Posted by Wan Yan Ling, October 15, 2007 at 5:00 PM
The Grocery Ninja leaves no aisle unexplored, no jar unopened, no produce untasted. Creep along with her below, and read her past market missions here.
So I've been peeking into other grad students' offices and using this column as a way to not look like the resident moocher. (You know, the guy who wanders around the office cadging a fistful of chips here, a cookie there, and when you ask him why he doesn't keep food in his own cubby, his response is always to pat his tummy and say: "Oh, I couldn't... I'd polish it off in seconds!" before reaching around you for an extra caramel.)
Anyway, a new discovery I've made: The leverage you get when you've got a professional-looking SLR on your arm is considerable. It's like, "Oh, look at your spiffy camera! I see you are on a quest to further the bounds of human knowledge. Here, try this x-y-z I traded a monk my GPS in Timbuktu for, carted back via camel, and smuggled through customs!"
Anyway. The one thing grad students, especially international grad students, can always be counted on is to have food in their office. And it doesn't matter how busy they look, they're always happy to talk about food from home.
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Posted by Lia Bulaong, April 25, 2007 at 9:15 AM
The Guardian's Julie Bindel talks to Camellia Panjabi, the restaurateur responsible for popularizing both regional Indian cooking to the UK as well as Szechuan and Thai food in India, about her long career in the food industry. Her seminal cookbook 50 Great Curries of India, first published in 1995, has just sold its millionth copy:
"The story of the book is a fascinating one," says Panjabi. "I had tried to introduce proper regional Indian food to the hotels, but I was told, 'No one will order them.' I was convinced they would, and put real Indian dishes on the menu rather than meat swamped in curry sauce. But they didn't order them. I decided that I had to educate the public about real food before experimenting." So she began research for her book. "I tried all the top publishers in the country, and all of them said there was no market," she says. Did she ever lose faith? "Never," she insists. She guessed the book would appeal to both men and women but in different ways. "I knew curry-making was a macho thing men would want to do at the weekend," she says, whereas, "Women were hesitant to cook curry for dinner parties, as they did not want to get saddled with something they could not do."
Panjabi's first London restaurant, Bombay Brasserie, has been open since 1982; one of her five other London restaurants, Amaya, recently received a Michelin Star.
Posted by Lia Bulaong, April 13, 2007 at 10:00 AM
Delhi will be hosting the Commonwealth Games in 2010 and in preparation for the grand event, the Indian Government is trying to modernise the capital (and get rid of Delhi Belly) by shutting down the 300,000 food stalls that are ubiquitous on its streets. Why is this considered such a tragedy in the making?
On a teeming street corner in Chandni Chowk market, in Delhi, Dipankar Das deftly flips a paratha on to a metal plate and piles it high with steaming vegetable curry.
Next to him, another street vendor stirs a giant pan of succulent jalebi — bright orange, pretzel-shaped morsels of batter soaked in syrup.
For thousands of years, food stalls such as these have been an integral part of life in Delhi, serving hot, nutritious, cheap snacks that many consider to be the only authentic Indian cuisine.
Anyone who's ever been to Asia knows that street food is the easiest way for a traveller to get acquainted with a country's authentic cuisine because it's not gussied up for tourists, it's what the locals actually eat, day in and day out. Delhi without its stalls would be a sad sight indeed. [via The Morning News]
Posted by Lia Bulaong, April 11, 2007 at 1:45 PM
Janet Fletcher of the SF Chronicle got seriously obsessed with coconuts after vacationing in South India, where almost every dish she ate contained fresh grated coconut or coconut milk. She says, "For years, I have passed fresh coconuts by, not sure even how to crack one open or what to do with it if I did. But with the help of some local experts, I'm making up for lost time."
High in saturated fat, nutritionists have been warning us off of coconuts for years—the University of California's even says it has "has no redeeming vitamin or mineral assets". But, she says, "Malaysians, Thais, Indians and Indonesians -- all major coconut eaters -- don't even come close to our rate of obesity, and Americans are far more likely to die of heart disease than Malaysians or Thais are. If coconut were really so deadly, [her friend David] King suggests, wouldn't these people be sicker than we are?" And anyway, coconuts are known to raise HDL, a.k.a. the good kind of cholesterol, more than other kinds of fats so it's worth another look. In the meantime, let's eat it! Fletcher includes four recipes at the end of her piece, including one for Green Curry Chicken, one of my very favorite things to eat in the summer. The curry has a lot of ingredients, but comes out very delicate but decidedly spicy; it's a great introduction for people who haven't had a lot of Indian or Southeast Asian food, or who are hesitant to eat coconut in a savoury dish.
Posted by Lia Bulaong, March 6, 2007 at 9:25 AM
"Britain is now as cuisine-obsessed as anywhere. Chefs are big stars. Food has become a facet of fashionable style in England. So where does this leave the traditional Indian restaurant, with its menu of rich, variously colored curries that come in mild, medium and hot, usually with a film of oil swimming on top, and its clientele that swells after 11 p.m. when the pubs close?" Henry Shukman of the NY Times visits five of London's best high-end Indian restaurants, three of which have Michelin stars.
Posted by Lia Bulaong, January 30, 2007 at 3:35 PM
Tikka in No Time: "Food manufacturers and even local grocers are now tempting people to cook easy Indian—a concept that once was oxymoronic—through the use of time-saving products."
Posted by Adam Roberts, January 2, 2007 at 6:00 AM
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