Vietnam on My Plate: the Very First Experience

Since one of our friends is leaving Stuttgart, we had a get-together to say "Goodbye" to her.
The venue for the party was the garden in another friend,s house in Ehningen.
There I had my first Vietnam-food-experience.
The dish is called "tikaa": pork ribs with caramelised garlic.

A friend from Vietnma cooked it for us.
IT WAS REALLY VERY GOOD!

Kanchkolar Kofta Curry

Kanchkolar Kofta Curry --- Green Bannana Balls Curry / Gruenbannanebaellchen in bengallischer Sausse (pfewwwh --- translation, esskulturell unmoeglich!!)


Ingredients:
(For two servings)

Green banana – one
Potato – One medium
Cumin seeds – half a teaspoon
Coriander seeds (optional) – a pinch
Bay leaf – one big
Green chilly – one medium
Turmeric powder – half a teaspoon
Cumin powder – half a teaspoon
Red chilly powder (optional, if you want to make it really spicy)
Tomato – one small
Flour / besan (chickpea flour).
Sunflower oil (or mustard oil)
Ghee (optional)

Cook the green banana and potato until they are soft (completely cooked.)
Sauté finely chopped onion and shredded green chilly.

To make koftas:

Mash the banana and add salt, the sautéed onion and chilly, and a pinch of cumin powder to it.
Mix everything very well.
Make small balls of it.

Make the batter of flour/ besan.
Dip the balls into it and dip fry.
Now the koftas are ready. Keep them to one side.

To make the curry:
Peel and cut the potato into small cubes.
Add oil into the pan.
Add half a teaspoon cumin seeds, the bay leaf, torn into two pieces, into it.
Add potato. Sauté. As soon as the potatoes start becoming golden, add turmeric, a little cumin powder, cook for some time. Add tomato puree. Stir. Add salt. Stir. Add water and bring it to boil.
Add koftas. Simmer for a minute. Turn off the oven.
You can sprinkle a little ghee on top. But, this is optional.
You may not serve immediately. Let it stand for a few minutes. Let the koftas soak in the gravy.

Serve with hot steamed rice.

Shrimp and Potato in Mild Mustard Gravy

Bon Apettit to myself! This was my dinner tonight.


First I added shredded onion and half a green chilly to heated oil. As the onion turned golded I added the shrimps and potato and sauteed for some time. I added salt, turmeric powder, cumin powder and coriander powder a little and stirred from time to time, and then water to bring it to boil.
After the potatoes became softer I added mustard and a pinch of sugar and boiled untill the potato was completely cooked.

The word "mild" is important. All the spices, and especially mustard, if added more than required, will destroy the taste. On the other hand, when added only a little, will bring in the out-of-this-world flavour to the food.
Instead of mustard I can cook it with tomato, also. In that case, too, mild is the key-word. The quantity of tomato should not be so much that makes it taste sour.
I used olive oi, but traditionally it is cooked in cold-pressed virgin mustard oil.

I had it with steamed basmati rice.

Aubergine mit Hackfleisch und Kaese

Germany is world famous for its automobile industry. We associate tennis, music, many inventions and even Indology with Germany. Germany means Steffi Graf, Albert Einstein, Max Mueller, Grimm Brothers! But not many of us know that Germany has a very diverse and delightful food culture. Just like us, Germany not only has innummerable tasty recipes of her own but also open to taste and assimmilate food from any other region of the world. In the small local foodstand that is open only in the morning as a part of the local meatshop in my tiny village, I have tasted my tastiest Lasagna, freshly prepared in their kitchen early in the morning, like all their other dishes.
Today I picked minced meat Lasagne for breakfast and something new for lunch: Aubergine mit Hackfleisch und Kaese.

The half of a big aubergine with mixed minced meat and cheese melted in mouth. With leftover of last night's spinach, steak and cheese salad, it was a grand lunch in the late afternoon today. :)

Drinks and Some Tiny Bites on Saturday!

My friends decided to have a party on last Saturday! Everyone was supposed to bring drinks. But I do not have a taste for drinks, since I am very loyal to pure German Leitungswasser (tap water), other than which I very rarely drink milk or black tea, or sweet wine and nothing else. So, I cannot pick up drinks ruling out the possibility of a disastrous choice. I decided to make something that could accompany the drinks.
I made two types of pakoras: 1) Crispy with rice powder, and 2) soft and delicate with potato, carrot and green peas (which could be called vegetable-chop in my hometown.)

For a change, I cooked something completely vegetarian for a party!!!
And I have never seen a better utilisation of a bath-tub before. (LoL!)

Steak, Spinach and Cheese Salad

Even though the original ingredients for this dish includes raw baby spinach leaves and boiled beet root, I boiled spinach leaves thoroughly, since EHEC has proved itself fatal in this region and I did not add beet root since I do not like it booiled at all.I added a little black pepper while boiling the spinach. For the meat I have used mini steaks of turkey. For oil I used olive oil, as usual.

Looks like Schaschlik! :)

It was my pleasure that this was recieved well.
I made this for our barbecue evening!