 |
| Khichuri topped with Jharna ghee with ilish fried in mustard oil and some of the ilish offal too |
Khichuri (Khichdi) and ilish maachh bhaaja (fried hilsa/ shaad) is possibly the most classic and coveted meal that a Bengali can have when it is raining.
That is what I had for lunch yesterday though it was not raining then. It did rain the previous night though and I had to calm Baby Loaf, our elder cat, then in particular as the sound of wind and rains scare him. He is a bit less than two years old and will always be my baby!
It was raining fish at home yesterday. The last of our stock of fish at home got over the previous night after we had a home-made light kaatla kaalia (onion curry). I offered some of the fish to Baby Loaf after washing the fish and he loved it. He offered some to little Nimki, our younger kitten, and the four month old loved it too.
 |
| L to right: Prawns, rohu, hilsa Rohu and hilsa head, tuna, surmai Pomfret, hilsa, rawas |
Baby Loaf has relished every fish that I have give so far…Bombay duck/ bombil, Indian mackerel/ bangda, surmai/ seer fish, pomfret, rawas (Indian salmon) and parshe (mullet). He is like K on that count as she loves fish too. The only exception being the mandeli (anchovies) that I had given Loaf months back when he was an inside outside cat and which he did not take to.
Loaf’s vet says that it is better for him to have him fresh water fish as seafood can affect the kidneys. When it comes to home cooked food, doc prefers us giving him chicken (not liver which is high on phosphorus it seems), but Loaf has not taken to it.
As I wrote a bit earlier, Loaf relished the kaatla the day before night, as did Nimki who enjoyed it more than the seafood that I had given him in the past.
The Bengali genes in both boys show in their love for fresh water fish. So what if they were born in Bandra in Mumbai? Separating the bones from the kaatla and then washing the fish to remove the spices and oil from it for the boys made me smile. That is what my mother would do for me as a kid.
Both the boys love fish a lot more than I did as a kid.
 |
| I vote for Poonam |
Of course, the fish I buy has to be from someone I trust and for that I have Poonam from the Khar Station Fish Market and the fish she has delivered to us in the past couple of months has been amazing as it has always been.
Incidentally, my mom was the one who had spotted Poonam’s shop when we had gone together to the Khar station market. It was as if she did so to ensure that her daughter in law and her future grand kitties would get the best fish possible.
I called Poonam yesterday and she came over and delivered enough fish to last us for a couple of weeks. We bought rawas (Indian salmon), pomfret, surmai (seer fish) which comes from the sea and kaatla, prawns and ilish from the river. She has started home delivery as a response to the lockdown as we prefer not to go to the market. We called Banu first to check if she was coming to work and then placed our order, as it helps when she cleans and portions stuff to put in the deep fridge.
The hilsa was ‘Howrah ilish,’ according to Poonam and she has been calling us to entice us to buy this for a while. ‘Howrah,’ of course refers to the fact that the fish had come from Kolkata. For all you know, it was caught in the Irrawady as most of the hilsa on offer these days is supposed to come from Burma or Thailand, even if hawked as Padma ilish from Bangladesh. The word ‘Howrah’ distinguishes it from bheeng or pala, the Gujarati hilsa that you usually get in Mumbai.
This was a 1.5 kg hilsa with no egg, so 100 pc fish. We had some of the fish entrails too. Since fellow Bengalis would be interested, the cost was Rs 1,500 a kilo. Down from Rs 1,700 earlier.
I requested our cook Banu to make hilsa fry and khichuri for lunch yesterday so that one could make the most of the fresh fish. I had given her the recipes before and she did a good job of them both. We use the local ambe mohor rice instead of Gobindo Bhog which is preferred in Bengal for khichudi. Both are short grained and fragrant.
Lunch was lovely and Nimki smelt the fish and jumped on the table and we had to lift our plates and eat to stop him from joining in. I let him sniff the plates once were done and he seemed like he was in heaven!
For someone who did not like fish till recently (yes, not all Bengalis are fish obessed), buying fish is something I love. It started because K loves fish and I loved buying and cooking it for her. And now the boys love it too.
As they say, you can take a Bengali out of water, but you cannot take the fish out of a Bengali!
Do you have a special rainy day dish in your culture? I would love to know about it.
PS:
I made a wholewheat spaghetti with mushroom and tuna in tomato sauce at night. The fresh tuna was on the house from Poonam. “Mere taraf se.’ It was finally ready at 11 pm as cooking got a bit chaotic with my first chasing Loaf across the house to feed him and then chasing Nimki across the kitchen to take him out. I got Alexa to play some Led Zepp to calm me down.
It all fell into place when we had dinner as the pasta turned out to be perfect and we watched Tehran, the gripping show on Apple TV, while we had dinner. A city I had lived in a for a bit as a kid. Capital of the country K’s forefather’s had come from to India from in the distant past.
We boiled rohu in haldi for the boys. While Little Nimki gobbled up the kaatla this time too, Loaf refused to eat and I finally coaxed him to eat by feeding him from my hands. Like me, Loaf does not like to eat rui/ kaatla everyday it seems! He refused to have it today too, while Nimki wiped it off.
 |
| Trying to make Loaf eat the kaatla |
In case you are wondering, yes that is a cat scratch in the picture above. I have them on both hands courtesy little Nimki who went a bit manic one night and was going after Baby Loaf and I tried to hold him back. That was his vaccine day and the pattern is that he becomes quiet after his shots and then very volatile at night. Well, thankfully now no more vaccines for him till next year!
QZAYT
THE LETTERS ABOVE WERE TYPED BY LITTLE NIMKI AS YOU CAN SEE HIM DOING IN THE PICTURE BELOW
 |
| And then he sat down on my keyboard! |
The #KittyKarmakars
There was no more rain today. Nimki came in to the room while I conducted my workshop on branding for home chefs, but soon went off to sleep without bothering me. Luckily the participants in the workshop did not do so!
From the #FinelyChoppedRecipeCorner
- 1 tea cup (ek mutho/ fistful) rice. Washed and soaked for at least an hour. Bengalis prefer the short grained Gobindo bhog for khichuri and my granny confirmed this when I met her this time. I use basmati but recently bought the local ambe mohor rice at Mumbai and quite liked the end result. It’s fragrant too
- Half the amount of yellow moong dal as rice. For 1 cup of rice, use 1/2 cup of daal. Gujaratis use green moong too.
- Condiments: 1 slit green chilli, 1 dry red chilli, 1 tej pata, 1 clove, cardamom and a 1/2 inch bit of cinnamon
- Flavour base: 1/2 teaspoon finely chopped ginger, 1/2 a tomato, cubed, for tanginess
- Spices & seasoning: 1/2 a teaspoon each of red chilli powder (skip chillies if you had bad stomach or throat), coriander and cumin powders, 2/3 teaspoon turmeric, 1/4 teaspoon garam masala powder and 2/3 teaspoon of salt and 1/2 teaspoon of sugar
- 1 teaspoon refined oil, 1 teaspoon ghee. We Bengalis prefer ghee made with cow’s milk and of late I’ve been tripping on a local favourite Calcutta favourite called Jharna ghee. My friends who stay in Kolkata know of other good brands too
- You can also add seasonal vegetables like cauliflowers and green peas now, carrots go well too, and potatoes are a must. Though this time I skipped the potatoes as my diet is rather extravagant in any case
- Heat oil
- Add chillies and garam masala and tej pata to the pan
- Add ginger and tomato
- Add vegetables
- Add pre-roasted dal (‘Roasting”: heating washed and drained dal on a hot pan on a fire till the raw dal browns a bit)
- Add rice
- Add spices and seasoning
- Add water and let it cook. This might take about 15 – 25 minutes. Cover the pan with a lid. Check and add water in between if it gets dry
- Once done, add the ghee on top and sprinkle some garam masala powder. Last time I added toasted crushed flax seeds too!
- My mother’s tip: dry roast the moong dal in advance and keep it in a jar
- Keep checking the water while the khichuri cooks and add more if it begins to dry.
- Add more water if you want a gola (runny) khichuri and less if you want a jhorjhora/ bhuni (dry) khichuri
- Cut two potatoes into cubes and par boil them
- Take five pieces of rui
- Smear both of the above with turmeric salt and chilly powder and fry them and set aside
- Make a masala paste of a tea spoon each turmeric, jeera (cummin) and dhaniya (coriander) powders and half a tea spoon each of red chilly powder and garam masala powder and sugar with a bit of water
Curry:
- Take a bit of oil in a pan
- Once heated, add some white jeera (cummin) seeds, whole garam masalas, dry red chillies and bay leaves and let them roast
- Add half a ground onion/ shallot and toss till it becomes brown
- Add a tea spoon of ginger paste
- Add half a ground tomato and let this cook
- Add the masala paste to onion, tomato, ginger mix
- Stir, add 2 small cups of water
- Bring the sauce to boil
- Add the fish and potatoes to the sauce
- Add salt
- Let it boil on high flame for 3,4 minutes and then simmer on low flame for 7,10 minutes
- Garnish with coriander and split green chillies
- Serve with steamed rice
- Heat a tablespoon of olive oil. I use extra virgin olive oil and cook on a low flame
- Once the oil is hot, add 1/2 a teaspoon of finely chopped fresh garlic
- Then add 200 g of tomato puree. I use packaged ones. The oil might splatter so be careful
- Add the mushroom (or minced meat). Salt. Stir.
- Let the mushroom/ meat cook and the puree thicken.
- You might want to add some veggies to the dish such as finely chopped green capsicum.
- Next goes in the pre-boiled spaghetti (I used wholewheat) and a few teaspoons of the water it was boiled in. I boiled the spaghetti while the mutton cooked.
- Toss the spaghetti and then add some black pepper, oregano and chilli flakes (assuming you have them at home). I added half a cube of processed cheese leftover from breakfast. You could do without it. Parmesan would be heavenly of course but we do not have it at home now. There is no sugar added to my version.
- Cover the pan with a lid for a couple of minutes to lock the flavours and you are done.
- Add some extra virgin olive oil at the end to the pasta on your plate.
