Wash your beans!

I've always been pretty careful about washing veg, rice, and other things before using them. However, I never gave beans a second thought. Why? Because I soak them (for the most part) and then discard the soaking liquid. Until someone mentioned to me all the lovely places that beans sit around in before getting to you, and how most of those places are dirty or dusty. It's not a problem of the plant being unsanitary, but just a function of how beans get packaged and the rest. It's nobody's fault.

But it's plenty disgusting.

This morning, I was about to put a few cups of pinto beans to soak for a chili. I gave them a thorough rinse. I scooped out the beans, and found a layer of dirt along the bottom of the container I'd used to hold the beans while running them under water. I was absolutely disgusted. I gave the beans a few more rinses, and only put them to soak when the water ran clear.

I'd assume that this goes double for hulled or split daals, like urad daal, red lentils, chana daal, etc. I never gave it a second thought, but I think I will from now on. I really don't want that stuff in my food.

Sprouted Corn & Brown Rice Blinis

EDIT: I thought that my mother would be horrified, but it looks like she's proud! 

another version of adai. but definitely different. kudo MY SON. i keep doing stuff like this to traditional recipes. go dinu.
love you
amma

I love you too, Amma! 

I learnt about blinis while watching this English cooking show called The Two Fat Ladies. Anyone who's lived with me for any length of time will tell you that I obsessively watched cooking shows, and between Julia Child and The Two Fat Ladies, I was fairly happy to while away hours upon hours of time in front of the television. Fortunately, my mother classed cooking shows under "Educational TV", so she didn't really bother much while I would spend all that time watching those shows.

You see, I was always more fond of reading than watching TV, and what TV I did enjoy watching generally involved nature documentaries on PBS, cooking shows on PBS (both Julia Child and Lydia Bastianich were favourites), and when we finally got cable, cooking shows on the food channel. I loved watching the Discovery channel, and looking at all those exotic places that the crews would go to, and watch the narrator quietly explaining what was going on.

So, while we were limited to 2 TV shows per day, there was no limit to the amount of educational TV we were allowed to watch. And, of course, no limit to how much reading we were allowed to do. Even while grounded, my mother would never curtail my watching of documentaries. There's a reason why my mother rarely resorted to grounding. She found that assigning extra chores was a much stronger deterrent.

But I digress (as usual)! On the episode where they were doing this cocktail party for the Brazilian ambassador to England, Clarissa did blinis. She had these darling little miniature pans that she fried them up in, and at the end, served them with sour cream and caviar. I never did get around to making them on my own, because they involved buckwheat flour, which I couldn't easily get my hands on at the time. Fast forward to a few years later, and I'm in New York, living as a vegan, working in a vegan restaurant. I thought back to that episode, and watched it again, thinking to make something interesting and vegan for a special.

It involved large quantities of butter (melted, so I could easily use oil), then milk (soymilk), then eggs with whipped egg whites. I stopped myself, because it was getting to the point where half the recipe was being substituted, and just watched the show, and let the matter drop. Fast forward to a few weeks ago, when I started seriously thinking things over. What is a blini, in essence? It's a slightly fermented batter, made of buckwheat and all purpose flour, combined with some kind of fat, and pan-fried. Easy, right? So what makes the eggs and such necessary? Buckwheat flour and wheat flour will have a tendency to not form a firm cake on its own. It should have bubbles in, because it's fermented overnight, but it wouldn't have enough structure and body to stand up on its own.

What does have enough structure, that is also fermented, and doesn't require binder to stay together? DOSA. The South Indians have been making fermented batters since time immemorial. In fact, they even make unfermented (but sprouted or soaked) bean batters to make various pancakes. Why couldn't I just use a base of a fermented bean and rice batter, stir in cornmeal for structure, let that all ferment for a very short time (enough to rehydrate the cornmeal), and then fry it off? It should work, right?

Off I went.

6 cups brown rice
2 cups urad daal
3 cups chickpeas
2 TB fenugreek seeds (WHOLE)

In one bowl, soak the chickpeas in 12 cups of cold water. In another, soak the brown rice in 9 cups of cold water. To the rice bowl, add the fenugreek seeds. Soak the rice and chickpeas overnight. The next day, soak the urad daal for 2 hours in cold water. While the urad daal soaks, drain the chickpeas and rice, and let them hang out in a bowl, drained. Two hours later, when the urad daal is soaked, drain it as well, and let it sit as well. You'll want your beans and rice to hang out for four or five hours so that they can sprout. That evening, grind SEPARATELY the chickpeas, urad daal, and rice, with enough water to get them down to a fine paste.

Don't worry about how much water you're adding. The batter will not end up watery at the end, because you're going to add other stuff to this as well. Once the three pastes have been formed, mix them together thoroughly with a few pinches of salt. Then, in a warm draft-free place, let the batter ferment (covered with a towel) overnight. If your oven is empty, and turned off, just leave it in there. Make sure to put it into a container large enough that if the mixture expands, it has plenty of room to expand. You want a container at least double the size of your batter.

On hot days, you'll only need about four hours to ferment the batter. On colder days, like in the winter, you'll need overnight at the very least. This is OK. If it IS a hot day, and you won't have time to get to the batter by the time it's done fermenting, feel free to refrigerate it, and ferment it for a day. It'll take longer, but you won't harm the taste any.

Then, when it's all fermented and bubbling away, you'll want to add your additional ingredients, based on what you have. For this particular recipe, I had some good quality stone ground cornmeal. I added that, along with ginger, garlic, salt, black pepper, and sweet corn kernels. I mixed everything together until it was a the consistency of a loose dough. Then, I thinned it out with water enough to get it to pancake batter thickness. You want it thin enough that the batter will spread when it hits the griddle, but not so thin that it becomes a crepe.

This is the most important step, after the fermentation of the initial batter. Because you've added fresh ingredients, you need to give the batter a second ferment, and a chance for the cornmeal to rehydrate in the batter. This way, when you cook it, you won't wind up with overly crunchy bits of cornmeal. It's not pleasant, trust me.

Let the batter ferment and rehydrate for at least four hours. This will get the cornmeal completely hydrated and make the eventual product have a light and fluffy inside. Finally, you're ready to go. Unlike blinis, which will spread on you (and therefore require a small pan in which to fry them) this batter will stay coherent. Heat up your largest griddle to about 400°F, and add some fat of your choice (I used Canola oil). Spoon the batter onto the griddle, spacing them about 2 finger's width apart. You want them a little spread out so that they have a chance to cook up on their own, and not meld into one giant mess. When you see the bubbles forming on the top of the cake, and popping, you'll notice the colour change from a milky white to a pale yellow. That's about when you're ready to flip. Carefully flip the cakes over (stabilising them with your hands, as necessary), and cook on the other side.

Much like a traditional blini, you'll see little holes forming on the cakes, and you'll have a very crispy inside with a light and slightly sourdough tasting inside. They will get more and more crisp as you fry them longer and longer.

If you want a thinner blini, with a more crepe like taste, feel free to grind the feremented batter (containing the corn kernels) in the blender until it's smooth, and spread the batter down with your spoon so that it's thinner.

I feel like the combination of the corn, with the corn kernels, and the ginger and garlic, and the black pepper and salt just have an amazing taste. You bite in, and you get a little hint of sweetness from the corn, a bit of sourness from the fermented batter, and that wonderful garlic and ginger.

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You could, if you have it, use chives, parsley, chopped leafy greens, or whatever other vegetables you like. I just used corn, because summer is almost gone, and I want to enjoy corn while I can. Instead of cornmeal, grits work just as well, as does semolina. It's really important to use the brown rice, because it actually does sprout, and gets improved with the long fermenting. And chickpeas give structure very well, without resorting to weird egg replacers and the like. The fenugreek seeds help the batter to ferment, as does the urad daal. After that, the cornmeal gives the texture a really nice boost, and keeps the cakes high enough.

QUICK Pickled Daikon

Yesterday was Steve's birthday luncheon. I made obscene amounts of food. I might be compelled to share the recipes for all the food some day, but there are no pictures to go with any of them, because we ate everything by the time I thought to take a picture. One dish that requires no picture (because it's so simple and no-fuss) was a daikon pickle that I made. It takes minutes to throw together.

The reason I wanted it is because I was making spicy food. I didn't want to cook the daikon, because it was so fresh and tasty. I couldn't serve it outright raw, because it's still got that radish-y sharpness to it. So I salted it. It was so delicious! People kept asking me what I did to it to get it to taste like that. I smiled, and said, "Salt!" They were all amazed, and kept munching on it as a snack.

My friend Frances said that it was (to her) like a healthier version of potato chips, because you get the saltiness, and mild starchiness, but none of the fat. And, since it was in little pieces, it was easy enough to pick up, and munch on.

1/2 daikon radish (about 500 g of daikon in total)
1 tsp salt

Take the daikon, and peel off the skin. Stand it upright, and take off one thin slice (vertically). This will help you have a stable base for the rest of your slices. Lay the daikon on its side, cut-side-down, and make thin (as thin as you can get it) rounds. Stack 5 - 10 of the rounds atop one another, and make thin slices to make little strips. Throw the strips into a bowl, and sprinkle generously with salt. Toss to combine, and let sit for 10 - 15 minutes in the fridge. Serve as a side dish to spicy food. It makes a very refreshing counterpoint to your spicy food, or a delicious low calorie snack.

Flowers for Algernon

I just finished reading Flowers for Algernon, a book written back in the 1960s by Daniel Keyes. It is not for people who don't like an emotional (as well as intelligent) story. In it, we meet Charlie Gordon, a man in his 30s who works as a janitor at a factory. He has an IQ of 68, and struggles with reading and writing. In that struggle, however, he strives to better himself by attending reading and writing classes for adults. He is chosen as the subject of an experimental procedure designed to tripe the IQ of the person through brain surgery. The story doesn't get into the specifics of the operation, because it's not important, and because it's written as Charlie's diary.

Essentially, the operation is a success, and you see Charlie's diary getting more introspective, and the grammar, punctuation, and diction improving exponentially. You see him realise that all those people who were joking around and laughing with him at the factory were actually laughing at him. When he comes to that realisation, it hurts, and he talks about his feelings, now that he can look back on his former life.

At one point in the story, you realise that as rapid as his progress was, his decline on the other side happens as well. It almost feels like the author suggested that the accelerated learning happened at the expense of "using up" your brain's lifetime, which means that because you progress much faster, your eventual demise comes rushing at you equally quickly.

In a heartbreaking turn of events, you see Charlie losing things that he has grown to love. He loses languages he understood fluently. He no longer understands scientific papers he's written himself. His own progress reports become indecipherable to him. What's even more heartbreaking is that he thrashes around (mentally), desperately trying to hold on to those memories, those experiences, those joys he had.

It was all the more sad, because I myself do enjoy my intellectual pursuits. I love to read. In books, I find escape, I learn things, I dream, I become. Above and beyond that, however, I love learning new things. Whether it be about food, or science, literature, or minor trivia, I take pleasure in absorbing new knowledge. I can so identify with Charlie, as he struggles to grasp things that seem just out of his reach. Even though he finds it difficult, he keeps trying, because he has this inner drive to push himself to become better.

More than that, I enjoy writing. I love being able to get my thoughts down into words, and get them out of my head. It means that I don't have to sit around with those thoughts. They can be committed to paper (frequently) or the Internet (less frequently, but still enjoyable), and I no longer need to hold on to them. When I write for myself (in my personal diaries), or for myself and others (like on my blog), or for my husband (in the goofy little love notes I leave hidden in his bag, or his wallet, or other random places he will get surprised with), it's like I'm reaching out to a part of myself that would otherwise languish without the attention. It's almost like writing is healing.

Without those pursuits, I feel like my mind would be a dismal place.

What are some of the things that you hold dear?

Learning

I had a teacher in 10th grade, who taught English. She was one of my favourite teachers of all times. She not only loved reading, but also writing, and obscure words. She loved going to England every year, and would show us pictures of her travels. She frequently asked us to read, and  to encourage it, she would offer extra credit to anyone who chose a book from her personal bookshelf (kept behind her desk), and come back and discuss it with her. The beauty of the deal is that she didn't make more work for herself by having you write a report on it. Instead, it was more like an informal discussion that you'd have with your friend about a book that she enjoyed, and that you enjoyed.

I remember being in her class, and having the infinite pleasure of meeting another book addict. I took her up on her offer. When my 2 books per semester ran out I asked if she didn't mind if I just kept reading, just for the hell of it. She had an extensive collection of Sidney Sheldon, Jeffery Archer, Ken Follet, and a bunch of other contemporary writers. They weren't High Literature, because she knew she was dealing with high school kids. Instead, they were just fun reads.

During this time, when I was enrolled in honours and AP classes, after school activities (AKA, drama club, track, and weekly prayer meetings with my parents), I still managed to read through one novel every day. The best part was her delight in giving me a book, having me read it, and discussing it with her the very next day. It's like instant gratification, because often when I reccommend a book to a friend, it takes them however long to read it, and we don't discuss it until weeks or months later. So to have another book addict to chat with was amazing.

She kept giving me thicker and more complex books. Jeffery Archer's As the Crow Flies, and Ken Follet's Pillars of the Earth were two such examples. I knocked out As the Crow Flies in a day and a half, and Pillars of the Earth in three.

There was this lady, intelligent, talented, and lots of fun to hang out with, teaching a class of honours English to students who frequently didn't appreciate reading. year after year. I remember asking her one day how she could keep up. "Aside from finding other book addicts like you, I find that every year, I learn more from my students."

I was floored. Here was this woman, who was so intelligent and varied in her interests (and books), who said that she was learning from her high school students! Ever since then, I have made it my personal mission to see to it that I strive to learn from everyone I meet, even when it's me who's the teacher in that situation. One of my cooking students, Ari, mentioned that she hates to wrestle with a butternut squash, because she's not got the arm strength for it. So, she just throws the whole thing into the oven like that, and roasts it until it's tender. This is something she  taught me after I'd spent day after day in the restaurant kitchen, wrestling enormous piles of butternut squash, and cursing every minute of it (they really are stubborn). Here's someone who was asking me to teach her to cook, teaching me a new technique to use in my own life!

Never discount the lessons that you learn from others. Even those who are younger, or less experienced, or less talented. All of them have something to teach you.

Thank you, Mrs. Deshong. You are a wonderful teacher, and I hope that wherever you are today, you're enjoying a good book.

How to land that job.

1) Don't use a generic "Objective" statement. We're all well aware that you're trying to get this job to use your skills that you've learned. Instead, tailor the objective statement on your resume to suit the job you're seeking. For example, if you're looking for a job in a store, as a cashier, you might say something like, "To ensure that every customer who walks past my cash register feels important, and cared for." In other words, tailor each resume to the job you're looking for, based specifically on each company you send it to. If you're sending a generic resume to everyone, you haven't spent any time on it, aside from the initial writing of said resume.

If you're not going to spend any time on writing the resume, why should I spend any time reading it?

2) Proofread any written communications with your future employer. Yes, even if you send it from your phone. Glaring grammar or spelling errors make you look careless.

3) Show up on time. I cannot stress this enough. Nothing short of the second coming of Jesus should delay you on your interview date. Leave your home two hours earlier than you think you'll need to get there. Why? Traffic delays happen. Spills happen. Rips and tears to your clothes happen. Subways get held up for train traffic, or lost power, or idiots holding open the door. You show up to the area that your job is going to be at very early, and you now have a bit of time to chill out, and relax. If you're late, someone else who wants the job badly enough to show up on time will win out over you. Even if your excuse sounds valid, the employer will still be thinking, "Well, how many other excuses will they come up with if I hire that person?"

4) Even if you get another job before your interview date, send a communication to that person who arranged it. It's a bad idea to burn bridges. No job is ever 100% certain. If you leave a good impression on the person in charge of hiring and firing, you have a chance of getting that job later on, should the one you got right now not pan out.

5) Know about the company you're applying to. I'm not saying that you need to go spend money there, but it helps to do some homework on the place you want to work at.

Hunger

I have an innate terror about feeling hungry. Call it childhood trauma (NOT from my mother, for the record; she made sure that the house was perpetually stocked with good things to eat) or what have you, but that feeling of knowing that there is nothing for me to eat gives me severe anxiety. I make sure to eat well before leaving my home.
Anyone who's watched me eat knows that I generally eat very frequently. I could have just eaten a very short time ago, but we pass another bit of food I want later, and I've got to stop and refuel. It's like that initial anxiety you get when you first have your new mobile phone. You're not comfortable with its battery life yet, so you charge it too frequently for that first month. You hate knowing that you'll be without charge at a critical moment. In reality, it's probably not that huge a deal. If the thing is running low, you can really just turn it off and turn it back on when you need it. But until you learn that, you're still in dread of the battery running out.

I guess that because I'm a vegan, my lack of food anxiety tends to be pronounced. I have been places where the only option is a cup of black coffee with some sugar. And no, there isn't bread that I can trust. You see, it's been such a while since I've had dairy, that even a small amount in my food (even when I don't know it's there) sends my digestive system into a violent protest. Eggs can sneak by without my notice. Honey doesn't actually do anything. But dairy, when I accidentally ingest it, has me wrapped around the porcelain overlord, sweating profusely, and blasting from every orifice. Not a pleasant feeling.

So it's especially a nerve-wracking experience to leave my little vegan bubble. You see, I work at a vegan restaurant, am married to a committed vegan, and keep a vegan house. The friends that I socialise with on a regular basis are at the very least vegetarian. Those who aren't generally tend to be respectful omnivores, and are happy to wait until leaving my presence before settling down to animal flesh and the rest. Pretty much every restaurant in my city (including the steak houses, I found out on one particularly annoying night) can and is often happy to serve me something not only filling, but delicious. If I call ahead, I even sometimes get a fairly excited chef, who'd like to try out something experimental to see if I like it. At the local Chinese food delivery place, they have a selection of veggie meats to go with all their dishes. And they know what I mean when I ask for vegan.

When I leave my bubble, however, it's not so easy. These are often places with no mass transit, and I don't drive, and everything is spaced out really far apart. On those occasions, I'll end up at a convenience store or pharmacy, and grab some cashews, or crackers. But frankly, after a few hours, crackers and cashews don't really feel satisfying, dense in calories though they be.

All of this has done nothing at all to relieve my anxiety around hunger. I hate feeling hungry. It's one of those things that I've had to experience so rarely that to actively get myself into a situation where such is the case infuriates me.

But if I stop to think about it, I realise that I'm really being silly. Being hungry is not the worst thing in the world, especially considering that I live in a country where food is readily available to me when I want it. So what if I do have to skip a meal once in a while? More will be waiting later. And maybe letting myself get hungry once in a great while will make the meal at the other end of the experience taste all the more delicious.

It's something I'm working on, and I know I can get through it if I try.

I'm still going to carry a bottle of water though. 

Allergens

When I started working at the restaurant, I began noticing that in nearly every item on the menu, there were little symbols, like "gf", or "ns", or "sf". Bossman and I talked about it, and I mentioned how amazing I thought that the convention of marking clearly on the menu what is and isn't safe for the big allergens was. It's the same reason that we get the restaurant Kosher. Same reason that we try to aim for making specials that are safe for as many people as possible: it's just good hospitality.

My mother has been cooking for years. She's been cooking for so long that she does little things without even realising that she does it. For example, when it's a new person coming to her house, she quickly assesses who they are, where they're from, what kinds of things they may enjoy, and their level of spice tolerance. She'll still make one or two things suited to the rest of the family. However, for the guest, she'll make sure that the food is accessible to as many people as possible. She won't use the weird, bitter, or strangely textured vegetables. She'll avoid anything too spicy, or too difficult to wrangle. She'll stick with things that have excellent flavour, but don't have loads of hot peppers or black pepper.

Then, once the person has come over a few times, she'll adjust as necessary. However, for large groups of people, such as when she makes food for the temple potlucks, or for large gatherings of friends, she'll still stick to those basic rules: no major allergens (dairy, gluten, soy), no challenging flavours (very bitter, or very hot and spicy), and lots of flavour.

So when I came to Chow, it was like coming home. When I have guests coming over, I do the same thing. I'll ensure that I make something that everyone can enjoy. If a friend of mine is gluten intolerant, I don't make just one thing for that person. I'll try to make the whole meal gluten free. Why? Because to see that look of happiness when they can eat (almost) everything on the very well-filled table is gratifying. You feel good, knowing that you've made that person feel special. Meanwhile, the people who aren't gluten intolerant can still enjoy gluten free food! Everyone wins!

When you do have a friend with a* diet issue, please just challenge yourself to do everything in your power to cater to that person, and have the whole meal follow that plan. At the end of the day, what does it hurt to just try it out for a bit, and see where it leads you?

*Notice the "a" diet issue. I'm not asking you to turn into a hospital, where folks who are deathly allergic to soy, gluten, nuts, grains, raw vegetables, coconut, spices, oil, and herbs ALL AT THE SAME TIME feel like they need to have you jumping through hoops. There comes a point where someone just starts making stuff up, or where you're just not able to accommodate them. If your body hates you that much, I can't really help you. I'm willing to learn, of course. So if you are one of these folks, let me know what you eat, and I'll see what I can do.

Adai

2 parts toor daal
1 part barley
1 part brown rice
1 part mung beans
1 part masoor daal
3 dried mulato chiles
3 dried ancho chiles
3 dried pasilla chiles
2 dried chile de arbol
1 TB fenugreek seed
1/3 part urad daal

Soak overnight. Using the soaking liquid, grind to an absolute paste along with 1 part grated ginger, a generous sprinkle of salt, and 1 part curry leaves loosely measured. Fry off in your favorite pancake skillet and eat with great gusto.

Happy Birthday, Amma

Amma (mother, in Tamil) and I have had a long-standing tradition that on my birthday, we celebrate both the person who's been alive another year (the birthday boy), and the person who got him there in the first place (the mother). It's a good tradition, and one that the ravages of distance and time have not managed to kill off. Now that my mother is on the other side of the country (and for anyone who's familiar with the sheer size of the USA, will know that it might as well be the other side of the planet), we continue the tradition over the phone, which is just as nice, because there are fewer distractions.

That being said, I'm preemptively making this post, because I know Amma reads this thing, so that in case the unthinkable happens, and I manage to astoundingly bungle what really is my favourite part of my birthday celebration (due to being too tired after work, or not charging the phone, or something else equally annoying and dumb), I will have at the very least made it clear that the first thing I thought about when I woke up this morning at 5:30 (after the initial thoughts of "ACK! BATHROOM!") was indeed my mother. However, because she's like three hours behind, I'm not about to wake up the entire house to call her at that ungodly hour. Especially not when my nephew is likely sleeping, and getting woken up by the phone is Not To Be Considered.

It's strange. I've had an inexplicable dread of hitting this particular milestone for a while now. I'm 30. Ugh. Even writing it makes me uneasy. But here it is, and I might as well admit to the old age that I've been cultivating since the age of 5. One of my aunts mentioned (in an amused tone, for the record), ages ago, that I was in equal turns an unabashed young child, and a 75 year old man at the same time. So. Here I am. 30 years old.

I've met (and married and stayed together with) the sort of man who I used to think only existed in sappy romance novels. I've written and had published my first book. I'm working at a place where I enjoy the fruits of my labour, and the challenges excite rather than drag down. I've got some pretty close friends who enjoy spending time with me. I've got a comfortable little home in a city I love dearly. I've managed to get rid of most of my major vices, and have reeled in any that I haven't given up completely (I'm not trying out for sainthood).

There are definitely things that I still want to do, that I still look forward to being able to do. But I've got plenty of time for those. It's not like I'm 30 or something.

Oh wait.

If I'm being perfectly honest with myself, the outpouring of love and good wishes from family (my sister called and left a voicemail at 12:30 AM last night, while I slept, and thereby managed to be the first to wish me, which she promptly followed with an email; her husband emailed shortly after that) really is life-affirming. I love that I inspire good feelings towards me, and that people want me to be happy. I've also gotten some lovely emails from fans who've been around since day one, from the before time when I was just a voice on a podcast, or a few words on the screen.

Thanks to Amma for my birthday, as always. Thanks to all my friends and family and fans who have sent over their lovely words of support and love. Thanks to my angel husband who still somehow enjoys my company. It's a good time to be 30. 

Veganacious Interview

A few weeks ago, the lovely Barbara Degrande asked me to be on her show, Veganacious. We didn't strictly talk about food (although there was gratuitous food chat going on). She had to spend a fair bit of time editing the thing, because we both got so caught up in having our conversation, that we lost track of time, and the thing ended up rambling and roaming a lot.
Download here!

Beans & Rice: Switching it up

I saw a complaint from someone who was trying to eat cheaply, while eating healthy, so s/he was going heavy on the beans and rice thing, and starting to get bored. It's a fair enough critique of eating very cheaply: things can sometimes get repetitive or tedious, and you don't know quite how to break out of your rut. There are a couple of things you can get started doing, so that you can add interest to your beans and rice meals, while still keeping on a tight budget. This person said that they'd been able to get enough money to add a couple of spices to their beans and rice, and were able to splurge on adding animal products (which, frankly, are way more expensive than vegetables that will give more bulk and interest to the meal), so I'm allowing myself the addition of a few vegetables into this mix, to keep things interesting.

First, you really need to familiarise yourself with a basic daal tarka. I don't mean the complex ones involving multiple layers of spices, and all kind of vegetables. I'm talking your basic, starter edition.

2 cups of dried beans, soaked and cooked (buying dried beans will drop down the cost considerably from the cost of tinned; if you don't have the time for soaking and boiling, use red lentils, split peas, or brown lentils, which will cook up just as quickly.)
1 TB canola or other vegetable oil (don't substitute olive oil; its smoke point is way too small to allow the popping of spices)
1/2 tsp cumin seed (do not substitute powdered)
1/2 tsp coriander seed, lightly crushed  (do not substitute powdered)
1 medium onion, chopped
1/4 tsp turmeric powder (if you can't find turmeric powder, use 1 tsp of curry powder)
Salt and black pepper to taste
1 1/2 cups water (either the cooking liquid from the beans, or fresh water if you threw them out already)

In a pot, add the oil, and heat it over highest heat. When the oil is hot enough that a bit of smoke escapes the surface, you're ready to add the spices. Add the coriander seed, wait about 30 seconds, and add the cumin seeds. These seeds will pop like mad. This is OK. When the popping has subsided, add the onion, and stir well to combine in the fat and spices. Add the turmeric powder after the onion cooks for about two minutes (still on highest heat). Once the onions are softened (not browned), add the cooked beans, the water, salt, and pepper. Stir to combine. Taste for seasoning, and adjust as necessary.

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Why did I start in on this? I wanted to start somewhere, so that we're all on the same page when I discuss the variations. Because, you see, the variations are endless.

If you're not able to afford a lot of different things, buy one or two of each veg at the store, which won't amount to much money, and do some of the following.

- When you add the onions, augment it with one carrot, one chopped jalapeno (or other chile) of your choice. I remember when I was really broke one time, and wanted some chile peppers in my daal, and I went to the store. I bought 3. They cost about $1.50/lb, because they were out of season. The 3 chiles came to a few cents. I just needed one or two for each day, and I couldn't afford a full pound at the time. The cashier gave me an odd look, but let me get what I wanted.

- Instead of the chile pepper, substitute a red, green, or yellow pepper, and a pinch of cayenne pepper. It'll give the lovely spiciness of a chile peppers while adding a fair bit more bulk and colour.

- If you see it on sale, add a couple of ears of corn to the pot after you add the beans.

- If you have it, add 2 chopped plantains (skin and all) to the cooked onions, right after the onions are tender. All of a sudden, you'll have a potato-like vegetable added in, while still giving you a lot more nutrition than a plain white potato will give you. The plantain skin, when stove-roasted, gives a very interesting and tasty texture that I really hope you'll try.

- If you can find it, add 3 chopped chayotes to the cooked onions, and sautee them until they're soft.

- Before adding the cumin and coriander seed, add about 1 tsp of black or white mustard seeds to the hot fat, and slam on the lid. The mustard seeds will pop like mad, smell amazing, and add a whole different dimension to the dish.

- After popping the cumin and coriander, add 1 tsp of either white or black sesame seeds. Again, you'll boost the iron content, and add lots of taste. This is such a family favourite that my mother adds sesame seeds to her popping spices quite frequently.

- Add any kind of dark leafy green that you can find at the store, from spinach, kale, collard greens, mustard greens, radish greens, escarole, endive, watercress, etc.

- If you're using large beans (kidney, black turtle, white, adzuki, chickpeas, etc), drain them after cooking, and dry roast them. There's a recipe in the book, but the basic concept is to just pop the spices, add some cooked and drained beans, add turmeric, salt, and chiles, then toss them around in the pan until they're roasted on the outside, and creamy on the inside. The beans get a completely different texture and flavour. Everything takes on a much different feeling.

- If you're using the large beans, and brown rice, try a brown rice & beans salad. Add chopped raw onions, some canned, frozen, or fresh corn, a diced tomato, diced cucumber, diced bell pepper, some shredded carrot, the juice of one lime, some salt, cumin powder, cilantro, and some salt and pepper. The beauty of the salad is that during those hot summer months, you can eat it cold, and add pretty close to whatever vegetable you like in the mix, and still keep things interesting. In fact, you could even toss that salad with a bunch of lettuce leaves to bulk it out a bit, and drizzle with a bit of olive oil, and you're ready to eat!

- Mash cooked beans and rice together, along with sauteed onion, garlic, a bit of carrot, and seasoning of your choice, then press into flat patties to bake at 350 for like 20 minutes or so. Eat over a green salad.

The sky is the limit when it comes to beans and rice, especially when you start pulling from other cultures, like Jamaican Rice & Peas, or Costa Rican Gallopinto, or North Indian daals, or Louisiana Red Beans & Rice. There are hundreds of other varieties, especially when you expand your budget to include different spices, spice blends, etc, different kinds of interesting vegetables (just buy one or two if you're broke), different beans, and different rice.

Chickpea flour pancakes

This morning was a little rushed, so I did a batch of mini Besan Puda. The recipe from Manjula's Kitchen is what I used as inspiration. I added lots of garlic (chickpeas love garlic), grated potato, and grated carrot. I used the smallest holes on the grater so that the veggies cook quickly.

Leftover pilaf

I'm home, and looking to get dinner knocked out fast. In with some onions and garlic, some frozen peas, frozen corn, leftover chickpeas I had from earlier this week, some cashews, leftover coconut rice, some steamed quinoa I had use somewhere else, extra hot chili powder, some curry powder, and a dash of gingelly oil. It very good, for being a bunch of odds and ends I had lying around.

Leftovers pancake

Last night, as I put away the results of a shopping trip to the Indian store, I was left with tiny amounts of each daal I had bought. I like to store my daal in glass bottles so that they don't get bigs. It means that I always have a tiny bit that will not fit into the bottle.

Instead of finding a bunch of tiny jars, I decided to soak them all overnight and make a batch of adai. This batch has toor daal, urad daal, mung beans, cracked barley, brown rice, poha, and masoor daal (red lentil) soaked overnight in cold water. The next morning, I ground it in the blender with salt, red pepper flakes, coconut, curry leaf, and some water.

They taste amazing.

Breakfast

Puri and red lentil daal.

Tradition!

I was having a discussion with my friend Kate when she was over here enjoying some food I had just cooked. She mentioned that even though she is vegan, she still has a soft spot for those things that she enjoyed eating when she was growing up. Food has powerful connections to it, above and beyond nourishment. Those foods you ate as a child that gave you comfort will hold a powerful connection for you. However, as Kate mentioned so eloquently, "Just because I want to still enjoy that food doesn't mean that someone else should have to suffer for it." Well put, Kate. So she, in her home, tends to actively seek out omni subs all the time, and is on a quest to recreate those memories, textures, tastes, and feelings while still holding true to her moral convictions.

Mind you, Kate isn't "one of those". Her spice cabinet is very well stocked. Her mind (and mouth) are both open to new experiences. When she was here, I was cranking out random weird South Indian dishes that most people hadn't heard of before (because most Indian restaurants focus on North Indian dishes), and she was cheerfully eating them. She absolutely loves vegetables of every shape and size. She takes genuine pleasure in all foods, be they the memories of yesterday, or experiments of the present and future. 

I said all that to share this story with you. My friend Joanna's husband Mark comes from a very large family in upstate New York. They're a rather close-knit family, headed by one of the sweetest matriarchs you could ever hope to meet. I would like to introduce you to the gentle, the kind, the ever-patient Suzanne. She sent me a message on 25 March. I'll let her say it in her own words. 

Hi, Dino. Mark's mom here. I have a vegan cooking question, and thought you might be able to help me. For years I have made a pineapple torte for our Easter dinner. The recipe uses gelatin, but now that we have several vegan/vegetarian family members, I'm trying to find an alternative that will still set nicely while not compromising the convictions of my loved ones. Any suggestions? Thanks so much in advance for any assistance you can give me. I hope we'll able to meet both you and Stephen on one of our next visits to Mark and Joanna.

I got a little misty-eyed, but was overall rather touched by her desire to respect the morals of her children. I thought that was a wonderful thought.

Hi Suzanne, Clearly, you are even more compassionate and kind than even your wonderful sons and daughter-in-law have mentioned! What a lovely way to continue traditions, but make everyone feel included! I have such an incredible amount of respect and warm feelings towards you and your family, because of the love that you all share with each other, and this is just one more example of that love. Thank you for reaching out to me. Mark and Joanna talk about you all the time, and about how what a pleasure it is to be in your presence. I hope to some day share in that too! 

I have found that agar tends to replace gelatine quite closely, though not exactly. It'll get very close, though. The Japanese have a long tradition of making vegan gelatine desserts, which they call Kanten. It seems like it's fairly pricey (and it is), but a little goes a long way. At work, we buy the stuff by the pound, and it lasts a long time. 

The beauty of agar is that if it ends up too firm (as it will do the first time you use it), you can melt it down and it sets right up again! I was so amazed by this that I thought that my boss was pulling a cheat on me somehow, but sure enough, it worked out when I tried it myself too! Who knew, right? As with anything where you're working with new ingredients, experiment with a little bit first, to see how the stuff behaves. 

Most of the Internet swears up and down that you can use it interchangeably with the amounts you'd use for gelatine, but I don't think that's the case, from how we've used it at work. I've found it especially effective in baking, when I want a bit of firming up, without adding cornstarch, and keeping the gel jewel-clear. For example, when making the cherry topping for the vegan cheesecakes we make at work, agar makes the fruit stay put. When you have finished setting up the agar (it sets up at room temperature, for the record, so no need to refrigerate unless you want to hurry it along), it'll stay solid for a long time. I remember using agar when I was running gel electrophoresis in genetics lab. It was endlessly amusing to see how the stuff held its shape no matter what you threw at it! Hope this helps a bit in your cooking adventures!
Dino

It had taken me a day or so to respond, because I had to double-check with my boss if pineapple would inhibit the setting up of agar, as it does when you put it into a cheesecake. Apparently, it doesn't.

Thanks, Dino, for your gracious reply. I really appreciate the time you gave to my question. Daniel located some agar in Rochester , and it will be a family experience making the torte together this year. (We live in a very rural area, and ingredient choices are not very broad here.) My husband has been very unwell, as you may know, and is facing his first of five surgeries this coming Monday. I'm so thankful that all of the children can cook, as I will be arriving very late the night before Easter. We'll all put the dessert together as soon as I arrive. Just gotta keep those traditions going! Thanks for helping us to do just that. Take care, Suzanne

I didn't realise what a rough time her family was going through. It was even more poignant that she was still thinking about everyone's comfort, in spite of having so much on her mind already.

So then, I rambled back, to maybe help take her mind off of things for a bit. Also, I kind of wanted to keep the correspondence going, because I wanted to know if the dessert worked out well for everyone.

Sounds good, Suzanne! Please let me know how it all turns out. Also, please have Daniel do a test run to make sure that the whole thing does set up. Few things are quite as disappointing as the grand finale being anything but. If it doesn't work, I can email Daniel something vegan that he can knock up quickly. I've had to do the same to gallop in and save dessert on more times than I care to remember. Seriously, there have been some nights.  

Like the one time that I had my dear friend Ricardo coming over for dinner, and he asked if he could bring a friend. No harm, no foul, right? I just add more water into the pasta pot, ready to feed both of 'em. About 20 minutes before arrival, Ricardo lets me know she's gluten free. D'oh! Thankfully, I had the rice pasta from Chinatown in my pantry, and I figured that today was the day to use the thing. 

Or the many times I've been to Joanna and Mark's house, and got a request for dessert. I'm not a baker, y'see. I just know a couple of recipes that're fool proof, that I keep in the back of my brain, in case of dessert emergencies. Like the apple lingonberry crisp I made for those two when I think Daniel and Andrew were visiting. That came out fantastic. Or the Lemon Poppyseed cake. Man, was that good! 

Funny story about the lemon poppyseed cake. I was flat on my back, having over-indulged the night before (in an effort to keep Mark at home, so that Joanna could go to the store to "get more beer" [when she was really going to pick up Daniel and Andrew]). I basically dictated the recipe, and the specific instructions to the gang, while running an online interview that I'd promised to do months before. It was the most hilarious thing (looking back), because there I am, hollering highly specific instructions to the kitchen, while trying to type to my interviewer at the same time. For the record, the cake was delicious. Thanks again for reaching out. I appreciate getting to know the families of my friends better. I wish your husband a speedy recovery. Dino

It took a while, because that was around when Easter hit, and things got crazy busy for everyone. However, I got back some very good news when the dust all settled on both sides.

So, Dino, the torte was perfect! Thanks so much for your assistance. I was sooo happy that everyone in the family could continue to enjoy one of our holiday traditions. You're the best! PS...Mark, Joanna, Drew, and Daniel have had amazing things to say about the food you've cooked for them, as well as good things to share about you and Steven. Seems like you have a knack for multitasking.

Score! The point is, to this whole long rambling tale, that we do still have those foods that mean more to us than the specific ingredients in them. There are traditions, there are memories, and there are all kinds of other things tied into those things. When you start on a vegan lifestyle, you sometimes have to tweak those traditions, and make them into new traditions, so that you still connect with your family and friends over those things, while still holding true to your moral convictions.

Again, to reiterate: it's not fair to judge everyone who tries a mock meat thing, or an omnisub thing as "one of those lazy vegans who just lives off of boxed food". Daniel and Drew were quite adventurous eaters too. When they were visiting Mark and Joanna, I made all kinds of varied things, which they eat with great gusto. They're both capable of cooking, and cooking well.

But sometimes, they just want a little taste of home, mom, and pineapple torte.

Roti & subzi

I'm getting tired of this notion that breakfast food has to be some specific sort of thing. It doesn't. It can be leftovers from the previous day's lunch or dinner, remixed into something different.

This morning, I made 5 whole wheat roti, and reheated some daal and subzi from Monday night's dinner. It was quite filling and delicious.

Please don't let the big corporations dictate what you eat and when you eat it. If you have a hankering for oatmeal in the afternoon, go for it. If pasta in the morning sounds good, eat it! And in all seriousness, any time is a good time for adai or dosa.

The roti was 2/3 cup whole wheat flour, 1/3 cup all purpose flour, just about 1/2 cup~ish of water that I kneaded for a couple of minutes, rolled out, and cooked on my dosa pan.

Chakli

http://youtu.be/H4ZFzeCvjw0 

Watch that video on Youtube, where the ladies explain how to make slightly healthier Chakli. If you've ever eaten this highly addicting Indian snack, you know that it can frequently call for obscene amounts of fat. 


Their version involves like a TB of fat to give it a bit of crunch, and then the rest of it is made up with daal! I didn't have moong daal, so I used some red lentils I had lying around. I'm fairly certain that the recipe will work quite well with even split yellow peas or something. The bottom line is that murukku and things like that don't require very expensive ingredients or a special trip to the Indian store. I was able to pick up rice flour from the Chinese store for around $1 for a 1-lb bag. I made a small~ish batch for a party that Steve was going to. It came to about 1/2 cup of uncooked red lentils that I pressure cooked, along with 2 cups of rice flour. The spices I had at home already. The only mandatory ones are the salt, asafoetida, and cumin. The rest are just bonus.


I didn't want the dough to fall out of the press in lumps, so I ground the spices in my mortar and pestle, so as to get them more incorporated into the dough. The ladies don't do this, so I guess that step is optional. Whenever my brother makes them, however, he grinds his, so I do the same. 


Here's to hoping that your snacks come out crunchy and tasty! 

Rainy days and salad days

There are few things that give me as much joy as a giant bowl of salad on a cold, overcast day. I can mentally put myself away from the cold and blustery city, and pretend to be some kind of happy herbivore, stolidly munching through my day's rations. I can imagine the warmth of the sun, the cool of the shade, the peace and quiet. For someone who dislikes nature as much as I do, I imagine myself in it a surprising amount. I am currently working my way through an enormous bowl of red leaf lettuce, spinach, red cabbage, olives, black beans, red onions, lemon juice, olive oil, cucumber, and sunflower seeds. Munch, munch, munch. Granted, few happy herbivores in the jungle would have access to such delicious fare, but I can certainly pretend for a bit, and escape from the overcast, dark day that's surrounding me. It started off well enough. I bolted out of bed at the crack of dawn (OK, more like 7:30, but I can give myself a little license here), and made kale and urad daal fritters. I added so much kale, garlic, and ginger, that the urad daal wasn't quite holding together, so I threw in a bit of rice flour too. I made a fresh pot of brown rice, and used some leftover kale to make a kale red lentil daal. Y'know. To go with the brown rice. All this took no time at all, because the kale was already chopped, the red lentils already cooked, and it was just a question of grating up some more ginger to make the tarka. 20 minutes later, I'm triumphantly out of the kitchen, with a rather hearty breakfast ready to roll. Since I soaked the brown rice the night before, it only took about 20 minutes to cook. That's the secret to sorting out breakfast quickly: have most of the prep done the night before, so that the morning itself, you can look like a hero. Nobody wants to wait while the delicious smells of garlic and ginger waft through the air, so the sooner you can get food on the table, the better. By the time I finished eating my breakfast, I was exhausted, and managed to conk out for a long nap. This is generally a Very Bad Idea, but I didn't have much of a choice when I found myself nodding off. By 10:00, I conked right out, and slept deeply until noon~ish. By the time I was done with round two of my morning ablutions, I was already running late. I ran into the bedroom, changed, threw the computer and Kindle and phone into the bag, and dashed out the door. By the time I got into the train station, I made it in just enough time to watch the train roll away. D'oh! Fortunately, I get into work, and am immediately inspired to cook, which meant that I managed to get everything done in an hour and small change. Into the oven the roasting dish went. But then, I made the mistake of looking outside, and seeing how gloomy and overcast it all looked. So I'm sitting here, with my enormous pile of greens, working on the next pile of paperwork, and imagining the sunshine and pretty days coming in again.

Sometimes low-tech works.

I was making an excel spreadsheet to track sales at work. Each day has two shifts. This means that I need to create a series of dates, duplicated. For example, there would be two entries for 3/1/2012, two for 3/2/2012, and so on. I was trying to figure out how to make the software do that for me.

I tried googling the issue, I tried searching the help files, I tried everything.

Then, someone suggested I try this. "Create the dates for the range that you need. Then duplicate the dates. Then put the dates in the same column. Then sort by date. Tada!"

It took a fraction of a second for it to sink in that something so obvious should have occurred to me in the beginning, but never did. I'm so used to the software making it happen for me that I'd forgotten the low-tech methods of doing things sometimes work just as well.

The sun will come out! Tomorrow!

And today, too. It was so beautiful today that I got in a good two or three hours of basking in the gorgeous sun. I made adai for my friend who's staying with me until Monday, and a very fast curry of yucca, green beans, and tomato. We all ate until we were filled, and then finished it off with a bit of green oolong tea, from Sullivan Street Tea & Spices. They sell loose tea by the ounce, which means that I can buy just a little bit at a time, and use it up, and then go back for more.

I got some lovely messages of encouragement and hope, which really did help my mood tremendously. Also, I cooked for my friends yesterday night, which made it even nicer. It's such a nice day that I don't even mind opening the window and letting a bit of fresh air in.

I could certainly get used to this!

One of the ladies who came over for lunch took a picture of her plate of food so you could all see it too: http://instagr.am/p/ISL5sOk6f9/

Pretty, isn't it? The white stuff is my own coconut & soy milk yoghurt that I make. Isn't it so nice and thick? We ate the adai with the curried veg, the yoghurt, and some lime pickle that I'd made earlier last year. It's gotten this lovely tartness, mellowed out by a mild bitterness. It came out better than I expected. Thanks for teaching me how to make pickles, Amma. It's come in handy big time.

Here's a picture of two very happy vegans after eating all that food:

Do you get thrown off balance by weather?

I know I do.

I remember going to these 3-day anti-bigotry camps (both as a participant and as a counsellor). The youths would arrive mostly with feelings of fear and mild annoyance at the lack of basic amenities (the water smelled horrific, the food was just passable, and we weren't allowed TV, radio, headphones, mobile phones, or any other electronic device), and would leave not wanting to go home. More times than I can count, the last day would be raining. It's almost like the overall sadness was bringing out the worst in the weather.

The obverse tends to happen to me, without my even realising it. If it's damp and drizzly, I tend to feel low and mopey as well. Today is one such day, and I'm fighting the urge to give in to the malaise. It's tough though.

When it's bright and the sun is out, I'm generally in a good mood, and filled with energy. Even on those days when it's hot and the sun is out, I can find deep stores of pep inside me, and keep going. Cold weather makes me want to hibernate. And overcast, slightly drizzly days make me feel dragged down, big time.

If it's a proper storm, however, like we used to get back in Florida, I don't seem to have that same problem. I love to throw open the windows, smell the fresh breezes coming in, and listen to the claps of thunder and watch the flashes of lighting. The sheer vigour with which a proper rainstorm plies its craft is energising.

But today is drizzly, and I shall try my best to stay positive. Somehow.

Let's Make Pesarattu

This is what it looks like when it's cooked:

This is what it looks like when you first put it on the skillet. Notice how there are peaks that are still uncooked, like there were in the adai. When almost all of the peaks are turned to the cooked colour, you're ready to flip.

So you've mastered the dosa. You've knocked out a few adai. Now it's time to go outside of Tamil Nadu, and head over to Andhra Pradesh, where you will find Pesarattu. The recipe I used was loosely based on the #Vachef one, as well as a couple of others I saw.

Andhra is a beautiful state with a long and colourful history, replete with opposites. It's the nest of orthodox Muslims. It's quite a common sight to see a man walking along with a couple of women in full black burqa. It's also the home to very devout Hindus, one of whom built a temple completely out of white marble. Meanwhile, you've got the Charminar less than 10 km away from the Birla Mandir.

The Andhra taste for hot spicy food is legendary. They adore hot chilies in everything, and will generously share their blisteringly hot food with all who visit. There's also a bit of a sweet tooth, with dishes like bobbatulu (a sort of sweet roti), and kajjikayalu (a sweet stuffed with coconut and cardamom; there is nothing about this that sounds bad).

I guess I've always had a soft spot for Hyderebad, because my aunts who live there have an extensive book collection, which they had no problems sharing with me while I was there. You see, I was never a huge fanatic for TV the way some folks are. I'll watch it if there's a cooking show on, or if there's a particularly nice documentary, but TV overall doesn't interest me. Books, on the other hand, are a different story.

Unfortunately, books in India are prohibitively expensive. People with large book collections are rare in the extreme. Comics, on the other hand, are prevalent and plentiful. I remember an aunt of mine in Chennai who had stacks upon stacks of Amar Chitra Katha comics, ranging from the Bhagavad Gita (it was a large multi issue hard bound version) to a bunch of other ones that I can't recall.

It was pleasurable, but nothing quite scratched that reading itch for me like reading actual books. In Hyderebad, I found my oasis. I had read and re-read the books I'd brought with me (something like half my suitcase was crammed with books), and I was going a little out of my mind. My aunt's book collection at that time in my life when I was so hungry for more was exactly what I needed to make that trip pleasant.

But I digress. Onwards to the food!

This recipe makes 4 1/2 10-inch crepes. You may increase or decrease as needed. I made this batch in this manner, because I ran out of rice. Again. Ugh. I made these plain, without onion, because I ran out of onions too. I really need to go shopping.

3/4 cup mung beans, with the skin and everything still on
1/4 cup brown rice
3 TB rice flour
3 green chilies
3 stalks curry leaf
3 inches ginger, chopped roughly
Salt, to taste
2 cups Water, for soaking
Oil

In a high-sided container, combine the brown rice and mung beans, and cover with 2 cups of water for soaking. Leave it that way overnight. The next morning, your beans and rice should have absorbed all but about 1 inch of water. This is fine, because you'll be adding some rice flour to thicken anyway.

Using a stick blender (or regular blender), grind the beans, chilies, curry leaf, and ginger together to make a thick batter. Stir through the salt and rice flour. If the batter becomes too thick, add a bit more water, and stir through. Because of the high content of beans, the crepes cohere quite nicely, so don't worry if your batter is thick or thin. It'll be fine.

Just as you do for adai or dosa, spread the batter onto a hot griddle, and sprinkle a few drops of oil on the perimeter of the crepe. Cook on both sides until browned and crispy. Delicious!

Steve took one bite (even though he'd already eaten oatmeal this morning) and moaned in delight. The best part of this for me is that it was all things I had around the house. If you don't have curry leaves or green chiles, just leave it out. The ginger is essential, as the masses of beans in the dish will leave you a bit gassy. The ginger tends to combat that rather well.

You too can make it!

My friend from an online cooking forum named Kenn decided to try eating all vegan for the month of March as a challenge to himself. He bought a copy of my cook book, and has given some of the recipes a try. He graciously allowed me to show a picture of his efforts here, so that you all can look and enjoy the food photo.

The recipe, if you're curious, is the Eggplant Planks. He explained his process for making them on his blog. If you enjoy my style of cooking with lots of produce and fresh ingredients, and avoiding premade faux meats and the rest, give his blog a look, because he's doing exactly that kind of food. He also takes beautiful pictures of the food.

I wanted to highlight his take on my recipe for a reason: he did exactly what I encourage people to do! He took the recipes as a starting point, then tweaked to his liking until it became something that he could call his own. I never would have thought to add tomato sauce to gravy, but it sounds absolutely delicious! It is by experimenting with what you like in particular and then sharing the results that we all learn about food from each other.

I love getting feedback from my readers who tweak the recipe, because then I learn something new too! Thanks, Kenn. Thanks for the very kind words, and for the beautiful food.

Adai

Adai is a newly discovered thing in my house. My mum used to make it for me when I was a kid, but I didn't appreciate it so much, because I preferred dosa, which really is more kid-friendly. However, as of late, I've been making Pa Jeon, or Besan ka Puda, or those little Paniyaram. All of which are delicious, and all of which challenge my conceptions of what a savoury crepe type dealie should be. I especially was moved to change my mind about adai after eating some of the Besan ka Puda, as it's essentially the same thing, but made from the raw ingredients, and with the chance to ferment a little.

Traditionally, you do not have to ferment an adai batter. That's the charm of it in the first place. You can set the beans and rice to soak, and slap that bad boy onto the griddle immediately. I prefer my crepes a little more fermented, because I like the flavour better, so I decided to ferment. You may choose not to. The choice is yours.

I personally prefer it with the mix that I've come up with. You can actually alter the mix to your own likes and dislikes. If you don't have toor daal, use moong daal. If you don't have either, use split peas, and it'll get you there. The essential part is that you make it with at least equal parts lentil to rice.

Unlike dosa, Adai is not so popular for a couple of reasons. For one thing, it's more expensive by a long shot. Traditional dosa calls for a 4 parts rice to 1 part urad daal mixture. This means that if you buy the cheapest rice, and the urad daal on sale, you can generally knock out a batch for a family of six with very little money. Adai, on the other hand, calls for much higher quantities of lentils. In my version, there are even more lentils than rice!

For another thing, because of the heft and "stuff" found inside of adai, it's not as popular with the kids, who like the diaphanous and crispy dosa, because they don't have much chewing of little bits to get through, and they can easily eat a couple and feel comfortable. An adai, on the other hand, is filling. It tends to be one of those things that you can have one, maybe two of at the most. Because it's so nutritionally dense, you tend to feel full faster, and stay full much longer than if you were to eat a dosa.

Finally, it's not as amenable to being folded over. It's a hefty little crepe. You can't fold it easily like you can a dosa. It doesn't take to fillings so much as it takes to the stuff already folded into the batter.

All that being said, if you don't mind the extra expense of making adai, you will be greatly rewarded. For one thing, it's much easier to handle the batter grinding. Unlike dosa, you need not grind the rice and beans down to a fine puree. You can get away with a bit of grit in the batter. You can also add all kinds of different things to the batter, and still turn out OK. You can sub out part of the rice for oats, or buckwheat, or even millet and still turn out something that's very tasty. You can sub out the daal for actual whole beans, like mung beans or chickpeas, and it'll still be delicious.

You can also fold in an endless variety of add-ons into the batter. Adai batter is extremely forgiving. You have some leftover chopped onions from the main dish you were making? In it goes! You have some extra grated carrots from the salad? Throw it in! You like to boost up the nutrition value by adding ground flax seed (as I did in this recipe; flax seed isn't traditional, but it's most delicious)? The batter will be better! The sky's the limit with regards to the flavouring options.

Add to this the fact that you can serve it with any kind of sauce (mint, cilantro, tamarind-date), chatni (coconut, mango, tomato), or stew (sambhar, rasam, kootu)/vegetable (curry, poriyal) that your brain can think of, and you're talking about a very useful little dish to have on hand.

Bear in mind that I did this to suit my tastes, and you may want to leave out the optional ingredients. Don't worry. I won't be offended! I personally like the addition of the urad daal, because it helps to keep the batter stronger and more coherent. I like the flax seed, because it means that I can thicken the batter after grinding with plenty of water. My blender isn't very powerful, so I need to add extra water to get it all ground down to my liking.

For the batter:

1 1/2 cups brown rice
1 1/2 cups toor daal
1/2 cup urad daal (OPTIONAL)
1 TB fenugreek seed (OPTIONAL)
4 cups water

Soak the ingredients for the batter for 3 hours. If you're adding fenugreek seed, and using brown rice, like I am, soak it for 6 hours, and you'll end up with better results. If you're using urad daal, like I am, please only soak the urad daal for about an hour.

Then, after the soaking process is done, add the mixture into the blender, in 1 cup increments, with about 1 cup of soaking liquid at a time. The reason to go in small batches is so that you don't strain your blender. We're not in a rush here, and this recipe makes a large batch of batter.


At the end of the blending, you'll end up with a batter like the one pictured above.

At this point, if you're using the fenugreek seed, take the batter and set it into a container on your countertop to ferment overnight. If you're not bothering with the fenugreek, don't bother to ferment. The fermentation step is strictly because I like the taste of it, and because I wanted adai for breakfast the next day, and not dinner that night.

When you're ready to fry off the adai on your skillet, you can add in your additions.

Additions:

1 1/2 cups chopped onion
1/2 cup chopped ginger
1/4 cup chopped curry leaf
3 green chilies (OPTIONAL)
2 - 3 pinches of asafoetida (OPTIONAL, if not using onion)
1/4 cup flax seed (OPTIONAL)
Any other veg you'd like

Mix the additions into 4 cups of batter, and salt to taste. Grind the flax seeds in a coffee grinder until it's a powder. Stir it into your batter. You'll have a cup or two of leftover batter to use later. The batter will be very thick and should bubble a little bit if you fermented it overnight. If you need to, thin it out with a bit of water. You want it to resemble a thick and chunky pancake batter.


Because I didn't go shopping this week, I didn't have much in the way of additions. I wish I had some coconut to fold in. That would have been lovely. I just added the ginger, onion, and curry leaf.


Using a 1-cup ladle, pour the batter onto a hot skillet (heated over medium high heat), and spread the batter around in concentric circles until it's about 1/4 inch thick. Don't worry about getting it crepe thin. It's never going to be super thin, because of the add-ins. This is OK. I'm using a nonstick skillet, so that I don't have to add very much fat.

Using a squeeze bottle, or a small spoon, put a few drops onto the perimeter of your adai.

When to Flip?

Look at the picture of the adai after it's sat on the skillet for about 30 seconds (click the image if you want a larger version). Notice how most of the surface looks mostly translucent? Notice how some of the "peaks" look a much more opaque white colour? The opaque bits (that I've circled in the image) are still not cooked all the way through. You want the bottom of the adai to be browned, and the top to be almost completely cooked before turning. At this point, I've still got too many uncooked bits, so I'm not going to turn it over yet.

Finally, once the adai is mostly cooked on the side you can see, flip it over, and look at the other side:


Isn't that beautiful? Flip it over a couple of more times until it's browned to your liking, then serve.

Please, come out.

Steve!
I wanted to tell you (and Dino)...
A debate started up in my classroom today about gay rights. One of my students took a strong stand against it. I won't repeat what he said, because we've all heard it, and I was thoroughly disgusted. BUT, as I listened, and responded with the 'other side' in as calm a manner as I could manage, it dawned on me...
The most beautiful example of HUMANS I have is you two. So, I told him about two wonderful friends of mine who managed to make me cry for the first time after 13 years. At their wedding. In a church. (Gauntlet thrown, said I. ha.)

Know what he said when I was done? "Ms G, I think you just changed my mind. Because that's awesome."

I just wanted to share how you helped me open at least one very closed mind today.

to you and Dino!
xo
Kate

Just got an email from Steve, who saw this on his Facebook wall. I don't have a Facebook, so he forwarded me the message.

I don't know if I've shared this with too many of my readers before, so if it's new, welcome. If it's not, then settle in, because it's something that is important that people know. When you're young and gay, you think you're the only one. Nobody else could possibly understand you, because you don't know any other gay people in your life. Because of the disgusting things that hatemongering people have done over the years to make us feel unwanted, and like there's something wrong with us, we remain silent, and hope that nobody else can tell.

And when injustice happens, we fear to speak out about it, because standing up for gay people would make the nasty people assume that you're gay. So you quietly watch it happening, and say nothing, in the hope that they don't find out about this horrible secret that you are hiding.

It feels so good to be out to the world, and not make any apologies for who I am. Maybe it's not your cup of tea, but I'm not asking you to join in, am I? Katie's letter reminded me one of the reasons that it's so important for me to be out: because if I'm closeted, then I'm invisible, and some other person out there will likely feel invisible too. Some other person who doesn't have my family, or my friends, or my wonderful and loving husband to support and care for and love me. Someone whose family asks him, either explicitly or not, to push that part of himself or herself down. Whose religious leaders ask the same. Whose school administrators wish for the same, so that they don't have to deal with the asshole parents who seem to think that wanting protection for all kinds is some kind of insidious agenda out to corrupt their rotten little spawn.

Maybe some other Indian kid out there, reading things on the Internet, sees that he's not the only one out there. Maybe some other immigrant kid, hoping against hope that he's not alone, can find a bit of solace in knowing that some day, he too can have such wonderful friends, who stand up and interrupt hatred when they see it.

If I weren't out, Katie wouldn't have had the opportunity to have been part of my life, because I'd be so scared of making even so innocuous a thing as a friend that I'd keep myself locked away.

Please, for your sake and the sake of others after you, be out. Be proud of who you are, and what you stand for.

It's late, and I'm mentally clumsy, but I felt like I had to get that little bit of encouragement out there for anyone who can read this.

Joy is a joy to read!

I just finished (re)reading Joy Tienzo's book, Cook, Eat, Thrive: Vegan Recipes from Everyday to Exotic, and I must say that I'm suitably impressed. Her ever-present kindness and thoughtfulness come through very strongly in her writing. Reading her book is like having a long chat with her, and enjoying her company.

The title says it all: everyday to exotic. She doesn't dumb down the flavours to appeal to boring people. Instead, she dares you to try stuff that you hadn't considered before, in new and exciting ways. With Joy, cooking is an adventure. As soon as I got it (even though I was at work), I started flipping through the pages of the book, and exclaiming in excitement at the delicious food that my boss and I could create.

White beans in mashed potatoes! How brilliant! Samosa soup! Yes yes yes! I'm totally there! Edamame pesto! Why hand't I thought of that before? I keep flipping pages, and exclaiming in surprise and delight, over and over again.

I remember when I first saw Joy posting on the vegan forums that I used to frequent. I saw all the mouth-watering food she'd post, and I'd go and make it, to see that it really does work. Her recipe for Hatian Fried Plantains was a staple in my house when Steve and I were newly married, because it was so tasty and easy to knock up in no time at all. Her ranch dressing has saved countless cows, because I know a couple of folk whom she generously shared the recipe with who were pushed over the vegan edge once they saw they could really make it work. I made her almond crepes (yes, they finally did work, even though my first attempt failed because I misread the recipe), and they're absolutely lovely. Her Moroccan Preserved Lemons are absolutely divine.

Thanks, Joy. Thanks for creating a work of love, and compassion, and beauty. Thanks for continuing to be an inspiration for people to strive for (and achieve) the best that they can. Thanks for being a wonderful, kind, and loving person.

Oven Uppuma Rava

Anyone who's made uppuma (and you should; it's very tasty) can tell you that one of the things that discourages one from making it is the roasting of the rava (semolina). Rava is this coarse ground semolina flour that's used in various Indian mains and sweets. In the South, we tend to use it in a savoury dish called uppuma, which is a mixture of a tarka of mustard seed, cumin seed (depending on whether the house is fond of cumin seed, like mine is), urad daal, dried or fresh chilies, curry leaves (if you have them), along with onion, and in some cases, turmeric (depending on whether or not the house is fond of that vibrant, yellow colour, as mine is), and water, along with the roasted semolina flour, to make a thick polenta-like main dish.

It's absolutely delicious, and very easy to make, once the initial roasting step is finished. Unfortunately, for most people (including myself), roasting is a huge pain. You have to dry roast it over medium low heat (low heat if you're not lightning quick on your feet) in a wok. It takes quite a while, and you must stir it constantly. As you're standing there and stirring that thing endlessly, there's other steps to preparing to make the uppuma that you're delaying, such as chopping the onions, or getting the rest of your counter space cleaned off, so that when everything is done, you don't end up frantically searching for a space to put the freshly roasted semolina flour, which then burns. Why didn't you think of this before? That would have only made sense, seeing as how you've just spent the better part of a half hour roasting this thing.

And now you're doubly irritated, because that was the last of your semolina, and you do have rice, but that involves even more time (an hour, to be precise, if you're talking brown rice), and you're hungry right now, so you angrily throw the pot, semolina and all, into the sink, scream and cry for a good solid 20 minutes, and then run down to the bodega downstairs, and anger-buy a bag of tortilla chips and a jar of salsa, which you proceed to eat between sobs.

Totally not speaking from experience.

All this can be prevented, if you will use your oven to roast the semolina. I discovered this trick on accident when I was at my brother's house in VA. His wife was making up a batch of uppuma as a lunch thing, and had asked me to roast the semolina for her. I asked her why she didn't just use her oven for it. She mentioned that the oven was being used as storage at that moment, and would I give her a sec to clean it out.

With rare exceptions, Indians who were raised in the South Indian tradition tend not to trust ovens terribly well. When coming to the USA, and making the odd bake sale dish, or birthday thing for the kid's school thing, they'll tend to use the oven to store pots and pans, and promptly ignore its other function: perfect roasting thing.

You see, when you roast anything on the stove, you're dealing with the vagaries of your cooking vessel. For one thing, not all the food is going to be in contact with the heat, which is coming from below, heating your cooking vessel, then heating your food. In an oven, the cooking vessel does get hot and help your food to heat, but the ambient temperature is hot as well, making the food heat evenly. Furthermore, because air is not as good a conductor of heat as water is, you're going to get a more steady and gradual roasting.

There's a reason why you should do your roasting in the oven: the margins aren't quite so razor-sharp as they are on the stove. If you miscalculate by a few mere seconds while roasting on the stove, you risk burning the whole thing, and making a mess. If you misjudge the oven, you still have some wiggle room to fix your mistakes.

Mind you, there are a couple of caveats before we venture into the oven's door:

1) Always double and triple check the temperature of the oven before putting anything in. If your recipe calls for 350°F, and your oven is set at 375°F, you're going to be in a world of pain when the food gets finished so much faster.

2) When roasting something like semolina, which is a flour, don't ever fill your baking sheet completely full. For one thing, the thicker your stack of food, the longer it will take to get everything roasted. For another, you have a much more likely chance of spilling a fair bit onto your floor on your way to and from your oven, and then your sister-in-law grumbles and mutters as she has to clean up yet another mess. Again, totally not speaking from experience.

3) USE. A. TIMER. I cannot stress this enough. With the oven, you don't have those visual cues to keep you going. It's a self-contained environment, where you'll likely miss something if you're not timing yourself. Initially, set the timer for a lower setting, and check frequently. Don't set it for longer until you're confident that it will all work out.

For me, the whole roasting process took a total of 45 minutes. Mind you, this is because I had set the initial times for 7 minutes, and then finally for like 12 minutes. For the first 21 minutes (in 7 minute increments), I baked the semolina in baking sheets, at 350°F (180°C). I then baked it for 2 increments of 12 minutes (24 minutes). Between increments, I gently stirred the rava with a slotted spoon.

A couple of obvious changes happened. Firstly, the rava smelled wonderful and roasted as time went on. For another, in the initial stages, the rava tended to clump a bit. This is normal. There's a bit of residual moisture in the rava from the surrounding air. When the whole thing is roasted to perfection, the moisture is driven out, and the rava becomes free flowing again. Initially, just stir through the lumps. It'll all work out. Finally, the rava became a light golden brown. Don't take it much further than that. That's about where you want it to be.

The best part of this method is that at the end of the first 21 minutes, I was able to prep my ingredients for the actual uppuma, and get them on the stove. This meant that I was using my time efficiently.

All said and done, yesterday's project took about an hour from start to finish. However, I now have a jar of pre roasted rava, with which to cook future meals very quickly. Once the rava is roasted, the actual uppuma itself takes about 10 minutes.

Why not cook the uppuma without roasting the semolina? Because then the uppuma will be a big gross clump of disgusting, and not be fluffy and delicious.

Once more, totally not speaking from experience.

Set up big pressure cooker for small cooking.

In the body of the pressure cooker is lentils with enough water to cover them. The first bowl in the stack has barley, and its cooking liquid. Atop that, I set the little trivet that came with the pressure cooker. Atop /that/ are some red potatoes, with a scant 2 cm of water in. There'll be plenty of steam in the cooker, so I need not even bother with it, but I don't want the potatoes sticking to my bowl. I then put the lid and weight on the whole mess, set it over high heat, and set my timer for 40 minutes. (Next time, I'll go with shorter time, because the potatoes got overcooked). Then I walked away, and heard the pressure cooker get to full pressure at like 6 minutes or so. Then, I dropped down the heat to low, and let the timer run out. I did a quick release. Honestly, if I just did like 20 minutes, I could have still done a quick release with no problems. I was just stupidly nervous. Boo.

My friend Christy Morgan, of Blissful Chef fame, is maintaining an ongoing pressure cooker party on her blog. Please check out this link for more info on cooking other stuff in pressure cookers! She's got lots of creative ideas for cooking in my style: whole ingredients, lots of produce, and minimising premade stuff. Check it out!