Flavours Of India

An archetypal Bengali considers food an important aspect of daily life. That’s why you will find Bengali food full of variety and having the essence of freshness and experimentation to make them better and best. Fish, Meat, Mix Vegetables, Sweet dishes and other food items are debated and discussed well among Bengali intellectuals. The housewives and cooks of Bengali recipes spend enormous time in their kitchens to prepare delicious dishes. The Bengali recipes are known for their variety. They make perfect combination of all types of vegetables, leafy green vegetables, some raw fruits like raw mango, raw papaya, and dry fruits to prepare different types of recipes.

What again differentiates Bengali recipes from other recipes in India is their extensive use of mustard oil for cooking. Health wise mustard oil is also a good oil to cook and it adds a different kind of flavor to the food cooked. The use of spices too differs, that is they use the same spices which are used throughout India, but their application is different. The specialty of all types of Bengali cooking lies in the use of a particular mixture of spices called Panchphoron, a mixture of five spices – zeea, saunf, fenugreek, mustard seeds, and kalaunji. They also mix some sweet flavors in some recipes for incredible taste and color. Sugar added to mutton recipes or chicken recipes of Bengali provides a very good color to the gravy.

The staple diet of any Bengali is rice, sabji, dal and fish. They prepare different types of fish recipes to relish with rice. A discrete flavor is instructed to the fishes by frying them in mustard oil. They fry the fishes deep brown till they become something crunchy.  Then they cook the fishes in gravy. Whatever you eat, the typical Bengali dishes end with sweets – either misti dahi or rasogolla.

If you ever go into a Bengali market, you will find the fish market crowded with different types of fishes and sea food like – carp, hilsa, salmon, rohu, bhekti, magur, prawns, koi, lataya, singe and other types of nutritious and delicious fishes.

Here is a recipe:

Bengali Style Mutton Dry

You would require:
500 gm mutton for 4 servings, minced garlic cloves, 2 onions finely chopped and blended with garlic and ginger in a blender, turmeric powder, chilly powder, garam masala, meat masala, 1 cup curd, 2 bay leaves, 1 cup mustard oil, salt to taste, and tomato finely mashed.

Before you start the dry mutton recipe, put the mutton into a pressure cooker cutting them into bite pieces and put over the flame till you hear 7-8 whistles. Now put the pressure aside. Take the pan and heat the oil and sauté the mixture of onion-garlic-ginger till the color turns brownish. Add the mashed tomato and sauté in low steam for 2-3 mnutes. Now add all the types of masalas and sauté for another 2 minutes. Add little water to it and sauté for 1 minute. Open the cooker and add the mutton on the frying pan. Add salt of required amount. Add little water and mix them well with the mutton. Cover it and cook for 10 minutes in medium steam. The mutton dry is ready to be served with sauce or toasted bun.

Life without sweetness is boring. Sweets have always been the integral part of Indian cuisine. Perhaps no where in the world you would come across such a variety of sweets that are predominantly available in every nook and corner of the market streets in India. Along with chat-patas the sweet is another favorite item for evening snacks as well as after meal servings. The sweet dishes are different from Western dishes in the sense they are prepared never with the concept of calorie but taste and richness. They aid in digestion and are normally consumed after taking a good meal.

An Indian meal almost remains incomplete without the sweet dishes. Here are few recipes of popular Indian sweets which are available in all corners of the country.

Khir

Ingredients you would require:
milk 2 liters, 4 tablespoon of sugar, 200 gm of pure basmati rice, few raisins, dry fruits, sliced almonds, chopped cahew nuts, a little bit of permitted color if required and bay leaves.

Heat the milk in a large pan and simmer it till it reduces to 3 quarters of its original volume. Now add the rice on it and let it get cooked for 10 minutes. The milk volume will be now reduced to half. Add sugar and heat for 1 minute. It is time to add the bay leaves, raisins, cashew nuts, almonds and dry fruits. Keep stirring while you put the ingredients in the khir. Cook for another 3-4 minutes. The khir is ready. But don’t serve it hot. Khir is usually served when it is cold and the taste of cold khir is very captivating after a good meal.

Rosogulla

Ingredients you would require:
1 kg of cottage cheese, sugar 1 kg, water 1 ½ liters, ghee 5 tablespoons, semolina 2 tbsp, standard-flour 2 tbsp, rose water few drops and cardamom powder. Sometimes permitted color and flavors are also used.

How to Prepare Rosogulla?

Pour the water in a deep pan and add sugar. Boil the mixture for 20-30 minutes till the volume is reduced to ¾.  Put aside the syrup prepared. Now it is time to prepare the rosogulla balls. Take a mid size bowl which can hold the cottage cheese. Add the cottage cheese to ghee, standard flour, semolina, and cardamom powder. Mix the entire ingredients together fine that they form dough. It must be soft enough to make the balls. Knead the prepared dough evenly until your palm becomes oily.

Now you can make the balls of rosogolla using the dough. Make the balls not less than 1 ½ inches of diameter. Add the prepared balls in the sugar syrup and get them cooked again for another 20-30 minutes. Now you will notice the balls turning spongy. Put off the flame and let it cool. After 15 minutes you should add the rose water to it. The rosogullas are ready to be served after one hour.