Indian As Apple Pie

Folks laugh when I tell them one of my favorite vegetables is squash. They often don't realize I mean the Indian Punjabi version. It's at once spicy, tart, and savory with touch of sweet. I first became obsessed with the heady flavors of this dish when cooking in our shared kitchens in Hale Manoa with my dear friend Mukta in Hawaii. While my mom made it growing up, this recipe tasted slightly different. I was a graduate student there living in the International dorms attached to the East West Center. Because we shared cooking space, I often felt that I...

Traditionally, vegetarian Indian meals have at least three components: a vegetable sabzi (stir-fry), lentils, and rice or bread. The idea behind this theme? That the lentils afford a vegetarian protein to help nutritionally balance out the meal.  I don't know about you, but most days I'm lucky to just get dinner on the table. I'm not always able to make sure we have that protein component in our meals even if we still want to eat a vegetarian diet. Why, I'm on a mission to taste test non-traditional ingredients in my recipes. Ingredients like quinoa, cashew cream, edamame, are known outside the...

  Growing up in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, my very Indian parents entertained a lot. It was more like they took their turn at hosting all of their Indian friends – people who became their family over time to act as a day-to-day surrogate to their blood relatives left thousands of miles away. A party, in our very North Indian home, meant fresh everything. Then, everything was made from scratch and made over the course of a few days versus the now typical call to catering. There were very few if any options on Indian catering back then, circa the...

One year when visiting India with my family, my dad took me to the hills in Punjab to a religious retreat. His family, especially my late grandfather, was known to make annual excursions to these remote, ascetic enclaves huddled in the cool mountainous regions of the northern state in India where I was born. There, prayer and meditation were a focus. But, as important to my grandfather, a hardcore foodie – were the meals. The food in what were essentially campsites, was something I have never eaten before in my life..nor likely will I ever eat again unless I go...

"So...If I eat this then do I get dessert?" asked Neha. "No. You have to eat everything. The rice - the yogurt AND the dal," I repeated. "Ohhhh. But I just took a taste of the dal and I don't like it," said Neha. "Right. But, I just heated up a second type of dal and I think you'll like that one." "I don't like that one either. So, if I eat just the rice and the yogurt can I have dessert?" Ahhhhhhhhhh....It's never ending. Trying to get Neha (6) to sit down and eat her meals. But, I'm determined....

I'm thinking about calling my upcoming cooking show 'frenzied chef' because that's how I typically feel in the kitchen. Frenzied. Rushed. Overwhelmed. Especially if I need to make more than one Indian dish. Tonight I've overcome all of my misgiving with my crockpot. Well, with my 4 crockpots. I've experimented in the last 24 hours with not only curried stews but now with dry sabzis. For anyone that has experience with Indian food - this is almost a revolution in cooking - to think that you can skip the whole tarka process (heating the onions/ginger/garlic and spices in hot oil)...