Experimenting with spices

How do you get a kid to eat spicy food? I often get asked this question. Perhaps it’s because we are Indian. The answer is to define what is spicy food. Chilli powder is not the only spice used in Indian food. We have been introducing hospo baby to spices since she was a baby. We would put cinnamon in her apple puree, cardamom in her pumpkin mash. Turmeric is a natural antiseptic, a pinch added to her milk bottle helps heal any infections.

I don’t cook as much Indian food as I would like at home, being married to a chef means eating dinner together at odd hours, usually after midnight. Eating a curry is just not appetizing or easy to digest that late at night. We reserve satiating our craving for curry to the weekends. Usually we order takeaways from Little India but when we found Cinnamon room in Parnell we quit the comforts of home to enjoy Indian food there, because it is as close as it can come to actually eating in India. They have “fulkas” on the menu, soft indian bread made out of unleavened flour, this is hospo baby’s favourite, she dips it into her lamb saagwala quite happily. 

Last weekend we tried iVillage, Cinnamon room’s sister restaurant in the newly refurbished Victoria Park. It did not disappoint either, the curries reflected depth of flavours and perfectly balanced spices. The owners found out that it was hospobaby’s birthday recently and made “kheer” rice pudding for her and a chocolate naan bread topped with 100’s and 1000’s. Sid and I have tried numerous cowboy Indian places, ones with creamy and sweet butter chicken or others who promise to deliver “Indian street food Tapas” and fail miserably.

I am now over cautious about spending money trying new Indian restaurants and stick to the tried and tested.

Curries are not the only form of Indian food, you can add Indian spices to your everyday meals. Rub some steak with curry powder and a dash of garam masala sear and serve with mint yogurt. Zoya loves chicken tikka salad, I rub some Patak’s chicken tikka paste, salt and pepper over chicken breasts and cook it in a pan, slice it and serve it with yogurt and mango chutney. I add baby spinach and carrots for us to make it a carb free meal. Hospo baby also loves peas, this maybe my mother’s doing. She has passed on this simple recipe for peas and yogurt, which I hope you will try no matter what your age.

Hospobaby’s favourite Indian-spiced yogurt and peas.

1 cup of fresh/frozen peas

1 teaspoon of cumin seeds

1 teaspoon of coriander seeds

1 teaspoon chilli powder

½ teaspoon turmeric powder

1-teaspoon coriander powder

1 clove of garlic

½ an onion finely chopped

½ cup of unsweetened plain yogurt

Salt to taste

1.     Heat a teaspoon of oil in a pan and add the cumin and coriander seeds. Let them crackle.

2.     Crush the garlic and add it to the pan with the chopped onions

3.     Now add all the spices and salt and sauté for 2 minutes, if the spices start to stick to the pan add a bit of water to loosen it up.

4.     Add the peas and mix everything together. Sauté for another 3-4 minutes until the peas soften.

5.     Take the pan of the heat. Beat the yogurt and add it to the pan. If you add the yogurt while the pan is on the hob it will split. The yogurt should form a sauce for the peas, you can add as much as you like to adjust the intensity of the spices. Serve immediately with basmati rice or rotis.

Hospobaby tip: try wholemeal frozen Kawan roti’s available at your local New World or at any Indian grocers; it is a much healthier alternative to naan breads.