Sunday Dinner: Indian Style

Every Sunday during what I like to call “HBO Season” (ie: approximately January through June), my roommate, my friends, and I get together to watch quality television and share a themed, homemade meal.  Some of our past themes have included sandwiches, garlic, breakfast for dinner, food from your homeland, Italian, and Moroccan.  Given that we are all reasonably good cooks, these dinners are often the best of the whole week. 

A couple of weeks ago we chose Indian food.  Whenever we embrace an ethnic food theme, we do our best to create authentic and delicious dishes.  Indian food night was no exception!  I went straight to my Indian cookbooks—one by Madhur Jaffrey (a famous Indian-American chef) and the other by Julie Sahni.  However, after I had bookmarked half a dozen different dishes, I realized that this decision would be tougher than I thought. 

My roommate Ben volunteered to get naan.  Though vital to the meal, his contribution was simple and required minimal preparation.  My friend Virginia was having much the same problem I was.  Eventually we both sat down and tried to make a concise list of what we thought was essential to our Indian meal.  In the end, we settled on a potato dish (Virignia), basmati rice (me), something made with beans or lentils (Virginia), and an aromatic vegetable dish (me). 

I think the key to good, authentic Indian food is a combination of ingredients (especially spices) and techniques.  For instance, while other rices can be substituted, basmati is the appropriate and best choice.  Common vegetables used in Indian cooking include tomatoes, potatoes, eggplant, and greens.  I ended up picking eggplant as my star ingredient.  After much deliberating I picked a dish of fire-roasted eggplant stewed in a spiced tomato sauce.  First I broiled the eggplant until the skin was blistered.  I then let it cool while I prepared the sauce.  As with many Indian recipes, this one called for a long list of spices including cumin, coriander, fenugreek, and turmeric in addition to onions, garlic, and ginger.  These all worked together in beautiful unison to create a flavorful sauce.  By the time it was prepared the eggplant was cool.  I peeled it and chopped it into approximate 1” cubes.  I added the eggplant into the tomato sauce along with peas.  After another 15 or 20 minutes of simmering, the dish was ready. I covered the pan and turned the heat to low to keep it warm and ready for service.

Since I finished up early, I also threw together a quick raita of yogurt and diced cucumber.  Virginia ended up making a dish of pan fried potatoes with black mustard seeds, onions and garlic.  She also brought incredible mung bean pancakes.  They were comprised of soaked, pureed mung beans, garlic, turmeric, and herbs (parsley I think).  The pancakes were hearty yet delicious, and quite different from any I had eaten before.  All together it made for a quite complete meal.  The only thing that was missing was a mango lassi to wash it all down.  Alas, I had to save something for next time!