A Drunken Sailor's Chocolate Cake

This arresting title caught my attention recently in a newspaper food column … I think it was in the Wall Street Journal’s weekly Food & Drink section … not only for its colourful heading but also because it had two of my favourite cooking ingredients – rum and chocolate – both in plentiful quantities.

Emily Luchetti

The recipe was credited to Emily Luchetti who I subsequently discovered was the pastry chef at the legendary Star’s Restaurant in San Francisco during that institution's halcyon days in the 1980’s and 90’s.  
  

(Emily Luchetti is now a celebrated author and TV chef as well as Dean at the International Culinary Centre in California.)

Jeremiah Tower

At the time Stars co-owner & head chef Jeremiah Tower reigned supreme as one of America’s most accomplished and flamboyant chefs who helped to usher in both the rise of the celebrity chef and the birth of so called ‘California Cuisine’.  One critic described Jeremiah Tower as  “the man who once reigned as California's most creative chef and presided over the biggest party in San Francisco during the height of the greed-is-good '80s.”

Star’s was a magnet for celebrities across America and beyond with regular guests including Rudolph Nureyev, Luciano Pavarotti, Sophie Loren, Liza Minnelli, one of the early supermodels Lauren Hutton, the actor Danny Kaye and Mikhail Gorbachev.   More importantly the restaurant helped pave the way for the emphasis on regional cuisine and fresh, local ingredients and a finely executed blend of traditional Western & Asian ingredients & recipes that are now the hallmarks of modern cuisine across America and around the world.    Some of Tower's recipes early in the history of Star's included Grilled Fennel Sausage with Rangpur Lime & Orange-Cumin Salt, Grilled Shellfish with Grilled Garlic & Ancho Chili & Herb Butter Sauces, and one of Pavarotti's favourites Golden Oyster Mushroom Timbale.

Somehow I misplaced the original article on the Drunken Sailor’s Chocolate Cake but not before I had noted down the reference to Chef Luchetti’s cookbook “Stars Desserts”.   The book was published in 1991 and is now out of print but I managed to track down a copy through AbeBooks, a second-hand and antiquarian book site for bookshops in the US, Canada, Britain and Australia that boasts a data base of 35 million books.

The recipe has the classic chocolate cake ingredients – butter, flour, eggs and cooking chocolate – but what sets it apart is the amount of rum ... two thirds of a cup in the original recipe , though I have used upto 1 cup for an extra seafarer's hit … which obviously contributed to the “Drunken Sailor” tag in the title.

However, despite the amount of rum in the recipe the overall texture is rich and chocolatey and has been a big hit in our house and at dinner parties for both young and old ... I'm really talking about Zia and Juhee here!

Recipe:   The Drunken Sailor’s Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:

170 grams dark cooking chocolate, coarsely chopped   140 grams butter   2/3 cup dark rum (I have used upto 1 cup)   4 eggs, separated   1 ¼ cups sugar   1 cup plain flour   Pinch salt

plus a 20cm cake pan, preferably with removable base

For Chocolate Glaze:

1 cup heavy cream     225 grams dark cooking chocolate, coarsely chopped

Method:

Preheat oven to 180 C.   Butter the cake tin & line bottom with greaseproof paper.   Melt chocolate, butter and rum … either in microwave in short bursts or in top half of doubleboiler.   Cool to lukewarm

Combine egg yolks and ½ C plus 3 Ts of the sugar in mixing bowl.   Whip with mixer until thick.    Lower mixer speed & add chocolate & then flour & salt.

Whip egg whites in separate bowl (after cleaning mixer blades) until frothy.    Then increase speed of mixer and whip till soft peaks form.   Add remaining sugar & continue beating until stiff.      Fold in 1/3 of whites into chocolate batter and then fold in the rest.   Pour into prepared pan.

Bake for 30 to 35 mins until cake feels firm, or a skewer comes out clean when inserted.   Leave to cool for 10 minutes then if using pan with removable base remove cuff from side of cake and cool further.   Otherwise just invert cake tin onto a wire rack.

To make the chocolate glaze put cream in medium size saucepan & bring to boil over high heat.   Remove from heat and then whisk in chocolate until smooth.

Cool glaze to room temperature and then glaze the cake … either just the top or both top and sides.   Allow glaze to set for at least an hour before cutting and serving.   Serve with cream, yogurt, ice cream or fresh fruit.

Enjoy!

Tony saab from Hyderabad
March 2017

Pumpkin Cake: a doorway to Italian Jewish Cuisine!

 If you look over this blog you will see I have have an abiding interest in cuisines of the Middle East ... food & recipes from Morocco, North Africa, Syria and Libya, Israel and Palestine.   One of the attractions for me, living where I am at present, is the affinity between Indian cuisine and many of the classic dishes from these regions; a similar use of rice and grains, spices, breads and savoury pastries and dumplings.  

In the course of my ''virtual culinary travels" I recently came across mention of a fascinating cookbook on Italian Jewish cuisine and its links with Jewish migration from many of the above countries (except Israel, of course - being a relatively new country in this region): "Cucina Ebraica: Flavours of the Italian Jewish Kitchen" by American writer and food historian Joyce Goldstein.     The introduction to the book looks at the migration and history of the Jewish people living in various regions of Italy and the food and recipes that developed over time with the meeting of these two cultures.

There has been a Jewish presence in Rome, southern Italy, Sicily and Sardinia since the before the 2nd Century BC with waves of Jewish migrants from different parts of the world settling in Italy over the coming centuries.   Whilst many were forced to leave  the country during the Inquisition (those Catholics again!!), by and large they co-existed and integrated with the local communities (well, ok there WAS the Jewish Ghetto in Venice!) till the country was unified as one nation in 1848.   This rich blending of cultures continued through the 20th century until 1938 when Benito Mussolini joined forces with Hitler and his Italian fascist party suddenly embraced a policy of anti-Semitism almost as enthusiastically as the Nazis.   Porca Miseria!!

 As a consequence many members of the Jewish community were either killed or fled their homes and migrated to safer havens in other parts of the world.    Today the comparatively smaller Italian Jewish community mainly lives in areas around Rome, Milan and Turin but their history and influence within their adopted country can be still be seen quite dramatically in the legacy of a  distinctive Italian Jewish cuisine.

I have only just begun to explore Cucina Ebraica ... there are fabulous and unusual recipes for antipasti, meat & poultry and fish dishes.    But one recipe that immediately attracted me was in the Dolci or Desserts section ... a spice and fruit laden cake made with pumpkin puree, almonds, cinnamon and lemon zest.  I had never used pumpkin in a dessert before; perhaps I was put off by those sickly sweet sounding pumpkin pie recipes you read about in the US south?!   But as author Joyce Goldstein tells us, Torta di Zucca Baruca is a cake recipe "from the town of Treviso in the Veneto" and the use of pumpkin indicates  Sephardic origins.   (Sephardic Jews arrived in Italy starting in the 1490s when they were expelled from Spain.)

 The recipe is surprisingly simple to make once you have pureed the pumpkin.   I had to make some substitutes due to lack of availability of some ingredients in India: no candied citron so I left this out but increased the amount of dried fruit and lemon zest.   I also substitued dried cranberries for raisins (didn't have any in my cupboard!) and I used brandy instead of wine as it's too expensive to cook with in India!

The result was an impressive looking golden-hued cake with a lovely moist texture and a very subtle spicy - citrus taste ... goes perfectly with mangoes that were in season here the past few months.

Cucina Ebraica  was published in 1998 and is now unfortunately out of print. You can still get a copy on Amazon India for close to R10,000; but I managed to get a good second hand copy on the abebooks.com website (a second hand book portal with 35 million volumes) for US$5.00 plus postage to India.   A bargain if I ever saw one!

Torta di Zucca Barucca  (Pumpkin cake from the Veneto)

Ingredients:   I pumpkin or butternut squash around 1kg, 3/4 C unsalted butter, 3/4 C sugar, 1/2 C ground almonds, 1/2 C candied citron - minced, 1/3 C raisins soaked in 3T grappa or wine (I used cranberries soaked in brandy), grated zest of 2 lemons, I/2 C flour, 2 teaspoons baking powder, 1 t ground cinnamon, pinch of salt, 3 eggs - separated

Method:   Preheat oven to 160 dgrees C.  Butter a 9 inch cake pan & line base with parchment paper.

Peel and chop the pumpkin into 1/2 inch dice, discading seeds and fibres. Should have about 4 cups.   Melt butter in pot add pumpkin and cook covered for 25 mins till it is soft.   (At this stage I used a hand blender to puree it.)

Put in mixing bowl & whisk in sugar, almonds, citron, raisins (I chucked in the brandy too!) and lemon zest.    In another bowl sift together flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt.  

Add flour mixture to the pumpkin mixture and blend together ... then add 3 egg yolks until thoroughly combined.    Whisk the egg whites in separate clean bowl until stiff peaks form.   Fold the whites thoroughly into the pumpkin mixture and pour into prepared cake tin.   Don't over beat!

Bake 45 to 60 minutes till cooked.   (We currently have a small dodgy Indian electric oven so I cooked it the full hour.)    Remove to rack to cool, then invert onto plate, remove parchment paper and turn back upright onto a serving platter.

As my Italian-Australian friend Josephine would have said: Bello gusto!!!

A Brief History of Chicken Chettinad

 

I recently discovered this beautiful Indian cookbook  – “The Bangla Table: Flavours and Recipes from Chettinad” – written by Sumeet Nair and Mrs Meenakshi Meyyappan.  Its a collection of recipes and stories from the Chettinad culture in South India’s Tamil Nadu state.                                                                                 The Nattukottai Chettinads were a people of traders who were known for their wide and adventurous travels – across India and other parts of South Asia, including Sri Lanka, Burma, Laos, Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia – in the 19th and early 20^th centuries. Phew!   Now their descendants live in 73 villages and three still functioning temples centred around the town of Karaikudi, some 400 kilometres from Chennai.   (It’s apparently about 7 hours drive --- from Chennai or Bangalore.)

Chettinad cuisine - a mixture of both veg and non-veg dishes – has been heavily influenced by the history of this unique community, including borrowing from Penang’s famous Straits Chinese cooking, the flavours and herbs of Vietnam and Laos, and the Buddhist culinary culture of colonial Ceylon, now Sri Lanka.  Christian, Muslim and Hindu cultures have all had there impact on the people and the food of the Chettiars, as they are known.

The other major influence on Chettinad cuisine was, perhaps not surprisingly, the British occupation and colonisation of India and surrounding countries in the 18^th and 19^th centuries.   Many traditional British recipes were either adapted for Indian conditions or somehow evolved into what is known as Anglo-Indian cuisine – or “butler cuisine”, as its also known due to the fact that chefs and staff in the homes of both the British and the wealthy Chettiars were known as butlers and these staff were over the years shared between the two cultures.

The source of the recipes in “The Bangala Table” comes from one single family-owned business ...  a heritage boutique hotel (or ‘stay’ as they are known in India) known as The Bangala.   This is an early 1900’s mansion now converted into a 25 room hotel run by the MSMM family (in Tamil culture families are known by the initials of each succeeding generation) and the matriarch of the current family is Mrs Meenaskhi Mayyappan, who is also the co-author of the book.

My Chicken Chettinad Pepper Masala

This week I cooked one of the signature dishes from this book ... Milagu Masala Kozhi or Chicken Chettinad Pepper Masala, described as the “flag bearer of Chettinad cuisine”.    


The masala is dominated by a slighlty numbing mix of black pepper and chillies which gives the dish a very dark and viscous appearance.   But the taste was sublime - especially when paired with two other recipes from the book – Beetroot Poriyal, a wonderfully fresh tasting and crunchy beetroot dish cooked with mustard seeds, more chillies and grated coconut and Mathulampazham Thayir Pachadi  (try ordering that in a restaurant!?) or pomegranate raita.


There are a number of other fantastic looking recipes in book including Crab Curry Masala, a Mutton Ball Curry, Quail 65, Fish Kozhambu, Crab Rasam and Eggplant Masala.  
All of these recipes have a distinctive South Indian flavour to them with heavy spicing and the sour taste of tamarind, common to many Tamil recipes of the region.

Here is the recipe for the famous Chicken Chettinad!

Chicken Chettinad Pepper Masala   (Milagu Masala Kozhi)

The thick pepper & chilli masala

Ingredients:

Wet Paste:   1 t fennel seeds    2 t black peppercorns (I used 3)   1 t cumin seeds    4 dried red chillies    1 t coriander seeds    ½ t tumeric powder    1 t grated ginger and ½ t grated garlic  (I simply used ginger-garlic paste that we make up each week in our kitchen)  ½ C vegetable oil   2 inch piece of cinnamom   2 green cardamom pods (crack open the pod)   1 ½ red onions, finely chopped   ½ C tomato puree or paste   1 t sea salt   600 gms of chicken (1 small – medium chicken cut into 8 or more pieces)

The chicken pieces cooking in the curry mix

Method:

 Dry roast fennel, peppercorns, cumin, and dried red chillies in fry pan on low heat.   Grind them and then add a little water along with turmeric, garlic and ginger.   Leave aside.

 Heat large frypan on high heat and add oil.   Add cinnamom, cardamom and onion and cook for 4 mins.   Add tomato puree and cook further minute.   Add wet masala and stir.   Cook 10 – 12 minutes, till oil separates from masala.   Add salt and stir.

 
Add chicken and coast with the masala ingredients in pot.   Cook 2 mins and then add 1 ½ cups water.   Boil on high heat for 4 mins then reduce heat to low and cook for 15-20 mins, stirring occasionally.    Sauce should be reduced to thick coatening on chicken.

 Serve with Beetroot Poriyal and Mathulampazham Thayir Pachadi .


       


Beetroot Poriyal

Pomegranate Raita.

 

Tony saab, Hyderabad Jan 2015

"Psaria" - a Greek-style Fried Fish with Vinegar Sauce

I recently discovered a series of cookbooks written by an Englishwoman named Sally Butcher.   She married an Iranian, taught herself to speak Farsi, and together they established what appears to be a very successful business importing and selling foodstuffs from Iran and surrounding countries in a shop in Peckham – a very multicultural suburb in south east London.

The shop is called Persepolis ... which is Persian for “Jamshid’s Throne” .... Jamshid also being the name of her husband.   And along the way Sally Butcher has written three amazingly knowledgable and informative cookbooks on vegetarian and non-vegetarian food from that region.  

                  

The books are "Persia in Peckham", "Veggiestan" and "Snackistan"; I have slowly begun cooking my way through these three books ... a quest that will easily take me through to the end of the year at least.  And whilst I intend to come back to the first two publications on this blog, the third book is called “Snackistan” ... an imaginary country which she refers to as “a borderless confederation of the Middle East’s favourite foodstuffs”.  And it is from this book that I found a delightful and unusual recipe for fried fish.

Fish pieces after frying in seasoned flour.

The fish is first coated in seasoned flour and then simply fried; as Sally Butcher notes “this serves the dual purpose of locking the flavour and aroma in” ... thus reducing those lingering fish smells in the kitchen.  The fillets are then allowed to cool and a rich and puckery vinegar sauce is prepared using white wine vinegar, fresh parsley and the leftover flour used to coat the fillets.



Preparing the vinegar sauce.

The end result is quite a dramatic presentation for such a fairly simple recipe and it would make a great party stand-by as the fish and the sauce can be prepared separately in advance and then brought together just before serving plus it can also be served at room temperature.

PSARIA  or   GREEK-STYLE FRIED FISH WITH VINEGAR SAUCE

Ingredients:

800g fish fillets    salt   150g plain flour   1 t paprika   1 tsp turmeric   sunflower or olive oil   3 garlic cloves   1 t fresh or dried rosemary   100ml or 1/2 C white wine vinegar   bunch of fresh parsley, chopped   black pepper

Method:

Wash & dry fish and sprinkle with salt.   Mix 3 T flour with some salt, the paprika & turmeric.   Coat each piece of fish with the flour mixture, shake off excess and reserve rest of the flour.

Heat 1.5cm of oil in a pan and fry fish on each side for about 2-3 minutes, until they are golden brown.   Remove, drain and place on platter.

Strain 3 T of the cooking oil into a saucepan, heat and then add garlic and rosemary.   Add 2T flour from saved mixture, heat and stir until it starts to form a roux.   Add vinegar slowly along with a little water if it appears too thick; the mixture will begin to thicken when the vinegar is added so resist the temptation to add more flour ... as I did the first time!   Add parsley to the roux and season with salt & pepper.

Pour sauce over the fish on the platter and serve hot as is ... or let cool to room temperature for an hour before serving ... this is the traditional way it is served.    

I served this with brown rice and an Indian bhindi (okra) dish ...

Tony saab/Hyderabad   March 2014

Murgh Anardana or Stewed Chicken with Browned Onions and Fresh Pomegranate.

Stewed Chicken with Browned Onions and Fresh Pomegranate

I haven’t posted on this blog for quite some time.   This was due to a number of factors: busy doing some outside work at the film school, the hard drive on our desktop was full, the scanner broke and then the memory card in my camera was corrupted. Phew!  Plus we went to Australia over the Christmas period ... lots of great food and eating and drinking with family & friends in Melbourne and Sydney.   But no time to blog!

Nevertheless, I haven’t stopped cooking throughout this time.   In fact in early January I had a fairly intensive week in the kitchen in Melbourne brought about by the temperature being in the mid ‘40s for several days. I was staying at my sister’s house in the Dandenong Ranges -20 k’s out of the CBD - and only had access to an old car my brother had kindly lent me .... which was in danger of overheating anytime I took it on a trip.   So I had to stay put most of the week and cooked up a storm for myself ... my sister and her family were away on holidays.  

‘Dinner for one’ can sometimes also be relaxing ... plus I had the budgerigar to talk to as he had to stay indoors all of that week too!

Anyway, last night I was back in the kitchen with one of my favourite Indian cookbooks ... Raghavan Iyer’s “660 Curries”.   Whilst the title makes it sound like one of those generic cover- all- bases badly written ‘cheapies’ you often find on the discount tables in newsagents, this book is actually a masterpiece!    As the great Madhur Jaffrey says on the back cover of this more than 800 page tome ... “this book is nothing short of a treasure chest ... bursting with the true flavours of India’s many regions”.

Raghavan Iyer grew up in Bombay but now lives in the US where he is a writer, culinary consultant and cooking instructor.   I am in awe at the depth of knowledge and research that is contained between the covers of “660 Curries”; many of the recipes he has personally collected from family cooks in households across India and from the expat’ community in the US; often their stories are incorporated into the introduction to a particular recipe.   And the book ranges across all the different sub-cuisines of India and carefully explains their varied ingredients and cooking techniques. His experience as a teacher shines through in the clearly written recipes.

                                    

Last night I cooked Murgh Anardana or Stewed Chicken with Browned Onions and Fresh Pomegranate.   It was a fantastic dish ... not too many ingredients, simple technique and a surprisingly unusual and refreshing sauce made from coriander and fresh pomegranate kernels, which popped in your mouth as you ate the dish.

Chicken marinating in the ginger/garlic paste

The recipe calls for the chicken to be marinated first in ginger and garlic paste for some time to allow the flavours to permeate the chicken.   And then you make up a sauce beginning with the onions; this frying stage provided the basis of the sauce to follow and contributed to its unusual and exotic tangy taste.

We served this with brown rice and a simple green salad.   Kids really loved it!

Ingredients:

1 T ginger paste   1 T garlic paste  1 chicken, skin removed & cut into 8 pieces    2 T veg oil    6 cloves    2 cinnamon sticks    2 black or green cardamom pods (I used 2 of each)    2 bay leaves    I red onion, cut in half and then sliced (I am going to use 2 next time!)    1 cup of half & half (that’s a US ingredient of equal parts milk & cream .... but I used coconut milk instead)    2 tsps garam masala (I also added dried mint)    1 tsp salt    2 T fresh coriander, finely chopped    seed kernels from 1 (or 2) pomegranates

Method: 

Mix  ginger & garlic pastes, smear over chicken pieces and leave to marinate ... for at least 30 mins or overnight.

Heat oil in pan and then add cloves, cinnamon and bay leaves.   Cook for 1 min till the spices perfume the oil.   Then add onions and cook 10 to 15 mins - stirring frequently - until they brown.   (Note: at this stage my onions disintegrated and stuck thickly to the pan ... which is why next time I will be using more than one and watching the temperature in the pot.)

Add chicken pieces meat side down and spoon the cooked onion over the top.   Brown chicken on first side for 5 to 7 minutes then turn and cook other side same time.   Then remove chicken to a plate.

Add some of your milk/cream mixture and deglaze the pan, scrapping onions and meaty bits off the bottom and sides.   Then add rest of the liquid and stir in garam masala, mint and salt.  Cook gently for a few minutes and then return chicken to the pan meat side down.   Spoon the sauce over the chicken in the pan and cook covered on medium-low temperature 15 to 20 minutes until chicken is cooked through.   Turn the chicken a few times during this process.   Remove and arrange on serving platter.

              Sauce with fresh pomegranates and coriander                         

Stir coriander and pomegranate seeds into sauce, heat to medium stirring occasionally until sauce is gravy-thick .... 3 to 5 minutes.

Remove large spices from sauce and pour sauce over chicken on platter.  Serve with brown rice!

Tony saab/Hyderabad, Feb 2014

Afghani dumplings and a ring from Kabul



'Ashak' - Afghani dumplings


I was thinking recently what a coincidence it is that three of the world’s most alluring cuisines ... food from Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan ... are from countries currently steeped in seemingly endless conflict.   Aside from the appalling loss of human life, family upheavals and the damage to those countries’ cultural heritage (like the destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan by the Taliban in Afghanistan and the more recent bombing by Assad’s forces of Aleppo’s medieval market - a UNESCO World Heritage Site - in Syria), the ongoing insurgencies in these countries have overshadowed the rich heritage of their cuisines developed over centuries.

Regretably I have never had the opportunity to visit these countries; but the closest I have come to experiencing Afghani culture in recent times was stumbling across a tiny shop in an outer suburb of Paris that sold Afghani artefacts, clothing and jewellery.  Aside from incredibly beautiful – and expensive – Pashmina shawls and an impressive collection of Pakols – Afghani woollen hats, the shop had an array of traditional Pashtun jewellery, including this beautiful ring which I bought for Juhee.   The Afghani shop owner told me it was made in Kabul from an old silver coin with the text written in Farsi.

 

Juhee's ring from Afghanistan

My interest in Afghani food was piqued the other evening when I was watching an episode of “Food Safari” on Indian TV; this show is fronted by a former colleague from SBS News, Maeve O’Mara.   Anyway, she was watching an Afghani-Australian woman cooking in her kitchen (in Sydney, I think) and the several dishes she made looked and sounded both unique and delicious.   This inspired me to indulge yet again in one of my only vices here in Hyderabad: buying cookbooks on the ‘net.   And sure enough, Flipkart (India’s Amazon) had a book entitled “Afghan Food & Cookery” by Helen Saberi.

 After doing a background check on this book – including discovering that the author was a researcher and contributor to Alan Davidson’s monumental “The Oxford Companion to Food”- I ordered the book on-line.  

 

Its an impressive volume with chapters on various Afghani breads, street food, Asian-style pasta and noodles, kebabs, rice pilaus, qormas (Afghani stews) and unusual desserts.  The recipes are designed within a distinctly Afghani tradition but combined with a Western sensibility to sourcing ingredients and health conscious alternatives.

One of the recipes demonstrated on the “Food Safari” episode was 'Ashak' ... hand made dumplings stuffed with a leek and chilli filling and served over yogurt sauce with dried mint and an Afghani lamb ‘keema’ or mince curry on the side.

 

Here is my version of this dish which we ate last night; the kids really enjoyed the dumplings.  The recipe is courtesy of “Afghan Food & Cookery” ... maybe it’s Iraqi and Syrian dishes next time? 

'Ashak' served on a platter with the yogurt, mint  & keema dressing

 Recipe:     “Ashak” ... Leek filled Dumplings with Meat Sauce  

                                               From ‘Afghan Food & Cookery’

 Ingredients:

3 ½ cups of plain flour   4 t salt   1 egg   2T veg oil   ½ kilo washed & finely chopped leeks (I used 3 leeks)   ½ t chilli pepper   1 ½ cups of yogurt   3 cloves of garlic, peeled and chopped finely   1 t vinegar   1 T dried mint

For the meat sauce:   6 T veg oil   2 red onions, finely chopped   ½ kilo lamb mince   ½ cup tomato paste   salt & pepper

 Method:

 Prepare dough:   sift flour and 1 t salt into bowl, make well in centre and whisk in egg and 1 T oil.   Add ½ cup water slowly and knead thoroughly to form a smooth dough.  (I added 2 T extra water.)  Divide into 2 balls & cover with damp cloth for an hour.

The dough rolled into a ball to rest before rolling

Prepare meat sauce:   Heat oil in pan, add onions and fry until reddish brown, stirring every now and again.   Add meat and stir fry until brown.   Add tomato paste, bring to boil and then add salt & pepper.   Lower heat and simmer until sauce is thick.   (I used less oil and added cumin, turmeric and chilli powder to give it a bit more flavour.)

Mix chopped leeks with salt and chilli powder and drain in colander the mix in T of oil.

The chopped leeks marinated with salt, chilli & oil

Roll out one ball of dough onto lightly floured surface to a thickness of 1/16 “ ... avoid thicker pastry as it will make dumplings tough.   Cut out rounds about 2 ½ “.  Place teaspoon of chopped leeks in each round, fold over one half and seal dumplings by squeezing  or pleating edges.   Place on well floured tray & avoid overlapping as they will stick.  Cover with cloth until ready to cook.   Repeat with remaining ball of dough.

 

The dough rolled out to a thickness of 1/16th"

 

 

 

 

Filling the dumpling skins with the leeks

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



The dumplings ready to be boiled

Place yogurt in bowl and mix in garlic & 1 t salt.    Spread half mixture on serving platter or individual plates.

Yogurt beaten with salt, garlic & chopped green chilli

Boil 7 cups of water and add 1 t salt and vinegar.   Put ashok into water and boil gently about 10 minutes.   Remove & drain on mesh.    Place dumplings on plate with yogurt dressing, cover with remaining yogurt, sprinkle on dried mint and a little of the minced meat.

Serve with rest of meat in a separate bowl.



 
Tony saab, Hyderabad July 2013