TANDOORI PANEER AND SAAG p. 47
The paneer is marinated in toasted besan, yogurt, and a variety of flavors, including carom seeds, black cumin, turmeric, garlic, ginger, chiles, dried methi leaves, chaat masala, and cilantro. Add cubed paneer and let it marinate for an hour. Then grill or broil for 3 minutes a side. I chose to roast at 425F for 20 minutes instead on a parchment lined cookie sheet. Delicious!
I took some liberties with the saag, both due to time constraints and ingredients. To start with, I used some Swiss chard and parsley instead of spinach, to get them out of my crisper and used up. The recipe wants to you blanch, chill, and drain them, before making them into a puree to be added near the end of cooking. I chose to chop them and add them raw after cooking the onions, garlic, chiles, tomatoe, and ginger. Spices for this dish are dried red chiles (I used bird peppers), cumin, turmeric, Malvani garam masala (I subbed my own garam masala and Konkani masala), and amchur (dried mango powder). Then you fold in butter and cream (I used yogurt). Plate up the saag and top with the paneer. I also added some cooked potatoes that needed to get used up. We had this with flour tortillas.
We really enjoyed both of these! At some point I will revisit it to follow the directions a bit more closely, but there are some great flavors here regardless.
ANDHRA STYLE GREY MULLET STRIPED BASS p. 106
I think this is my favorite recipe so far from this cookbook! To make the sauce, start by adding mustard seeds, cumin seeds, and fenugreek seeds to some oil. Cook until they begin to crackle. Then add curry leaves and some asafoetida and continue to cook for about half a minute. Now add onion. Continue to cook for another 10 minutes or so, until translucent and a little brown. Next you add kashmiri chile powder, ground coriander, and turmeric. Once they bloom, add some chopped tomato and water. Let that simmer until the tomato breaks down and everything reduces and thickens, about 15 minutes.
Once the tomato sauce is ready, add a spoonful of tamarind paste and a can of unsweetened coconut cream. Let it simmer for another couple minutes and then season to taste with salt. Keep warm.
Marinate skin on fish fillets with some ginger, lemon juice, and salt/pepper for about 10 minutes. Then, making sure the skin is dry, fry them up starting with the skin side down for 5-8 minutes total. You want crispy skin and the flesh to be just cooked through. Serve the fillets in a pool of the coconut sauce.
I can’t begin to emphasize how much this dish is more than the sum of its parts. The sauce has richness from the coconut, along with a little sweetness (enhanced by the onion), as well as tangy-ness from the tomato and tamarind. The ground coriander and the curry leaves really pop! I could eat this sauce by itself with rice or flatbread and be perfectly happy! But the fish is great too! Make this!
I served this with roasted broccolini and basmati rice. The broccolini florets really soaked up the sauce, which was a nice bonus!
MASALA FISH CAKES
I thought this was just something my mom did with leftover fried fish that my dad wouldn’t eat a second time 
I skipped the eggs, because eggs tend to make many of my patties and cakes too runny, and I had no problem with the cakes binding with the salmon I used instead of cod.
The taste I sampled was a bit flat (maybe the stronger flavor of salmon needed more, or I am just used to more spicing), so I added finely minced onion and garlic and more green chilli and cumin.
If you like fish cakes or fish patties / burgers, the masala version is a delicious glow-up.
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That recipe link seems to have disappeared, but I found another:
It looks beautiful! I love the black chickpeas particularly, will enjoy trying this recipe (cleaning out my closet today, I found a pack of dried pomegranate seeds (had thrown out a bottle of ones I had ground some years ago earlier in the week> Thanks for reporting.
Black chickpeas are really good as chaat / sundal / salad! Also green chickpeas (which you can get dried, and also fresh frozen at an indian or middle eastern store).
NAGALAND HOUSE BABY PORK RIBS
I finally got around to these ribs, and they are dynamite!
I skipped the separate cooking of ribs and bbq sauce, and instead pressure cooked the ribs with both sets of ingredients, then removed the meat and strained and reduced the sauce. I also broiled instead of deep frying the ribs, coating them with the sauce. (
It’s a real disservice to focus purely on the heat of bhut jolokia / naga chillies, because they are so incredibly flavorful – fruity and delicious, with a light tingling. I used only 1 small dried naga chilli for about 1.25-1.5 lbs of ribs, which was plenty of heat and flavor, so the 2-3 the recipe calls for would for me blur the flavor in favor of a burning heat.
The scant accompanying seasonings work really well with the fruitiness of the chilli – orange, star anise, ginger, apple juice, apple cider vinegar. I didn’t have apple juice at hand so I skipped it and used sugar and molasses for the sweetness. The orange comes through very nicely – I used fresh orange zest.
I don’t like kachumbar (basic Indian “salad” accompaniment of finely diced cucumber, tomato, and onion) so I went with Viet cabbage slaw and quick-pickled beets.
This would work well as a braise with pork shoulder / butt or country ribs too, and if using ribs again, I might leave them saucy another time and skip the frying / broiling at the end.
I’d really love to be your guest and try these, just I dislike Star Anise/and Five Spice.
You’d be very welcome! You could skip the star anise here and use garam masala, or any warm spices you like. The chilli itself is very flavorful, so if you have another flavorful chilli to substitute, you could probably skip the other spices too (chipotle might be very nice).
