  While you fry the fish, you can make the spice mix ready. In a coffee grinder/dry grinder, grind whole  black peppers, cumin seeds and onion seeds together to a fine powder. Add little water to that powder and soak it for some time. 

4. Once you have fried all the fishes, if you see there is not adequate oil in the kadhai, add some more (1 tablespoon is enough to cook the gravy). Now add some chopped the garlic cloves. When they turn brown, take them off the oil. The garlic cloves have been added just to make the oil fragrant.

5. Now add the slitted green chilies to the oil. When it starts spluttering, add the tomato paste to the oil and saute it for some time. If you do not have ready made tomato paste, you can also use deseeded, deskinned pureed tomato (1 medium tomato). 

6. When oil starts separating add the  Black pepper + Cumin + Onion seeds mix to the oil and cook it for some time. You might need to sprinkle a little water to stop the mix to stick to the bottom of the pan. 

7. After 3/4 minutes of cooking the masala add 1 cup of water and salt as per taste and just a little sugar to make the gravy. When the gravy starts boiling add the fried fishes into the gravy. Let them get coated by the gravy well. This preparation would be little dry and the gravy would be sticking to the fishes.. 

8. Your fish is ready now. Serve it hot with white rice.

Enjoy

Snow Peas Green Mix/ Matar shak er Chachchori

My in laws are vegetarian. And Bengali vegetarian means foods without onion and garlic. In this family even musoor daal is considered as a non vegetarian (Amish) item. Being a strict Bengali vegetarian their staple food in a daily platter is Chachchori. So after marriage, I learned to cook Chachchori to serve my hubby the platter he is grown up with. My mom used to cook it, too. But my mom-in-law is expert in applying different varieties of forons (tampering the oil with different spices) to her archaic. Thus she makes simple dishes exotic with her mastery on tampering with spices (dry seeds on the oil or foron). 

My hubby has spent his childhood in North Bengal. They had abundant supply of local greens. One of them was snow peas green (Matar shak). I have never tasted this shak ever in my life until last weekend. I have purchased it from the Korean Grocery store nearby our house. My hubby was so much exited to see this green, it came instantly to our shopping cart without any second thought. I loved watching him mesmerizing his childhood memories associated with this simple green.

 I have cooked it as per my mom-in-law's instruction.

Ingredients:

1. Snow peas Green/ Matar Shak: 1 bunch
2. White Badi (Urhat dal/ white lentils dumplings)
3. Panch Foron (panchpuran - mixture of five whole spices)
4. Egg plant big : 1/2
5. Potato: 3
6. 1 table spoon mustard seeds soaked in water and then grinded with 1 green chilli
7. Mustard  oil: 3 tablespoons
8. Green chilli: 3
9. Salt as per taste
10. Turmeric powder: 1 teaspoon
11. Sugar as per taste

Steps:

 1. Chop  potato and egg plant in the same shape and size. I have cut them thin long pieces. This is a traditional way of chopping vegetables for Chachchori. If you want you can add flat beans or Shim to this charchchori, that adds extra flavor to it. But I did not have any, so could not add it though. 

2. Finely chop the snow peas green or matar shak. You need to wash the green rigorously before you chop them.

3. Now heat mustard oil in a kadhai/pan. I took a big one so that all vegetables fit it inside.

4. Fry  the Badi/Vadis and take them off the kadhai when they turn brown from all sides.

5. Add green chilli and Panch Foron.

6. Add potatoes. Fry them nicely until they get coated with oil from all sides. 

7. Add the egg plants. Stir them.

8. Add salt and turmeric powder. Mix it thoroughly with the fried vegetables in the kadhai and cover the kadhai.

9. After 5 minutes add the snow peas green or matar shak in the kadhai gradually. There might be space crunch at this moment in the kadhai. Add shak in little batches in the kadhai instead of adding whole bunch at a time and mix it thoroughly. When it reduces in size, add the next batch, and so on.

10. Now cover the kadhai. The shak will leave lot of water and all the vegetables will be cooked in that water only. Add sugar as per taste. When the vegetables are soft and mushy, add the ground mustard seeds paste and the fried badis.

11. Mix them well, cover and let it simmer for 4/5 minutes.

12. The chachchori is ready to serve. Serve it hot with white rice.

Enjoy

Kamolabhog/Orange Cheese balls in sugar syrup

The memory of childhood is really a treasure forever. Although our ancestral home had been in North Kolkata, I passed my childhood in a small town named Kulti. It is an industrial town. The life of the town was the steel company, IISCO. There were no so called restaurants in the town. There were only a few sweet shops (Mistanno Bhandar) and snack corners. The best one in the town was Nilkamal Mistanno Bhandar, in Ranitala (downtown Kulti). And the best from their collection of sweets were Kamalabhog and Lyangcha. My favorite was the Kamolabhog. Whenever we had guests coming over, baba used to bring sweets from that shop. 

Also, in the wedding ceremonies of that time, the desert items in the feast used to be mostly Rajbhog or Kamolabhog or Pantua often. Life was much simpler, there were not many colors but whatever the colors were,  they were really bright and shiny. And the taste of the Kamolabhog I can still feel inside my mouth. 

Here in USA we don't get Kamolabhog at all in any shops. One time I got canned Kamolabhog, but the preservative smell was too strong and the balls were too hard to consume. Then only  I planned to make Kamolabhog at home. 

The recipe to make this delicious sweet is as follows:

Ingredients:

1. 1 Gallon of Milk

2.  200 ml of Orange Juice

3. 1 Lemon

4. 2 teaspoons of orange extract

5. A few pinch of Yellow Food color

6. 1/2 Cup of Khoya

7. 1.5 tablespoon of warm milk

8. Few strands of Safforn

9. 2 teaspoons of semolina or suji

10. 3.5 cups of sugar

11. 8 cups of water

12. 8-10 Green Cardamom

Steps:

1. Take a gallon of milk in a big pot and start boiling the milk. You need to stir it so that the milk does not stick to bottom of the pan.

2. When you see the bubbles are appearing on the surface of the milk, add the orange juice to the milk slowly. You will see the milk starts curdling and the whey starts forming. I needed to add juice of a lime mixed with little water to curdle it nicely. With just orange juice the milk did not completely curdle. Once you see the milk solid is completely separated from the greenish water, your chhana or cheese is ready.

3 Now take a colander and place it in the sink. Put the cheesecloth on the colander and strain the chhana  on the cloth. Turn the tap on and wash the chhana with cold water so that it does not get hard and also the lime water is washed off completely. But be careful!! Do not wash it too much, otherwise, it will be hard.

4. Now tie all the opposite ends of the cheesecloth and hang it on the tap for 40-45 minutes. This will let all the water straining out from the cheese.

5. In between you can prepare the khoya. Grate the khoya bar. I used Nanak Khoya and 1/2 cup of khoya was sufficient to make 28 Kamalabhog.

6. Warm the milk and soak the Safforn strands to the milk. Knead the Khoya with safforn soaked warm milk mixture.  Make 28 small balls from that mixture.

7. Take the chhana now on a plate and mix orange extract and yellow food color and mix it thoroughly. Also add the suji to it and also 1/2 teaspoon of sugar. Now knead it nicely with your palm on the plate or on the clean counter-top for 5 minute. Do not rub for longer time, the chhana will get hard. 

8. Now make balls from that chhana. I could make 28 equal size balls. You can make more depending on the size of Kamolabhog you want to make. Ensure that there should not be absolutely any cracks on the ball otherwise your balls will break in the sugar syrup while boiling.

9. Now put the small khoya balls inside the cheesballs and make them round again. It is a tedious step. If you want, you may skip adding the khoya balls inside the komolabhog.

10. Now make the sugar syrup. Take a big vessel "(so that the cheese balls get enough space to puff) and add 8 cups of water into it.  Add 8-10 green cardamoms into the water. Let it boil. Add 3.5 cups of sugar to it. When the sugar dissolves to the water, reduce the heat. 

11. Now gently add the cheese balls to the sugar syrup and let it boil. In between check whether the sugar syrup is drying. You may need to add water in little quantity to the pot time to time. I added 2 time 1/4th cups of water.

12. After 30 minutes with a spoon gently roll the balls so that the other side faces up. Cook it 10/15 more minutes and you are all set. 

13. Cool it. Put them in the refrigerator and serve it.!!! 

Enjoy!!!!

Sheekh Kabab/ Minced chicken or lamb skewer

During my Delhi Stay I have become fond of two items, momo and kabob. Although there were numerous restaurants that serve mughlai/Tandur cuisines, a group of Punjabi/Shikh  persons used to sell kabobs and tandur in a mobile van.They used to bring marinated and semi cooked tandurs and sheekh kabob in a van (mostly Maruti Omni car). On my way back home from office the rich aroma of burnt meat attracted me so much that I could hardly resist myself from  buying a good portion very often. I don't remember now how they used to sell hot staff in a car. I have not noticed that time that arrangement carefully but was busy digging in the tandurs or the kabobs. 

After marriage I discovered that my hubby is also fond of Mughlai cuisine. I have been wishing  to make sheekh kabob, reshmi malai kabob and many other items for a long time. But in India I did not have tandoor machines at home. After coming to USA, we got privilege of using convectional oven in our everyday life. So the door to make grilled and convectional food opened to us and really eased our cooking life.

Sheekh means iron rod. Sheekh kabob is the kabob that is cooked on a skewer (made of iron or bamboo).  

The simple recipe to cook Sheekh Kabob is as follows:

Ingredients:

1. Minced chicken or lamb: 2lbs
2. Onions finely chopped: 1 medium
3. Minced garlic: 1 tablespoon
4. Minced ginger: 1 tablespoon
5. White pepper powder: 1 teaspoon
6. Garam Masala powder (cardamom, cloves, cinnamon grounded): 2 teaspoon
7. Cumin powder: 1 tea spoon
8. Coriander leaves: 2 teaspoon
9. Green chillies: 3/4 finely chopped
10. Nutmeg powder: 1 teaspoon (I have used freshly crushed nutmeg) 
11. Skewer: 15-20 sticks

Steps:

1. Soak all the bamboo sticks in water for an hour. If you are using an iron skewer you can easily skip this step.  


2. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl. Cover and refrigerate for 1-2 hours.

3. Then you need to take handful of the minced meat mixture and roll it around the soaked skewer. I have used two skewers per kabab to ensure that the stick does not break .

4. When all the kababs are made, you can brush little oil or ghee on them that gives a nice color. I have placed all the kabobs in a foil wrapped baking tray.

 5. Preheat the oven at 475 deg F.

6. Place the tray inside the oven preferably on the middle rack and cook it for 20 minutes.

7. Take the tray out after 20 minutes and rotate the kababs stick so that the other side faces up.

8.Put the tray back in the oven and cook for 10 minutes more.

9. Take the tray out and with the help pf a knife or scissor take the kabobs off the stick and serve it onto the plate. The trick is to push  the meat little down at both ends of the stick and the it comes out very easily.

10.Sprinkle some chat masala and lime juice over the kabob. Serve it with coriander chutney and salad.

Enjoy

 

About-Me Cullinary journey begins

I am a bong and I am foodie. From my childhood I used to watch my mom cook her mouth watering delicacies. As a famous Bengali proverb says "Ghumie achhe shishur pita sab shishur i antare" (lines from Sukanta Bhttachaya's poem) I have always lived with a dream of cooking like my mom and also excel in that.

I got my first chance of  cooking when I was in college. My mom had a fracture on her right hand. That time I cooked for a whole month under my father's supervision and mom's guidance. I made so many dishes everyday and also when my elder sister visited us that time I have made two/three special dishes. One was Chhatur Barfi. It tasted so nice. Got lot of appreciation that time. I have to try that now once. I almost forgot the recipe.


During my university days I cooked once or twice in my friend's and private tutor's place. Kajol da, my teacher, a scholar but a very humble person, was very close to me. He used to call me "Bonu" (Sis). I feel really lucky to have a teacher like him. After our studies we used to have a chat session accompanied with chop-murhi or Beguni or sometimes Belgharia-Dumdum's station road special Malpoa. When exams were approaching we used to have a 8-10 hour study session at his place. We used to have our lunch together. Sometimes mom used to pack my food in a lunch box but being a foodie used to share Dada's food as well. There sometimes we (Me, Pritha) have cooked together in his rannar masi's absence. It seemed like a feast rather than a study session to us. I was helper actually that time being novices at cooking. I remember the lovely taste of machher jhol, lentils, alu bhaja and also begun bhaja etc.  Also remember cooking at my friend's hostel cum mess. They used to stay in a privately owned home rented to college/university  students. One winter afternoon we planned to visit the book fare but that day  their cooking help did not turn up.
I with my friend made chicken kasha and rice. We ate a sumptuous meal that gave enough energy for a long walk in the book-fare. I really miss those days badly.

Later when I moved to Delhi, I  initially used to stay at my elder sister's place. There I have cooked once luchi/puri. They were very small in size. My bro-in-law used to teach me that i cooked for dolls not for real persons. I started cooking in week ends one or two dishes to help my sister. My brother in law had immense interest in cooking. I still can feel the taste of his "cream chicken".  Didi was good in making Delhi side dishes like aloo-paratha, muli paratha, gobi paratha. Then I have started staying in company guest house in Noida Sec-28. The place was beautiful and so was the accommodation. Seeing all the other girls cooking and staying by themselves all alone I got my encouragement and started my cooking journey. We used to share our food and eat together most of the time. Being the only non-veg cook in the hostel my dishes were in high demand and heavily appreciated.

Then as any other girls' journey goes on, I got married and my cooking journey elaborated full fledged. Although I cook daily, I don't get bored of cooking. Rather I like to add on varieties to our regular food, try different cuisines, make traditional recipe with a twist.

In this blog I will write about my culinary experience. I will write about the recipes and post pictures of the foods I cook. In this blog you will find recipe of very simple food  to festive delicacies. I don't want to post only restaurant style cooked recipes but recipes that were cooked by my mother, grand mothers and are almost forgotten. I need your blessing, love, and support to make it a success.