L18 FLAVOURS SATURDAY, MARCH 20, 2010 ° WWW.LIVEMINT.COM
PHOTOGRAPHS
BY
SAMAR HALARNKAR
OUR DAILY BREAD
SAMAR HALARNKAR
The crackle and snap of memories
Oink, oink: (clockwise from left) The roast pork recipe is an old family favourite; marinate the pork with spices and other ingredients; make sure it gets a rich brown colour when you roast it on the stove. cooked, remove the cover and cook for 10 minutes so that the meat starts to brown. Take care not to burn it. If you want to hurry things, use a pressure cooker instead of an open pan.
A handeddown recipe, its details forgotten, leads to a fragrant weekend of porkie powder
Quick Fish with Porkie Powder Serves 2 Ingredients Kkg fish (I used singhada) 4-spice powder left over from the pork 1K large onions, sliced finely 1 small tetrapack tomato purée ¼ cup white-vine vinegar 1 tsp Konkan fish masala or red chilli powder 6 large garlic pods, crushed and chopped Salt to taste
W
hole spices are little voyages of discovery. Where they lead you depends on the course you chart for them. You can fry, roast, grind. You can use them whole. You can do a combination of these. I am partial to roasting and grinding. Roasting Indian spices usually liberates a heady, hidden fragrance, quite dissimilar to what you began with. “Wow, what’s that aroma?” is a question I am often asked when I’m roasting spices on my cast-iron chapatti pan. How do you know when to stop the roasting? Take them off the fire as soon as they crackle and pop, revealing their hidden selves to you in the process. I find magic in their heat-driven pop-snap-crackle routine, a release of heady flavours, a promise of the meal ahead. It makes me smile, and it makes me eager to cook—even on a day I don’t particularly feel like it. Last week, I didn’t really feel like cooking. I was hung-over, and I had woken up at 5am. The more I drink, the earlier I wake up. Don’t ask. I had made the wife’s tea, and I
was blearily hanging around the kitchen ruminating on my pounding head and empty fridge. There was some defrosted pork, but now what. When I don’t feel particularly creative, my kitchen-confidential diary is always available. I wanted something short, and the shortest recipe happened to be something listed as “Mummy’s Pork, Diwali spesh (special)”, entered on 28 October 2008. Clearly, we had stayed home that Diwali. The only problem was there were no proportions. I called my mother, but she couldn’t remember this particular recipe. Ah, that meant I could fool around. As usual, that heady aroma wafted through the house, wound itself around the wife’s senses and dragged her bleary eyed into the kitchen. So Mum’s old recipe got a fresh lease of life. The pork ended up tasting different from anything she
Local pleasures Bangalore and Mumbai now have their own markets for organic produce B Y P AVITRA J AYARAMAN & R ACHANA N AKRA ···························· assers-by strayed into Bangalore’s Vyasa International School on a recent Sunday morning, wondering why a school playground was playing host to something resembling a vegetable market. As it turned out, almost everybody who walked in bought something, observed members of the Navachetana Trust, a nonprofit group that works in the areas of art, environment and wellness. Navachetana organized the 3-hour market that has been christened Namma Santhe, or “our market”—and hopes to make it a monthly affair. Twenty stalls had on display fruits, vegetables, spices, dals, chutney powders, jams, juices and pickles. They were all locally produced, and much of it was organic. “The idea was to introduce the concept of a local market back to the big cities,” says Aliyeh Rizvi, programme manager, Navachetana Trust. So locally grown vegetables and fruits such as bananas, okra, tomatoes and coconuts were the mainstay. Rice and pulses were next on the most wanted list. While the Bangalore-based organic retailers were at the market, Rizvi is happy that farmers
P
from villages nearby came with fruits and vegetables too. These were almost sold out. Rizvi says the farmers need a designated space. “There were five farmers who lost their way despite the specific directions we gave. They were overwhelmed by the city and went back. That is indicative of how much we need a space where they can come and understand their consumers directly as opposed to selling to middlemen,” she says. In Mumbai, Kavita Mukhi is organizing the first farmers’ market on Sunday. Although she has
had made—clearly I had taken it down a new path. That’s the wonder of a good roasting. As it emerged, there appeared to be too much spice powder—helpfully labelled “porkie powder” by the wife who assigns labels to leftover powders I store in confusing, nameless little bottles. The next day was a Sunday, and as night fell on a cool Delhi spring day, I felt even lazier. So, I removed some quick-cooking fish and used the leftover porkie powder, uncertain of what might emerge. As it turned out, the fish was light, spicy and—if I may say so—a perfect way to end the weekend.
1 tsp mustard seeds 3 tsp coriander seeds 2 tsp cumin seeds 6 large garlic pods, crushed ½ cup red-wine vinegar 2 tsp ginger-garlic paste 2 large onions, sliced Salt to taste
Ingredients 1kg pork 10 dried red chillies
Method Roast red chillies, coriander and cumin seeds. Grind them to a powder—the aforementioned porkie powder—with the mustard seeds (if you want it spicier,
been working to arrange this for the last six months, she says that in some ways the process began 20 years ago when she set up a small store selling dry organic food in Malabar Hill. “It was the GM crop issue that motivated me to finally take this step. It makes me so angry. Besides (it) being unhealthy, farmers will become dependent on big corporations for their seeds,” says Mukhi, who started Conscious Food, a brand of organic foodstuff. “India is full of farmers who produce organi-
cally. The farmers’ market will give people access to them,” she says. There will be food items, organic candy floss for children and stalls for eco-friendly household items, recycled paper, among others. The farmers’ market in Bandra, Mumbai, is planned as a weekly affair, with all kinds of seasonal fruits, such as grapes, oranges, bananas and apples, and vegetables such as spinach, tomato, potato, onions and more. Megha Rawal, who is working
Mum’s Roast Pork Serves 4
Au naturel: A cart at the organic market at Bangalore’s Vyasa International School.
India is full of farmers who produce organically. The farmers’ market will give people access to them.
add a tsp of peppercorns to the grinder). Marinate the pork with the powdered spices (you won’t need all, keep aside 2-3 tsp), red-wine vinegar, ginger-garlic paste and salt. In a non-stick pan, heat 1-2 tbsp of olive oil. Sauté the garlic till brown. Add onions and sauté till deep pink. Add the marinated pork and sauté for 10 minutes. Cover pan and reduce heat till well cooked. This could take an hour. When the pork is
with Mukhi to organize the market, says, “The flavours (of organic food) are richer and more intense, not diluted because of all the chemicals.” Organic supplies available in supermarkets tend to be costlier but here, the prices will be on a par with those in regular markets since no middlemen or dealers are involved. With around 250 visitors, the turnout at the first market in Bangalore was not overwhelming, but it did have sellers hopeful of making converts out of supermarket shoppers. Like Subu Palamadai, a graphic designer and illustrator with a design firm, who heard of the market through friends. “I have been trying to go organic for a while and think it’s a good step,” says Palamadai, adding that the lifestyle change—in terms of taste, looks and availability—is a tough one to make. “The taste is different, and the vegetables don’t look as good as the modified stuff at supermarkets.” As he picks up a bag of unpolished rice and some pickles, he says it just takes getting used to. “The taste of vegetables, for example, is unpredictable (the taste tends to vary) and a lot like eating from your vegeta-
Method Marinate the fish with porkie powder, vinegar and salt for at least 2 hours. Heat 1-2 tbsp of olive oil in a non-stick pan. Sauté garlic till brown. Add onions and sauté till deep pink. Add 1 tsp of fish masala (I get mine from Nandgaon near Murud-Janjira on the Konkan coast; ordinary red chilli powder should work as well) and sauté well. Add tomato purée and toss. Add fish, reduce flame to low and cook through. This is a column on easy, inventive cooking from a male perspective. Samar Halarnkar writes a blog, Our Daily Bread, at Htblogs.com. He is editor-at-large, Hindustan Times. Write to Samar at ourdailybread@livemint.com
ble garden” he adds. But while Palamadai drove to the market from his home 5km away, around 60% of the crowd was from the area around the school. “We would like the community to be involved and spread the word around, just the way a locality market works. From the first market, we have a database of 250 people and I hope they will spread the word,” says Rizvi. Navachetana doesn’t want to use its limited funds to advertise in newspapers, so the project is entirely dependent on word of mouth and the leaflets they distribute a week earlier. In Mumbai, Mukhi is following the same principle. “We haven’t done any advertising, (are) just depending on word of mouth,” she says. Mukhi has also found a supporter in chef Vicky Ratnani who is designing a special organic menu for Aurus, a popular beachside restaurant in Juhu. “Since it is going to be a weekly market nearby, it makes it easy for us. I’ll design dishes depending on what’s available there,” he says. With time, Rizvi hopes, the farmers and retailers who own stores in the city will take the onus of organizing the market while the trust can look after the logistics: “This way we can look at more than one market in the city, so Bangaloreans, who seem so cocooned in their comfort, don’t have to drive across town.” pavitra.j@livemint.com
www.livemint.com HEMANT MISHRA/MINT
Every Monday, catch Cooking with Lounge, a video show with recipes from wellknown chefs, at www.livemint.com/cookingwithlounge