An Invitation to Indian Cooking - Madhur Jaffrey [34]
Pour paste into a bowl large enough to contain the meat. Prick the meat with a fork or with the point of a sharp knife and place in marinade. Mix well, cover, and leave for 3 to 4 hours. (Refrigerate if it is a very hot day; otherwise leave at room temperature.)
After the meat has marinated, pour contents of bowl into a wide 4-quart cooking pot. Add the fennel and onion seeds. Bring to a boil. Cover, lower heat, and simmer about 1 hour.
Lift off cover. Taste to check the salt (you may want to add a little more). Raise the heat and boil rapidly until most of the liquid evaporates. You will need to stir more frequently as the liquid diminishes. Now add the oil and keep stirring and frying over a medium flame. This dish must be “dry,” i.e., a thickish sauce should cling to the meat, which browns as the liquid cooks down. Be careful not to break meat pieces as you stir.
To serve: Place in a warmed dish and serve with chapatis, parathas, or pooris. You could also serve it with almost any kind of rice. With it, serve peas, okra, beans, or cabbage, and some yogurt dish, perhaps Yogurt with Potatoes.
Lamb chops with whole spices and yogurt
SERVES 4
In this dish, lamb chops are cooked with whole spices, garlic, ginger, Chinese parsley, and yogurt. It is simple to make and very delicious in its final blend of flavors.
8 lamb chops
4 heaping tablespoons plain yogurt
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
10 whole black peppercorns
10 whole cloves
2 bay leaves
8 cardamom pods
2 cinnamon sticks, 2 inches long
2 whole dried hot red peppers (optional)
A piece of fresh ginger, about 1-inch cube, peeled and minced
2 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
4 tablespoons chopped Chinese parsley (coriander greens or cilantro), or use fresh mint, watercress, or regular parsley as a substitute
1 teaspoon salt
Trim lamb chops of excess fat, leaving ⅛ inch along the sides. Pat dry with paper towels.
Mix the yogurt with 1 cup of water and set aside in a nonmetallic bowl.
Heat the oil in a 10–12-inch heavy-bottomed pot. When oil is very hot, put in 4 chops at a time, brown well on both sides, and remove with slotted spoon. Turn heat down to medium and fry the whole spices (peppercorns, cloves, bay leaves, cardamom, cinnamon, and red peppers) for about 20 seconds or until the bay leaves turn darker. Now add minced ginger and garlic, and fry, stirring, for a minute. Add the parsley and keep stirring for another minute.
Now put lamb chops back into the pot along with any liquid that may have collected in the bowl. Stir the yogurt water once again and pour over chops. Add salt, bring to a boil, cover, and simmer one hour. Stir gently every 10 minutes.
To serve: Serve with Rice with Peas, Cucumber Raita, and any of the green bean recipes. Or serve with plain boiled potatoes and a green salad.
Pork chops cooked with whole spices and tamarind juice
SERVES 4
Indians sometimes use Western cuts of meat to cook local dishes. We did not eat pork very often in our home, but every now and then my father would drive down to a special butcher to buy pork chops. Here is one of the ways we ate them.
1 tamarind lump about the size of a walnut
8 loin or rib pork chops
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
12 whole black peppercorns
10 whole cloves
2 cinnamon sticks, each 2½ inches long
8 whole cardamom pods
2 cloves of garlic, peeled
2 whole dried hot red peppers (optional)
1½ teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
Soak the tamarind lump in ¾ cup hot water for at least 2 hours.
Pat dry the eight pork chops with paper towels. Trim off all but ⅛ inch fat along the sides.
Heat oil in a 10–12-inch heavy-bottomed pot over medium-high heat. When oil is very hot, put in 4 pork chops at a time and brown them on both sides. This should take 3 to 4 minutes on each side.
Once the pork chops have browned, remove them to a side dish and keep covered. Lower flame to medium.
In the same oil place first the peppercorns, then the cloves, the cinnamon, the cardamom pods, the garlic, and finally the red pepper. Stir and fry these ingredients for about