Saturday Afternoon Indian Inspirations

This past Saturday I used my knowledge of Indian sub-continent fare to make a little something, actually a big something considering I used some of our farm delivery vegetables. I think I can explain about how to make it in every home. The food is delicious and healthy.

Here's a little list of the things needed, nothing that should be too exotic:
1onion, diced;
1 tbsp cumin seed;
1/4 cup diced jalapeno;
1/4 cup sliced cilantro stems;
1/8 cup minced garlic;
1/8 cup minced ginger;
tiny pinch of tumeric;
tomato sauce (I'll explain a little about this in a second).

That's all you need if you want a really good base for meats or vegetable. Tumeric might be the only truly exotic thing there. You only need a tiny amount for any dish it asks for; it's the spice the turns everything neon yellow/orange/heading to green.

Don't be too concerned about the volumes of jalapeno and cilantro, and garlic and ginger, just that they are in a 1:1 ratio with each other and a 2:1 ratio of green to white.

The tomato sauce I speak about originally, in true Indian food, would be a healthy sized can of stewed whole tomatoes that you need to grate over a grater. I done that; I've also used cans of tomato sauce, cans of crushed tomatoes, and on this day, I used the remnants of a bottle of bloody-mary mix that a bar owner down the street had given to me.

Here's how the steps work:

Heat the oil and drop in the cumin seeds. They'll start to sizzle, and you should let them toast. Don't burn them. Add the onions, and you're kitchen will smell awesome.

Let that go until the onion becomes translucent, then add the diced jalapeno and cilantro stems.

Once those soften up, add the garlic and ginger. Now everything really starts to smell great.

After that starts to get aromatic, about a few minutes of letting it go, add the tumeric and other curry powders, if you have them. We still have some really hot powder that was given to us as a gift.

Then the tomato sauce goes in. Now you have a really good base for meat or vegetables, or both. On this day I went with both.

Here is the diced chicken I added. This smelled so good at this point...

Then I added the vegetables. I started to get nervous because it didn't look like there was enough vegetables. I used a little of everything from the farm stuff, and it proved more voluminous than I would have thought.

All was fine in the end, of course, as the vegetables release their water. Here's the finished product, after about fifteen or twenty minutes of simmering.

Serve it over rice and you have a nice balanced meal. It, like a casserole, gets better as the days go on, and it's just as good the next day.

That base--the cumin, onion, pepper/cilantro, garlic/ginger, tumeric and tomato--is so delicious and easy and healthy, that it can make nearly anything into a tasty exotic alternative.