Rice on Kitchen3N

Easy Fried Rice

Mon, 10 Mar 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Ever since I started cooking for myself, my taste for takeout has rapidly declined (pizza and sushi exempt). Take chinese takeout for example: when I was a kid, it was the ultimate treat. My Friday lunch if I used my allowance wisely. I’m not sure what you know about Bengali moms, but they are pretty militant in their meal regiment. Rice, vegetable saute/bhorta, some kind of protein curried, and daal. That is what you have for dinner, every night. Without fail. Every bengali kid who grew up here knows the struggle to have something different on the table (first world problems, I know). And the retorts that follow: “Eh? Pizza? How is that any kind of food? What with all that cheese…and they wonder why American kids are so fat!”. This is usually said as one or more uncles are stuffing their faces with beef or goat curry and are working away at a Mt Everest sized mound of rice on their plate.

Rice Pilaf (Palau)

Mon, 25 Nov 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Begin rant: I’ve got social media fatigue. I even convinced myself at one point that it was a productive use of my time, because wasn’t I mainly reading news articles and stuff? Recently, that answer became a glaring NO. Buzzfeed compilations, vine videos, 20 ways to know you’re from this city or that farm or truly ghetto. And my feed is just filled with shares of blog posts from self declared intellectuals who think they have such pearls of wisdom. I learn more from my moments of quiet reflection, when I’m running or washing dishes, than I have after reading a dozen of said articles. The handful of books I’ve read on marriage and relationships have given me important tools - many of which I’ve seen recycled time and again in those pieces. I can probably count on one hand articles of merit I’ve found through social media: Anne-Marie Slaughter’s famous article Why Women Still Can’t Have It All, NY Times’ The ‘Busy’ Trap, Nicholas Carr’s How the Internet is Making us Stupid, and The Extraordinary Science of Junk Food. So, my resolution is this: read more books. Reflect more. Check-in less. With this as an exception. End rant. On to the food. I know a lot of my (handful) of readers are on their own for the first time, either newly married, or going to med school (ok, that probably covers all of my readers). That’s why it’s important for me to cover all the bases of Bengali cuisine. And this rice pilaf (palau) is the quintessential dish for entertaining. Any time you have company, the main decision you have to make is: biryani or palau + curries? Plain rice isn’t considered special enough, even though some of the best meals I’ve had consisted of plain rice, served with a plethora of spicy/tangy bhortas, curries and daal. Actually, ask any Bengali and they will probably prefer the homey meals to these elevated, reserved-for-guests spreads.Even apart from the traditional spread, this pilaf would make a fine accompaniment to any roast poultry dish. Which is why I was eager to share it with you in advance of Thanksgiving, in hopes that you might give it a try in lieu of your usual rice or carb. Onions get caramelized and lend a sweet component. Toasted rice and browned butter give it depth. The whole thing gets hit with a wonderful concoction of aromatics: garlic, ginger, cardamom, cinnamon and bay leaf, providing the warmth and flavor. And the whole thing comes together pretty quickly, as long as you let the rice soak in some water while you get the onions going. The peas are optional, and often not included in Bengali rice pilafs (more common in North Indian cuisine). But I like to add them in to convince myself I’m feeding the kids something healthy. I served this alongside another classic for-entertaining-only dish: chicken korma, a sweet and savory chicken cooked in a curry/cream sauce, and spicy shrimp bhuna. And of course, salad! You definitely need a side salad to cut the richness. Followed by ice cream sundaes with homemade hot fudge (the recipe for that coming soon!). Pretty darn good if I do say so myself.

Khichuri (Rice and Mung Bean pilaf)

Mon, 06 May 2013 00:00:00 +0000

For Bengalis, rain does not mean good books, cozy blankets or hunter boots. Nor does snow signal hot chocolate, snowmen or shoveling. No, for Bengalis, any sort of precipitation means only one thing: khichuri. Growing up, I always noticed, though never understood why on any overcast, slightly cool day, the first thing my dad would request was khichuri. I’d think to myself, in the usual teenage overly dramatic Holden Caulfield voice: Khichuri is just rice and daal cooked together…WHAT is the big deal? So, like Peter in The Snowy Day (can you tell I’ve been reading a lot of big and little people classics?), I thought and thought and thought about it.

South Asian rice pudding (Kheer)

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Apologies for dragging him into yet another one of my posts, but I’ll do it anyway. One of the many things my dear husband and I bond over is our mutual disdain for South Asian sweets. It seems they’re all permutations of milk products or by products, overly sweetened and offering little by way of depth of flavor (think: golap jam, rosh golla, malai kari and so on). We have, however, a few exceptions: sweet doi (yogurt), rosh malai and my Rahima Aunty’s kheer.