Thursday, September 06, 2012

Ma-in-law's Robibarer Mangshor Jhol -- Bengali Mutton Curry

Pathar Mangshor Jhol, Bengali Mutton Curry
Robibarer Pathar Mangshor Jhol - Bengali Mutton Curry

Sunday Bengali Mutton Curry | Robibar er Mangshor Jhol

This quintessential Bengali Mutton Curry is synonymous to Sunday lunch. This recipe of mutton curry or panthar manghso is from my Mother-in-law and has a thinner curry or jhol than my Mother's. Mixed with rice and some salad it is a very flavorful meal


Bengali Mutton Curry (Panthar Mangshor Jhol)

Goat Meat Curry in the Oven

This post is not about clouds.

It is about Manghsor Jhol -- Mutton Curry. The Sunday one. The Bengali home staple that has reached a mythical proportion simply by virtue of us bragging about it. And Robibarer Manghsor Jhol does give us bragging rights, the whole gamut of it. We have nostalgia woven with it.

Bengali Mutton Curry, Pathar Mangshor Jhol, Sunday Mutton Curry

Bengali Mutton Curry


But I have written paeans about it in my earlier posts so today I will talk about clouds instead.

Not that I know much about them. The only times I actually watch clouds is when I am stuck in traffic or more specifically when I am stuck in traffic with two kids in the back seat. Also when there is no traffic but a never ending road and two kids in the back seat, I often suggest that they watch clouds. Somehow it makes me feel like a very free spirited kind of Mother, the one who makes blueberry jam and then spreads it thick on coarse rye bread handing them over to her children who play in the meadows by brambles and thistles.

Sadly I am not that kind. I have never made blueberry jam and my kids refuse rye bread. And we will not even discuss brambles. But I digress.

So anyway this random "cloud watching" thing inspired a desire in Little Sis to spend an entire afternoon watching clouds and nothing but clouds. And she wanted it to be done in a proper setting. Not from cars. Lying down on a sleeping bag(no grass mind you)  set out in the deck on some balmy summer afternoon, LS wanted to watch them clouds.

Amazingly two summer months almost passed us by and we never got a chance to do that! So when summer was drawing to a close, I grabbed a late afternoon with a good measure of clouds and we watched. No proper setting, no sleeping bag, not even grass. While BigSis was attending one of her classes we sat on the ledge by the sidewalk outside her class and watched.



"Wow. Doesn't that one look like a teddy bear?", I said trying to be at my excited best.

"No. It looks like a monster", said LS.



"Now that one is like a cute little doggy", I said all cloying and sweet.

LS who was now more interested in the rocks on the sidewalk than any cloud, glanced and said  "Nope. It looks like a big dragon".



"Come on. This one surely is like a magic fairy's hair", I blurted out trying to salvage a sweet cloud watch moment.

"Oita dushtu lok er moton lagche (That one looks like a mean person)", concluded LS.

And with that we closed our "cloud watch' chapter and concentrated on rock tricks,

*********
Okay and before I go onto the mutton curry, I have to tell you this. Soon after turning four, LS seems to have discovered the words "girlish" and "boyish". I have no clue where she got them from but she has been scattering her conversations with those words.

Today hearing her Dad's voice over the phone, she declared "Baba sounded very girl-ish on the phone. Maybe he drank too much pink lemonade"

*********
MILMangsho1


Back to the mutton curry now which is my Ma-in-law's recipe this time. Her Sunday Mutton curry recipe is different from my Mother's Sunday mutton curry recipe and yet they largely taste the same with finer points to be debated on. The mother-in-law's recipe involves marinating the mutton with  mustard oil, all the spices, tomato, onion, garlic and ginger that makes the curry. If you can manage to do this single step of detailed marination, the night before, the actual cooking happens very fast the next day.

Easy Bengali Mutton Curry Recipe, Robibar er Manhshor Jhol


Now on days when you are rushing and a simple mutton curry will do you can side-step the "kashano" or "bhuno" part of this recipe and directly make the jhol in the Pressure cooker. That jhol is a bit runny and akin to something that the famous author Syed Mujtaba Ali would refer to as "Bangali'r Mangshor Maacher Jhol" which means a Mutton Curry which is as runny as plain as an everyday fish curry.

If you spend 30 mins of your time in "kashano",then the same mutton curry becomes richer and more regal looking. Take your pick and have a lovely Sunday lunch of Mutton curry and rice. Oh yes, do cook the rice in the same pressure cooker with remnants of the mutton gravy to flavor it and little ghee. My daughters love that rice as much as the curry.

MILMangsho5_pic



Ma-in-Law's Sunday Mutton Curry



Wash and clean 2lb of goat meat.

Make a paste of following
2 cups of chopped red onion
6 fat clove of garlic(12 regular)
2" of ginger peeled and chopped

Roughly pound 5-6 hot Indin green chili.

Chop 1 medium sized tomato. If the tomatoes are the tough. commercial kind just puree them or get a better tomato.

Chop 3 potatoes in half

In a bowl marinate the meat with
onion+garlic+ginger  paste
the tomato
1 tbsp Cumin Powder (sometimes I replace this with Meat Masala for a richer taste)
1 tsp Red Chili Powder or Kashmiri Mirch
1 tsp Turmeric powder
2 tsp Mustard Oil
1-2 tbsp yogurt
salt to taste
Ideally overnight marination is good but even 3-4 hours works well.

Half an hour before cooking toss the pottaoes along with the meat in the marinade.

When you are ready to cook, get your pressure cooker. If you don't have one, do not panic, we can also do it in a regular heavy bottomed pan, only it will take longer.

Heat about 2tbsp Mustard Oil in the cooker. Add a tsp of sugar and caramelize it.

Next temper the oil with
4 Green Cardamom/Elaichi
4 Clove/Laung
1 Bay leaf/TejPatta
a 2" stick of cinnamon

Once the oil is flavored add the marinated mutton and the potatoes. Add the pounded green chilies.

Mix everything well together and let it cook for some time. Stir intermittently so that the meat does not stick to the bottom of the cooker. The meat will also release some water. Wait for the water to almost dry up and for the meat to change color.

For a richer version of this curry, the meat is kasha-oed for about 25-20 minutes till you see the oil surfacing. But in my Ma-in-law's everyday version, we do not wait for the oil to surface. Once the meat has changed color and no longer looks raw, we give a good stir, and add enough water so that the meat pieces are submerged. Then I adjust for salt and spices and close the Pressure Cooker lid.

Once the Cooker starts going "Phissssssshhh", I wait for about 8 minutes or so and then switch off. I have a Futura cooker and it does not whistle so I am not sure of the number of whistles.

Make a wet paste of
2 green cardamom
2 clove
small stick of cinnamon
in a mortar-pestle
Once the pressure has been released, open lid and add this fresh garam masala paste(kaaNcha garam mashla bata) along with little ghee. Close the lid again and open only at time of serving. Thanks UshnishDa for this tip.



Test

51 comments:

  1. Bookmarking this for Sunday meal,..even I love to eat mutton curry specially on Sunday or biryani,,,l

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    Replies
    1. Thanks. Yes this one is simple and easy but tastes best with goat meat

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  2. I loved the pink lemonade bit the best :)

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  3. thank u , i do something little different ...learnt from my granma of course i.e. instead of adding kaancha garam masala and ghee i drop couple of methi seeds now one should not sprinkle loads but as per the quantity b'coz it will taste bitter. And believe it it gives altogether a very different and lovely aroma with methi seeds .:)

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    1. Just methi seeds to the jhol ? Or should I add during phoron ?

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    2. not as foron.. but when it all cooked sprinkle few and once again cover it .. serve it when your about to eat.. the aroma is pretty different.. am sure you will like it... :)

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  4. Sandeepa, my son has a school project - monsoon, where the teacher asked moms to make the backdrop... black clouds, rain etc.... tor chobi gulo theke direct copy kore debo akash ta. thks. u know m son stopped entering ladies dressing room while swimming. now i sit idle and he goes to gents changing room of his own. good na? nxt mutton curry banale ei recipe ta follow kore dekhbo.

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    1. Arre meghla akash aro sundor. Tobe chaile bolish, aro cloud watching kore chobi pathabo. Amar mutton curry khub kom hoy, ei summer er chuti te besh kodin holo.

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    2. Patha patha, I m so fond of ur photography :)

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  5. Luscious mutton curry.......dekhlei jive jol esche jay.

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    1. Thank You. Mangshor jhol dekhle Bangali ki ar samlate pare ?

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  6. Rabibarer mangsher jhol obsession is slowly gripping my household as well. My hubby grew on this religiously.....while in my parent's household red meat was struck out much before the health food fad, for reasons I can not remember today. In fact it was and still is mainly a fish only household. I can cook a thousand odd dishes better than my Ma in law but, never ever do I dare to compete on the maangsher jhol bit. My hubby is exceptionally sensitive on the issue. The jhol consistency, the texture, the alu pieces, its degree of cooking etc have reached a state of obsession. Thus came my Dronacharya for cooking,Sanjeev Kapoor and like Eklavya I cracked it, well almost letz say with his take on this Bong version of Mangsher jhol.....Thanks for putting up this post. Will try and definitely enjoy the variation. Loved the cloud watching bit. I enjoy doing that from my balcony as well....but the cracker was ' having more pink lemonade'...Pls give the princess a tight hug on my behalf for this masterpiece

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    1. This is a very easy variation. And if you can spend the time for kashano it is same as my Mother's version where she adds the spices in steps.

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  7. LOL @ Dad must be girl-ish because he drank too much pink lemonade. I loved the mutton curry I tasted at your house, was it this or your mum's?

    I didn't even think of cloud clouds when I read your first line, I thought of cloud computing! Sigh!

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    1. Sra - LOL ! Cloud computing looks like that is first thing we will think of when we talk about clouds. Much like Apple.

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    2. Et tu ? Cloud Computing ? What pray is that ;- ?

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    3. Indo, Bong Mom, yeah! I have just started dealing with IT stuff at work and am coming across much jargon. I think I was googling cloud computing for dummies before I saw your post. I think I understood it better before I looked it up.

      Something about storing your services on the Net rather than on your own server to cut costs?

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    4. Did you see that interview ?
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApQlMm39xr0

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  8. Dear Sandeepa
    Very nice recipe ..it has been ages I have cooked with a marination of onion, ginger garlic paste . I am taking the note of using garam masla in tempering and also the raw one at the end ..i can get the combined fragrance right now ! Going to try it as soon as I am back from Santoniketan. Wao..Thanks for mentioning my name , I feel proud ..ha ha
    Of course the preamble on cloud, photos are very nice !
    bhalo theko
    Ushnishda

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    Replies
    1. Raw paste is as suggested by you. I don't add it usually. But we liked it. Mutton curry tastes good every way.

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  9. Delicious, I wasn't planning on making mutton for a while but because of you know who I will be cooking some this weekend.

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  10. Lol on pink lemonade comment by your daughter. Mutton curry looks delicious and perfect for a Sunday brunch/lunch.

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    1. yeah too much she is, where they get this pink-blue idea from birth I don't know.

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  11. Amar meye r sathe cloud watch kortaam, ekhon r hoye na eyi sab kaaj e or mon neyi :-)..mangshor jhol rabi barer hok na sombar e hok ..sab din he bhalo lagey..hugs to lil sis and to you :-))..

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    1. Ekhon ektu boro hoye geche to tai ar cloud dekhte chaiche na, ki obostha :-) Tomar meye keo onek bhalobasha

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  12. Once a friend asked, "when you say BENGALI MANGSHER JHOL, is it the mangsho who is bengali or the jhol?"
    ;-)
    My family loves the pressure cooker jhol....ek thala bhaat vanish hoye jaye! and potatoes are a MUST in this curry....mangsho na thakleo cholbe kintu mangsher alu thakte hobe!

    cheers,
    d

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  13. big hugs to LS.. baba turned girlish drinking pink lemonade. ROFL.We watch clouds too.. P has kind of outgrown, but T does that all the time from the car and whereever we go. love the idea of sleeping bag:) I will have to do that once when it cools down here in our back yard.

    ebar amar khide khide lagchey.never did that last part. next mangshor jhol e eta add korbo. I LOVE the smell of that marinated mansho with shob kichu and the mustard oil. Ma je boro steel er dekchi te marinade korto sheta amar kachey (and I use it for the same purpose now); sheta dekhei I can still smell that!!!

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    Replies
    1. Amio last part ta kori na usually, guro garam masla diy ektu

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  14. Ummm...I can feel the aroma of the mangshor jhol. I'll try the gota garom moshla phoron as well as the methi seed thing as Basabdutta mentioned. never tried adding ghee in the mutton curry, will try that too if I can convince myself.

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    1. I added just a teeny bit of ghee mixed with the kaancha gorom moshla. You can easily skip it.

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  15. The mangsho-bhaat er thala looks awesome. I had mangsho (stew) for lunch today, but hungry again just looking at your pictures. When my Mother asked our help in Patna to do the gorom moshla on sheel nora, she would instruct her, chandan bata moton korish. And she would add to the mangshor jhol to finish it off. :-)

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    1. Ar chandan bata, amar ta moteo omon smooth hoyni

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    2. Tomar Ma , amake fire korto for sure

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  16. Post ta porar ekdom shomoye hoyeni ... ekhon pore mon bhorlo. LS ta toh bhari mojaar hoyeche ... ekkebare tortori. :-)
    Ami je olpo koyekbaar mangsho rendhechi oi patla jhol ta hoyeni ... maybe I went over the top with the moshla ... tomar deya measurements diye korbo ekbaar ... amar oi patla jhol ta e bhalo lage bhaater shathe. And oh ... oi same cooker e bhaat ta korar idea ta toh darun!!! Next baar eyibhabe e korbo. :-)

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    1. Choto der kotha shunte bhari moja lage, ar ek bochor tarpor i boro boro hoy jabe :(

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  17. Baba Pink Lemonade kheche !! Kisher theke ki jukto kore na bachha ra :-) Amra o choto belaye 2 bon mile cloud watching kortam amader baranda-e madur pete , shuye clouds shape gulo dektam ar interpret kortam.
    My Dad too follow the same rule just before taking it off from the heat he adds gorom moshla'r paste ar abar lid ta bondo kore dito. Bhishon lobhoniye lagche dekhte mangshor jhol ta. Last er chobi te thala dekhe bojha jache je koto tripti kore khechile :-)

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  18. Have your kids seen Pixar short film Partly Cloudy. they might like it if they make shapes in the cloud :) jhol ta to darun... shigiri banabo ete.

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  19. My daughter's sunday favourite, as was mine, and D's, and most Bongs' worth their salt. But it's the rice, at the end, that made me want to go and take out my pressure cooker. Of course, I'll have to make the manghsho first for it to flavour the rice :)

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  20. Hi,
    Based on your delicious Ma-in-Law's Sunday Mutton Curry photos, we'd like to invite you to submit your food photos on a food photography site called http://www.foodporn.net so our readers can enjoy your creations.
    It is absolutely free and fun to make others hungry!
    Thanks :)

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  21. This looks delicious. Definitely trying soon!

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  22. I just discovered your blog (through a different recipe),and I Love it already! For the photographs, the anecdotes, cloud-watching, and the food of course. (And because I tend to like people who use the word "dang!".)

    Great blog(again), and you seem to have such lovely kids! :)

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  23. Hi there

    Just wanted to say thanks! I am following your cooking instructions for almost a month now. My wife is expecting (due date next month...she is not a bong)... I have cooked so many stuff for her blindly based on what u mentioned and every time it was awsome...everytime I see my wife happy I feel privileged. .. (she is unfortunately suffering from sugar n pupp). I just wanted to say..."Thanks"...you have significant contributions towards our happiness. ....

    Kunal

    ReplyDelete
  24. Hi there

    Just wanted to say thanks! I am following your cooking instructions for almost a month now. My wife is expecting (due date next month...she is not a bong)... I have cooked so many stuff for her blindly based on what u mentioned and every time it was awsome...everytime I see my wife happy I feel privileged. .. (she is unfortunately suffering from sugar n pupp). I just wanted to say..."Thanks"...you have significant contributions towards our happiness. ....

    Kunal

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  25. allo gulo ki marinanated mutton er saathe makhte hobe ?

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  26. Sandipa di, aapnar recipe ta ajke try korlam. Just like the way ma makes it. Ektu jhaal-misti beshi kore du thaala bhaat neme gyalo. This could not be more simple. Thank you.

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  27. Sorry to reactivate your old post. But mangshor jhol is totally epic. I mean Sunday is meaningless without mangshor jhol. And hey that last pic is so damn true for me. Though, I cannot take it in anymore but I keep staring at my empty plate; holy bugger!! cannt believe this is over ..:)

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  28. Brilliant, the green chilli bata, and the garam masala half before and half after with the ghee just adds that extra oomph...doler lunch

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  29. Belive it or not, today was the first day I attempted to make this dish. Have had it a million times since childhood but always made by others - aunts, maids, etc. I went by your recipe and it was so good....so so good. Thank you so much.

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