Photographs by Sebastian John

I have a liking for offal meat – gizzards, tripe, trotters, brains, kidney. Though I don’t buy them often for home cooking (my wife has biased tastes towards offal meat), I never miss a chance to eat if I am offered, or if it is available on a restaurant’s menu that I can trust. The best chicken gizzard dish I have had are the yakitori’s (sunagimo) in Tokyo. My Japanese friends used to take me for rounds of sake and yakitori when I worked there for couple of weeks in 2006.

When I came to the US I tried my hand at fried chicken gizzards. As much as I love soul food, I just could not come to terms with the fried gizzards. Though I liked them, the dish was just too heavy for me. I fell back to my mom’s recipe. She does not have a particular liking for gizzards, but once in a while she would make it for me.

The dish she makes is light on dry spices and oil. There is more emphasis on fresh ingredients – onion, ginger, garlic, tomatoes and and green chillies. The dish is always finished with a sprinkle of fresh ground cumin. I have tweaked her recipe a bit, mainly to save time. She dices the gizzards into small pieces, after sauteing the spices, adds the gizzards and simmers them till they are cooked. Gizzards can take considerable time to cook over normal cooking temperature and pressure — about 45 minutes to an hour. I just cannot afford that much time, so I pressure cook. It takes about 15 minutes. I add then saute the spices and stir fry the cooked gizzards in them.

Ingredients

1. 1 pound of chicken gizzards
2. 2 bay leafs
3. 1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder
4. 1 fine chopped onion
5. 1 diced medium-sized tomato
6. 3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
7. 1/4 teaspoon ground garlic
8. 1 jalapeno
9. 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground cumin
10. Salt
11. 2 tablespoon oil
13. 1 cup water

Wash the gizzards well and make sure that the inner skin in the gizzard is taken off. It will be in light-olive green in color and can be easily pealed off the gizzard. The skin is very bitter and will ruin the dish.

Heat one tablespoon of oil in a pressure cooker pan, and fry the bay leaves. Add the gizzards, turmeric powder and water. Bring it to boil, and add salt. Close the pressure cooker and once the pressure builds in, cook for 15 minutes. If you are using a sauce pan or stock pot, cover and simmer the gizzards for at least 45 minutes. I have cooked gizzards for an hour and half till they became tender.

Remove from heat and set aside.

Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a saute pan/skillet and fry the onions till they are soft and slightly golden brown. Add the gizzards along with the stock water and cook on high heat till the sauce thickens. Add ginger and garlic paste, and tomatoes and cook for 2 – 3 minutes. All the liquids would have evaporated by now leaving back a thick sauce. Add the jalapenos, cook for one minute and then add the cumin powder.

Note:- Since there is minimal oil, and the cooking is done on a high heat, please continuously stir the dish. Otherwise the gizzards will stick to the bottom of the pan.

Serve with rice, parathas/porota or enjoy as a snack.

Photographs by Sebastian John

This week has been extremely busy, and bittersweet in many ways. We bought our first home this Wednesday, and in a short while I will have my first kitchen!! (I have been constantly on the move since I finished my undergrad in the early 90’s.). In the last 16 years or so, I have lived in Trichur, Trivandrum (Thiruvananthapuram), Cochin, multiple places in New Delhi, California, Virginia, and Washington DC.

I had visions of creating my version of the Thanksgiving dinner but that never happened. We were just too exhausted from signing papers. We slept through the day of Thanksgiving, and were thankful after our family friends (whom we stay with) took us out for a fabulous dinner. That evening we were told that a relative of ours needed urgent surgery after some medical check-ups. Yesterday we went out shopping for our new kitchen (though eventually we regretted going out because we forgot it was BLACK FRIDAY.)

So today I decided to cook white chicken curry, that I had seen on a Pakistani website. But the chicken that I had bought couple of days back turned bad and I had to throw it into the trash. My love-hate relationship with fridges continues…. I finally threw in the towel and decided to use potatoes instead of the chicken. I knew potatoes cannot do justice to chicken, but at the end the it came out pretty good. We had a good dinner serving the curry with cumin rice and some store-bought carrot pickle.

Ingredients

1. Two large potatoes
2. 1/2 cup yogurt
3. 5 green cardamoms
4. 3 black cardamoms
5. 3 cloves
6. 1 star anise
7. 1 stick cinnamon
8. 2 bay leaves
9. 1 medium size onion
10. 2 jalapeno/3-4 Thail green chili
10. 1 teaspoon ginger and garlic paste
11. Salt
12. Oil

Chop onions and fry them in 3–4 tablespoons of oil till they are soft. Make sure they do not turn brown, otherwise the curry will cease to be “white”. Add cardamoms, cloves, star anise, cinnamon, and bay leaves and fry for about 2 minutes.

Add the potatoes, ginger and garlic paste, and fry them in the spices for about 1 – 2 minutes. Add yogurt and about 1/4 cup of water, and bring to boil. Add salt to taste. Lower the heat, cover and simmer till potatoes are partially done. Remove the cover and continue simmering till potatoes are well done and gravy thickens. Add the chopped chillies and cook for another 3-4 minutes.

Serve with rice or rotis (flat breads)

To make cumin rice –

Heat 1 teaspoon of oil/butter in sauce pan and fry cumin seeds. Add water as required for the amount of rice to be cooked and bring it to boil. Add rice, cover and simmer till it is done.

I will be making the chicken version sometime soon……..

Photographs by Sebastian John

We have been going through our pantry to empty it out, and have been finding packets of dried beans, lentils, and cans of this and that. Among them was a can of mango pulp made from Kesar mangoes we had bought this summer at one of the Indian grocery stores on Oak Tree Road, Iselin, New Jersey. After we got introduced to these stores during our story last year on the Indian community in Edison/Iseln, we are still amazed at the sheer variety of Indian produce these stories sell.

My wife decided to use the mango pulp to make a bread. In our marriage, my wife makes up for my lack of baking knowledge. She learned from her mother, who is an awesome baker. She (my wife’s mother) once ran her own cake business when my wife was a child. My wife’s job was to hold the cakes when they delivered them in the car.

She decided to bake a bread with sooji (farina) instead of all-purpose flour. She also used rice flour to just bind it a bit better. The results were delicious. The sooji makes the bread much heartier, as well as giving a pleasant texture of being both soft and crunch. And, its got way more fiber than boring white flour.

This is my wife’s bread recipe in her words -

Ingredients

To make two full loaves. This bread can also be made eggless (omit two tbsp of rice flour and add one more tbsp of mango pulp).

1. 2 cups and 2 tablespoon of sooji
2. 2 teaspoon baking powder
3. 1 cup sugar
4. 2 teaspoon cardamom powder
5. 2 teaspoon nutmeg powder
6. pinch of salt
7. 3 tablespoon rice flour

Mix dry ingredients together until well-blended. Then add:
1. 2 cups and 2 tablespoon mango pulp
2. 1 egg
3. 1 tablespoon lemon juice
4. 1/2 cup oil

Let sit for ten-fifteen minutes (this lets the raw sooji soak up the liquids)

Preheat over to 375.

Grease two bread pans with Crisco. Yes, I know it has hydrogenated fats and its terrible for you!! You are just using a very small amount to grease the pan. Nothing ever sticks to Crisco – I love the stuff for this purpose.

Pour batter into pans and sprinkle slivered almonds on top.

Bake for about 35 minutes. Check center with a clean knife for doneness.

Photographs by Sebastian John

I hardly cooked this week. Work and catching up with friends saw us eating out most of the last days. So I decided to cook something today, and clean out the refrigerator. We had bought some paneer a week or so back, and it had been languishing in the recesses of the fridge. A “Product of Canada”, the label on the packet said that it had to been used within five days after the package had been opened, otherwise it was good till Jan. 2010. An Indian eating paneer in the US, that was made in Canada…hmm.. I guess that is globalization.

I didn’t have many ideas what to do with the paneer, but I knew I didn’t want to make any of the traditional Indian paneer dishes. So I decided to wing it. It would be good or bad..but at least give it a try. I decided to make a ginger-tamarind glaze with brandy, and broil the paneer with it. Ideally I would love to grill the paneer, to get the sear marks which adds to the texture of the dish. But I dont have a proper grill, so I baked the paneer cubes for ten minutes at 400 F, and then broiled them for 4 minutes each side.

Ingredients

1. 1 – 1.5 inch paneer cubes

To make glaze
1. 2 teaspoon finely chopped ginger
3. 1/4 cup tamarind juice extracted from pulp
3. 1 teaspoon paprika
4. 1/4 cup brandy
5. 1/2 teaspoon crushed black pepper
6. 1/2 teaspoon brown sugar
7. Salt to taste
8. 1 teaspoon oil

Pre-heat the oven to 400 F.

In a sauce pan heat oil and fry ginger till soft. Lower the heat, add black pepper, paprika and salt to taste. Add sugar and let it caramelize. Add tamarind juice and simmer till it reduces into half. Add brandy and continue simmering till you get a thick glaze.

Coat the paneer pieces with the glaze and bake them for 10 minutes. Then broil each side for 4 minutes.

Garnish it with chiffonaded pineapple mint and serve. The mint as the name suggests gives a subtle sweet pineapple smell and flavor to the dish.

This is version 1.0 of the dish. I will be experimenting more on the flavors, and fine-tuning the taste.

A vendor selling paneer in Delhi during winter

I found this photo amongst my old negatives. I forget the exact date, but it was in the late nineties. To the left is paneer (it was fresh and heavenly). I guess on the right is khoa.

Photographs by Sebastian John

I was going through the pantry this afternoon and I found the puttu maker that I had bought three years back when moving to the U.S. I had completely forgotten about it. The puttu maker had traveled from India to California, then to Washington DC, and then two house moves in DC. Somehow it survived all those travels, never got misplaced, and had been in the pantry for the last one year after our second move in the city. Considering I found it, I had to make at least one round of puttu. After all it is the beloved breakfast food of most Keralites.

I decided to try it with corn meal (Indian Head Yellow Corn Meal). I used the same procedure that is used to make puttu with rice flour. I served it with chick peas cooked in roasted coconut curry. Traditionally black chickpeas are used for making this curry. Since I don’t have them, I substituted with the regular chickpeas.

So what is puttu? In its simplest form puttu is moistened rice powder layered with fresh shredded coconut and steamed in the puttu maker. I have seen puttu made with brown rice and white rice powder. Sometimes rice is substituted with wheat flour, ragi, all-purpose flour, semolina/farina, and as in this post with corn flour. Traditionally puttu is cylindrical in shape. Variants include -

Chiratta puttu – Chiratta means coconut shell in Malayalam. The flour is steamed the shell, which lends it a very earthy taste.

Mani puttu – Small balls of rice flour kneaded with coconut and steamed. They are served with with sweetened coconut milk. I have eaten with savory curries too.

Nool Puttu – Also called idiyappam are steamed rice noodles with a crest of shredded coconut. Idiyappam’s are popular street food in Kerala, and are usually served with savory curries, especially chicken or beef.  This was one of my favorite meals during my graduate years in Trivandrum.

Ingredients

For puttu (as posted here)
1. 1 cup corn meal.
2. Salt
3. Sugar
4. pinch of cardamom and nutmeg powder
5. Water

For roasted coconut chick pea curry
1. 1 can chick pea
2. 1/2 cup dry shredded coconut
3. 3 dried red chillies
4. 1 teaspoon of whole coriander
5. 2-3 green cardamom pods
6. 1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
7. 1/4 cup of coconut milk
8. 1/2 teaspoon chopped ginger
9. 2 finely chopped shallot
10. 1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder
11. Salt
12. Oil

To make puttu add salt to taste, 1/2 teaspoon sugar, pinch of cardamom and nutmeg powder (this was my experiment) to the corn meal. Slowly add water and mix the flour ensuring no clumps are formed. The resultant mixture should not be like dough, but rather loose. To test it, take a handful of flour and form a ball. If it is of the right consistency, the flour will shape into a ball, and when you put slight pressure to it, it will crumble.

Layer shredded coconut and corn meal into the puttu maker and steam it for about 5 minutes.

For chickpea curry, dry roast the spices for 2-3 minutes in the following order – first coriander and cumin, then cardamom, followed by red chillies. Lower the flame and add dry shredded coconut. Stir continuously till the coconut turns light brown and gives off a nice caramel smell. I specified the order because the toasting time for coriander and cumin is longer than cardamom and chillies. So if you reverse the order by the time coriander and cumin is toasted, the cardamom and chillies will burn.

Toasted coconut, chillies, cardamom and coriander

Transfer the roasted spices to a blender, and puree with coconut milk. Add water if you want to make the sauce thinner.

Heat 1 teaspoon of oil and add ginger and shallots. Fry till shallots turn golden brown and add turmeric powder. Add the chick peas and stir-fry for about 1 minute. Add the coconut spice puree and bring it to boil. Cover and simmer for about 5-7 minutes.

Serve with puttu.

This is the first time I have made puttu with corn meal. It was slightly more denser than puttu made with rice flour. I would be experimenting more options, including pan or oven-roasting the corn meal or mixing it with butter to give it a smoother texture.

The puttu maker -

More puttu trivia -

The range of dishes that is served with puttu is astounding. Apart from kadala (chickpea) curry, meat dishes (chicken, mutton and beef), egg curry, fish, boiled green lentils, potato stew, plantains and poppadoms (papads). I have seen people eat with just sugar and milk.

Though current puttu makers are all made from stainless steel, earlier ones were made with bamboo stems and coconut shells.

In the 1992 Malayalam movie Sooryamanasam, Mammootty played the lead character named “Puttu Urmees”.

The phrase “puttu adikan poova“, means “lets us go get some food.”

Photographs by Sebastian John

Last week we went to try out IndAroma – a Indo-French cafe in Alexandria, VA. It turned out to be a nice cozy place with an eclectic mix of food – appetizers, entrees (biriyani, curries etc), breads, cookies, cakes and pastries. But what I really liked about the place was the ambiance. It was so different from the run-of-the-mill, heavy-draped Indian restaurants that serve food from Styrofoam plates. It was open, had large windows, comfortable booths, and pleasant lighting. And also it did not have a name that started or ended with Taj, Mahal, Palace, Spice, and Curry.

Next to IndAroma, was a grocery store run by the same owners. When I was told that it was one of the best arranged and labeled Indian grocery store, I took that with a pinch. Till I walked in and saw with my own eyes…it indeed was one of the best stocked and arranged Indian stores I had seen. And the name “Ginger and Spice” also scored brownie points with me..because the name of my blog is INJI which means ginger.

Browsing through the aisles, I was amazed to see drumsticks in the freezer. I had never thought I would see drumsticks in the US – fresh or frozen. I got a bag, not particularly knowing what to do with it. I could make lentil-drumsticks, sambhar, or thoran. Last evening I decided to cook the drumsticks in a sweet-spicy coconut sauce.

Ingredients
1. 1 bag of frozen drumsticks (If you get fresh, all the better)
2. 3/4 can of light coconut milk
3. 2-3 Thai green chillies
4. 3/4 teaspoon chopped ginger
5. 1 medium sized tomato
6. 1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder
7. 1/4 teaspoon paprika
8. Salt to taste
9. Oil

For tempering
1. 1/2 teaspoon black mustard seeds
2. 4-5 curry leaves.
3. Oil

Blend together green chillies, ginger, turmeric powder, paprika with coconut milk and set aside.

Heat one teaspoon oil in a frying pan/skillet and stir-fry drumsticks for about 2 minutes. Add about 1/8 cups of water, lower the heat, cover and simmer till drumsticks are 3/4 done (the pulp will come out when you squeeze the sticks). Transfer the boiled drumsticks and set aside.

Heat one teaspoon of oil in the same pan, and splutter the mustard seeds and curry leaves. Lower the heat and transfer the coconut-spice blend into the pan. When the mixture starts boiling add the boiled drumsticks, cubed tomatoes, cover and simmer till the drumsticks are done.

Plate and serve with rice or Indian flatbreads.

Drumsticks are pods of the Moringa oleifera (Muringa in Malayalam) tree and are packed with vitamins and other essential nutrients. Read a scientific paper here.

Photographs by Sebastian John

I had some leftover cilantro-mint masala I had made for the Cornish hen. It stays good for a week or so when stored in a clean sterilized bottle. But I don’t like anything sitting in a refrigerator beyond two days. I have a love-hate relationship with  refrigerators. Though my mom does not keep too much food in the refrigerator, I joke with her sometimes – “should I conduct radiometric dating, before I consume this?”. That gets me thrown out of the kitchen.

So, I had the masala, and some chicken thighs. I cook mostly with chicken thighs because they have enough fat on the skin that gives good drippings for sauce, and are soft, tender and flavorful when cooked. My wife is not a big fan of drumsticks, and I don’t like the chicken breasts sold in the general grocery stores. Apart from their unnatural size (I still have to get over my fear of freakishly large meat cuts in the US), they invariably turn up dry and chewy when cooked. When I feel like cooking chicken breasts, I buy smaller organic whole chickens (the way nature intended to be!!).

I looked up recipes on the internet for “hara masala chicken”, and most incorporated yogurt. I decided to skip on the yogurt, keep the dish simple, light and earthy. We ate this with rotis.

Ingredients

1. 5 chicken thighs with skin
2. 3-4 tablespoons of green masala (you can alter how much you want to use depending on taste)
3. Salt to taste

For Green Masala
1. 1/2 cup of cilantro leaves including little bit of the stems
2. 3-4 sprigs of fresh mint
3. 1 1/2 teaspoon chopped ginger
4. 2-3 cloves of garlic
5. 4-5 Thai green chillies
6. One medium sized onion
7. 3-4 crushed green cardamom pods
8. 3-4 curry leaves
9. 1 teaspoon rice vinger
10. 1-2 crushed cloves
11. 1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
12. Salt
13. Oil

To make the sauce place all the ingredients in a blender and process till you get a smooth paste. Heat about 1 tablespoon of oil in a pan and transfer the paste into the pan. Using a non-stick pan would be best for this process unless you want to add lot of oil. Lower to minimal heat and simmer till all the water evaporates and you get a really smooth green sauce

Rub the chicken thighs with crushed black pepper and salt. Place them into hot skillet with skin down and sear them for about 4 minutes. The fat on the skin will melt and give enough of drippings to avoid adding extra oil. Leave behind 1 – 2 teaspoons of fat and drain the rest off. Flip the chicken pieces and sear for additional 2 minutes. I remove the skin off the meat at this stage. It (skin) will be crispy and can be easily pulled off with a tong.

Add the green masala to the meat, lower the heat to medium (or less, depending on the BTU rating of your stove). Cover and cook till meat is tender.

Serve with rotis.

my wife sampling the chicken. She is the resident food taster.

Photographs by Sebastian John

I touch the oven with the same trepidation as a cat would touch cold water. The first time I had to “operate” an oven I picked up the hot Pyrex pan without mittens, and burnt my palms pretty bad (But I didn’t drop the dish.) Well, I cannot be blamed completely for it. I grew up in a culture where there is a very limited concept of oven cooking. Most food is steamed, boiled, braised, grilled or fried.

I have been learning the nuances of baking after I moved to the US in late 2006. I have done some small baking over time, and I have enjoyed the process. One, because of the consistent and precise heat which I like very much, and second the ingredients retain their shape and texture after cooking. Much to my pleasure I discovered that rice cooks well and looks great after cooking in the oven. The other big plus factor for me is that I can stick the dish into the oven and concentrate on my work (research and photo editing) and not worry about coagulated ingredients and burnt pots.

So, I decided yesterday to cook my first bird dish in the oven…yes the first one!!!

I baked two Cornish hens, and of course I had to give some Indian twist to it. So I made green masala to go along with the baked hens. Much to my relief and pleasure the hens came out good and were moist, and the fresh and spicy sauce complemented the chicken. But I guess the heavy bearing of baking my first dish took the toll on me, and I did a lousy plating and also forgot to drizzle the sauce on the hens.

Ingredients

2 Cornish hens
For stuffing each bird -
1. 2-3 spliced cloves of garlic
2. 1 teaspoon chopped ginger
3. handful of sliced scallions
4. 2 sprig fresh rosemary
5. Crushed black pepper
6. Salt

For Green Masala
1. 1/2 cup of cilantro leaves including little bit of the stems
2. 3-4 sprigs of fresh mint
3. 1 1/2 teaspoon chopped ginger
4. 2-3 cloves of garlic
5. 4-5 Thai green chillies
6. One medium sized onion
7. 3-4 crushed green cardamom pods
8. 3-4 curry leaves
9. 1 teaspoon rice vinger
10. 1-2 crushed cloves
11. 1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
12. Salt
13. Oil

Set the oven to 350 F.

Clean and rub black pepper and salt under the skin, and the cavities of the chicken (Separate the skin by gently working your fingers between the skin and the meat. You may not be able to separate everything, but do as much as you can.) Stick one rosemary sprig under the skin near the breast and one inside the cavity. Stuff the chicken with garlic, ginger and scallions and place in the oven for one hour, baste as needed.

I made the green masala because the rich, fresh and earthy sauce complemented the meat. To make the sauce place all the ingredients in a blender and process till you get a smooth paste. Heat about 1 tablespoon of oil in a pan and transfer the paste into the pan. Using a non-stick pan would be best for this process unless you want to add lot of oil. Lower to minimal heat and simmer till all the water evaporates and you get a really smooth green sauce (If you have extra sauce, you can refrigerate in a clean bottle and use over the next few days).

After the hens are done remove them from the oven. Siphon off about 3-5 tablespoons of drippings and fat from the baking dish and add to the green masala sauce. Simmer for another 3-4 minutes on low heat everything mixes well.

Drizzle the sauce over the hens. Garnish and serve.

Though this was my first baked meat dish, it was pretty moist and well appreciated by my wife and family friends with whom we stay with.

[digg=http://digg.com/food_drink/INJI_Green_Masala_Cornish_Hen]

Photographs by Sebastian John

Tapioca (yuca/cassava) is a staple food in Kerala. Referred as the “poor man’s food”, it is grown in the backyard of most houses in the state, and also extensively in farms. The root is steamed, boiled, fried, grilled, and eaten with an assortment of relishes, chutneys and curries. The most famous is the tapioca and fish curry (Kappa and meen curry), immortalized by the toddy shops of the state

(click HERE to see photos of a toddy shop in Kerala. This particular shop has one of the best and most extensive dishes I have seen in a toddy shop. The shop is in a town called Mapranam, in Trichur district)

When we had a farm, during the season tapioca was a regular fixture in our house. My mom would sell most of the tapioca, and still we would have enough to feed a large family. One of my mom’s favorite way to cook tapioca was boiling it along with beef till they were buttery soft. The spices and beef flavor permeated the pieces of tapioca and gave a whole new dimension to the otherwise bland root.

For this dish I boiled the tapioca root along with the beef I used to make the “Beef Plantain Roast“.

Ingredients

1. 1 long tapioca root (about 2 pounds)
(buying good tapioca is key. As a thumb rule, try to buy thinner tapioca roots. thicker ones sometimes have very stringy fibers and it is hard to chew through them. They also don’t cook very well to get the buttery consistency.)

For relish (two types)

shallot tamarind relish
1. 2-3 shallots chopped fine
2. 3-4 green chillies
3. 1/8 teaspoon tamarind pulp
4. 5-6 curry leaves
5. 1 teaspoon coconut oil
6. Salt to taste

red chili relish
1. 4-6 dried red chillis
2. 1 shallot chopped fine
3. 4-5 curry leaves
4. 1 teaspoon coconut oil
5. Salt to taste

Cut and skin the tapioca. To skin tapioca make a cut along the length of a tapioca piece. Then firmly and smoothly run the knife (with the blade facing away from the interior of the tapioca) along the exterior skin of the tapioca (the root should be resting in the palm of your left hand). Do not jerk the knife because it can cut through the tapioca skin and cut the hand.

Add the tapioca pieces to beef curry (see “Beef Plantain Roast“) or in beef broth till they are cooked through. If cooked well, a fork should run cleanly through a piece.

To make the shallot tamarind relish, place the shallots, green chillies, and tamarind pulp in a food processor and blend till all the ingredients are mixed well. The relish should be chunky. Add the mixture to chiffonaded curry leaves, coconut oil and salt and stir well.

To make red chili relish, fry the red chilis, shallots and curry leaves in oil till the chillies turn bright red. Place the mixture in a blender, add oil and salt, and blend to a smooth consistency.

Serve the boiled tapioca with the relishes.

Where to buy tapioca?

I have seen tapioca in Safeway, Giant and Harris Teeter in the Washington DC area. It is also very common in Hispanic neighborhood stores.

Photographs by Sebastian John

Work and some photo commitments took me off the kitchen for couple of days. While at the grocery store today, I spotted some plantains and decided to make the beef plantain roast, a traditional Kerala dish. I also got some yucca (cassava or tapioca) to make another dish, which I will explain later. Unripe plantains are used as vegetables and the ripe ones can be consumed as fruit. Having a neutral taste, the plantain takes on the flavor of the broth that it is cooked in, and hence are a great accompaniment to cook with beef.

The dish is my dad’s favorite one, and it can be spotted in my parent’s kitchen very frequently. Though essentially it can be considered as a side dish to be served with rice or flatbreads, my dad (and sometimes I too) eat as “snack”. Somehow I have enjoyed this dish very much in the late afternoons with a cup of steaming black coffee sweetened with jaggery or as we say in Kerala “kattan kappi”.

Though beef is the second main ingredient in the dish, it is just a sidekick. The main purpose of beef is to flavor the plantain. The ratio of plantain to beef pieces in the dish is about 5:1. Again, this is no rule. For beef lovers the ratios can go down!!

(The yucca pictures in this post are for another dish. It is a common practice in Kerala to boil yucca along with beef so that it gets the flavorings. I will explain the dish in another post.)

Ingredients

1. 2 unripe plantains
2. 1/2 pound beef (chuck roast)
3. 1 medium onion chopped fine
4. 1 tablespoon ginger (can be adjusted to personal tastes)
5. 4-5 thai green chillies
6. Salt to taste
7. Oil
8. 1 to 2 cup boiling water

For tempering
1. 1 tablespoon chopped shallots
2. 2-3 cloves of garlic
3. 1 sprig curry leaves
4. 1 teaspoon paprika
5. Oil

Yucca (left); plantains (right)

Sear the beef along with onions, ginger and green chillies for about 5- 8 minutes. Add one cup of hot water (avoid adding cold water), add salt and bring it to boil. Cover and simmer for about one hour till the beef is nearly cooked.

Add the cut plantains and continue cooking till the plantains are cooked and beef becomes very tender. The plantains will turn into mush if cooked beyond the requisite time. Remove pot from heat.

Add oil to a skillet, and when hot add the chopped shallots, crushed cloves of garlic and fry them till shallots turn golden brown. Add curry leaves and paprika and fry for another 30 seconds. Transfer the beef and plantains into the skillet and stir to coast the pieces with the friend shallots and seasonings.

Plate and serve.