In my backwards food world comfort takes two forms: pasta or Indian food. The pasta one is a no-brainer -- who can turn down a pan of gooey homemade macaroni and cheese under a buttered breadcrumb crust? -- but the Indian one is likely one of my idiosyncrasies. My family lived on the subcontinent for three of my adolescent years and we subsisted on dal bhat -- rice and lentils. It's a miraculous meal of sorts: one of the world's least expensive yet most nutritious food combinations, which locals eat (along with curried seasonal vegetables, tarkari) for both of their two daily meals, every day of the year. EVERY DAY! Forever! With meats like chicken or goat taken only on feast days. Now, I can eat pasta pretty well every dinner for a month and not get tired of it, but to sustain a nation of people on one basic meal for a lifetime makes dal bhat the World's Greatest in my estimation. And there is something so wonderfully satisfying about the combination of rice smothered with creamy, spicy cooked lentils; it has exactly the same filling qualities of a good tuna-noodle casserole or chicken pot pie.
It's not just Indian food; I recently read a great short piece by an American author extolling the same virtues of Mexican beans and rice (sorry, I'm mid-move and have already packed the anthology which contains the author's name). I should be less surprised that at least half the world is sustained by these comfort foods.
And did I mention how easy dal bhat is? These days I'm simmering a small potful of red lentils while I caramelize about 4 big, thinly sliced onions in the cast iron pan. Once the onions are sweet, deep golden and tender I add a big tablespoonful of Dean & Deluca's hot curry powder, a double-size pat of butter, a drizzle of honey and a load of salt. As soon as the onion mix-up goes into the lentil soup I clamp on the lid and let everything get to know each other. A scoop of sticky basmati goes into my favourite bowl, I dole out an enormous ladle of dal and then ...the magic happens. Add some Patak's hot lime pickle and eat with a cereal spoon.
Oddly, though, restaurant Indian usually doesn't cut it. There's too much heaviness from butter and cream in restaurant dals so you can't eat a whole giant bowl of it without nearly bursting and groaning the whole way home. I was excited to eat at and review Amaya, our city's best Indian restaurant, last week, because I know they are stingier with the ghee and fat, bit I still felt five feet wide when I left after an otherwise extraordinary meal.
But that's material for another day -- the restaurant "secret" of how to make everything taste better. Hint: it's fat.
It's not just Indian food; I recently read a great short piece by an American author extolling the same virtues of Mexican beans and rice (sorry, I'm mid-move and have already packed the anthology which contains the author's name). I should be less surprised that at least half the world is sustained by these comfort foods.
And did I mention how easy dal bhat is? These days I'm simmering a small potful of red lentils while I caramelize about 4 big, thinly sliced onions in the cast iron pan. Once the onions are sweet, deep golden and tender I add a big tablespoonful of Dean & Deluca's hot curry powder, a double-size pat of butter, a drizzle of honey and a load of salt. As soon as the onion mix-up goes into the lentil soup I clamp on the lid and let everything get to know each other. A scoop of sticky basmati goes into my favourite bowl, I dole out an enormous ladle of dal and then ...the magic happens. Add some Patak's hot lime pickle and eat with a cereal spoon.
Oddly, though, restaurant Indian usually doesn't cut it. There's too much heaviness from butter and cream in restaurant dals so you can't eat a whole giant bowl of it without nearly bursting and groaning the whole way home. I was excited to eat at and review Amaya, our city's best Indian restaurant, last week, because I know they are stingier with the ghee and fat, bit I still felt five feet wide when I left after an otherwise extraordinary meal.
But that's material for another day -- the restaurant "secret" of how to make everything taste better. Hint: it's fat.
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