Cardamom

A fresh curry powder that is mildly hot and packs a flavorful punch compared to commercial blends, which may sit on store shelves for months past their prime. Stir into butter or mayonnaise and use to flavor rice, roasted potatoes, or fish.

Known as a festive, regal dish in India and Pakistan, biryani is packed with flavor. Don’t be scared off by the long list of ingredients. The dish really is quick and easy to prepare.

Sheila Malovany-Chevallier is a typical Parisian expat, one who lives a fascinating life. She and her husband, Bill, reside in a bohemian artist’s apartment in the Latin Quarter during the week, and in the countryside, near Dijon, on weekends. Spending her work time teaching English at the Institute d’Etudes Politiques, and doing a new translation of Simone de Beauvoir’s Second Sex, she would seem unlikely to have time to cook. But not only have she and her writing partner, Constance Borde, also an American living in Paris, written several American cookbooks in French, with all the Jewish recipes with which Sheila grew up, but when she is invited to dinner, she makes a point of bringing every hostess an elegantly packaged sweet she has made herself. These ginger cookie clusters are one of her and my favorites.

In India and Pakistan a very fine pasta, known as seviyan, is used for this quick pudding. Most grocers in the West sell it laid out in long, slim boxes, but in cities like Lahore you can find it in open markets—all exposed, in the shape of little nests of thin pasta piled up into a mountain. The pasta is broken up and lightly browned before it is cooked into a pudding. I find that angel-hair pasta, which often comes in the shape of nests, makes a very good substitute for seviyan, and that is what I have started to use. This pudding may be eaten hot, warm, or at room temperature. In Pakistan, it is known as sheer korma and in India as seviyan ki kheer. On a cold wintry day in North India or Pakistan there is nothing nicer than a warm version of this pudding. The nuts and raisins are optional. You may leave them out altogether and then, if you like, just sprinkle some chopped almonds or pistachios over the top.

This rice pudding is known as kheer in North India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, and eaten under different names throughout South Asia. It consists, in its basic version, of nothing more than milk, cardamom for flavor and aroma, rice, and sugar. In villages and towns, rice harvests are generally celebrated with a kheer. In some communities, new husbands and wives feed each other a spoonful of kheer during the final part of the wedding ritual. It may be served lukewarm, at room temperature, or cold. Because it is associated with celebration, expensive ingredients are often added, such as saffron, nuts, and dried fruit. Here is the basic version, the one I love the most; you may scatter a tablespoon of chopped pistachios over the top before serving.

What is required here is not a cream that one can go out and buy. This “cream” is really a kind of pudding or kheer, thickened by boiling milk down, not by adding starch to it. In order to take some of the labor out of the process, Indians have taken to adding condensed milk. This works very well indeed. This is a thinnish cream, ideal to serve with fruit. I put the cut-up fruit (mangoes, guavas, pears, peaches, and bananas are ideal, but I have used berries as well) in individual bowls, or in old-fashioned ice cream cups, and then pour the flavored cream over the top.

This is best made when good fresh mangoes are in season. When they are not, very good-quality canned pulp from India’s excellent Alphonso mangoes may be used instead. Most Indian grocers sell this.

Lemon grass is grown on the edges of the more precipitous slopes of Sri Lanka’s numerous tea gardens. Some of these plantations are visible from the front patio of Ena’s mountain bungalow. Lemon grass keeps insects away, and its long roots hold back the soil. I had this aromatic and festive dish in the museum-like home of Sri Lankan batik artist Ena de Silva, where it was served with dozens of curries and relishes. You may serve this at banquets and family meals alike. It goes well with coconut-milk-based curries, such as Kerala-Style Chicken Curry.

Lamb shanks make for some of the best braised meat. The bone and marrow enrich the sauce and the gelatinous nature of the meat nearest the bone gives it a silken texture. In India we braise shanks in dozens of ways. Muslim families sometimes eat the shanks for breakfast with all manner of flatbreads and raw onion relishes. You could serve them with rice as well, such as the Yellow Basmati Rice with Sesame Seeds.

This is a very popular dish in Delhi, where it is made with bone-in cubes of goat meat. I generally make it with lamb. I like to serve this with Indian flatbreads. Store-bought pita bread or tortillas would be good too. A vegetable and a legume should be included at dinnertime.

Bhuna means “browned”—actually, the process of browning. So in this dish the meat has a browned look to it, and whatever sauce there is, it is thick and clings to the meat. This is a family recipe that comes via my niece, Abha. If you like, two slit hot green chilies may be added at the same time as the cilantro, just before the final stir. I like to eat this with Indian flatbreads (pita or other store-bought flatbreads may be substituted) as well as Potato and Pea Curry. You could also serve it with rice.

Dumpukht is a style of cooking that was made very popular in India in the Moghul courts starting around the sixteenth century. Meat or rice dishes were semiprepared or, in the case of meats, they were thoroughly marinated, and then put in a pot with a lid that was sealed shut with dough. The pot was placed on lightly smoldering embers. Some embers were also placed on the top of the lid, thus forming a kind of slow-cooking oven. When the dough seal was cracked and the lid removed, the aroma of the spices left the guests oohing and aahing. This cooking style is still very popular in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. This is a royal-style dish, rich with almonds and saffron, which are native to Kashmir, and yet it is quite light. The recipe may easily be doubled. For a festive meal, also serve Eggplants in a North-South Sesame/Peanut Sauce, and a rice dish.

A gentle, family-style curry. If you leave out the cayenne pepper, this may even be served to small children, along with rice and perhaps Corn with Aromatic Seasonings.

I had this dish in Bangladesh and thought it was exquisite. It seemed to have come straight from the palaces of seventeenth-century Moghul rulers. It was a true korma, a stew cooked in yogurt, mild but exquisitely seasoned, and without any brown, yellow, or red spices to mar its pallor. There were some New World sliced green chilies scattered over the top, but they seemed a later addition. I have put them in—but even without them, the flavors are beyond compare. Of course, it helps to get a good-quality organic chicken. Have your butcher skin it and cut it into small serving pieces for you. In Bangladesh, this chicken was cooked in ghee (clarified butter, page 286). I generally cook in oil. I like to use a good sour yogurt here, such as the acidophilus yogurt I get from the health-food store. If you cannot get that, just add 1 tablespoon lemon juice to the ordinary supermarket yogurt. Serve this with rice or flatbreads or even in a Western way with potatoes and a vegetable.

Here is a soup that I had in Pakistan’s most famous northwestern city, Peshawar. Many of the grander Muslim families, in both India and Pakistan, offer some form of aab gosht, or meat broth, at the start of a meal. Sometimes it comes in cups even before one is seated and requires just sipping. This is a variation of that and requires a spoon. What I was offered on a rather cold day was a steaming bowl of well-seasoned goat broth in which floated oyster mushrooms and slices of river fish. It was so delicious that I decided to come up with a version myself. I have used beef stock, though lamb stock would do as well. If you cannot get fresh oyster mushrooms, use the canned ones, sold by all Chinese grocers, or canned straw mushrooms. Just drain them and rinse them out.

Almonds are considered brain food in India. They were always given to us in the morning, especially before exams, after they had been soaked overnight and then peeled. Each one of us got seven almonds—don’t ask me why. So here is a delicious, lightly perfumed morning dose for two people. The soaking makes them taste a bit like green almonds. The perfume is an added bonus. You may serve them with drinks. I often offer dinner guests a few of these almonds just before I serve dessert and coffee.

A friend described the flavors of a pudding she tasted in an Iranian restaurant, and I applied them to the classic crème caramel. It is magnificent.

A curious gelatinous relish with a slightly bitter flavor is made with fenugreek seeds. It is an acquired taste that can become addictive. Eat it with bread to dip in. The flat square yellow-brown seeds need to be crushed or ground, so it is best to buy the fenugreek in powder form. It needs to be soaked to remove some of the bitterness and to develop the gelatinous texture.

One trick that I learned a long time ago about cooking pork is that you have to brine it. The brine for this recipe is a sugar-salt solution mixed with apple juice concentrate (you will need 2 cans of frozen juice) for the brine and spiced apples. With its sweet apple flavor, this is an intense marinade that works miracles on pork chops. Trust me—once you taste a thick pork chop that’s been flavored in a brine, you will never go back. Cozy up to your butcher to get the pork chops cut to your liking. Thin pork chops—no way! Serve this with Corn Pudding (page 236).

These are shaped rather than rolled cookies. To shape even-sized cookies it is helpful to use a #40 ice cream scoop that measures exactly 1 tablespoon of dough. Arrange the oven racks so they are evenly spaced. This works best for most cookies and multiple pans will bake evenly at the same time.

This is a special bread/cake that Danes like to make for the holiday season. It’s a quick version of flaky Danish pastry.

This variation on the traditional Indian beverage is like a frosty cold, bright ginger beer. Cardamom gives the drink a floral undertone, and tart lime juice and sea salt add refreshing balance.