Tomato diye Macher Patla Jhol

Come Winter, I start recollecting the exact way this light fish curry with tomatoes would taste. It is not that I make it only in Winter. No, it is an easy dish and I make it throughout the year whenever I have less time on hand which apparently translates to often.

But never do I think deeply about it as I do, when the mercury drops and I seek out a patch of sunlight sliding through the high windows of my family room.

Years ago winter meant sunshine on your back, a sunshine that warmed you unlike the folly outside my window. It also meant lots of fresh plump red tomatoes, their skin smooth and taut as a baby's bottom and green coriander leaves, dhone pata, with a smell that reminded you of green fields stretched out luxuriously in the winter sun.

Ok, I am not really sure if they reminded anyone of anything but food but that statement sounds pretty nice so that is how it will be written.

It also meant mid-terms or half-yearly as we called them.Coming home early, dusty and tired after half a day of writing about meaning less things on a sheaf of paper, right in time when Ma would be serving lunch. On such days, this light fish curry with the fresh tomatoes was what I most looked forward to. Made with Rui(Rohu) or some fresh Chara Pona, this halka jhol solely relied on the tomatoes and the fish to impart the right taste. With some fluffy white rice, this would be the only bright spot on a day that would be later spent ruthlessly memorizing the details of Panipat War.

Better days of December would soon follow and there would be rich fruit cakes, pastries from Flury's, juicy Darjeeling oranges made into kamola kheer, but this macher jhol would still hold its place and would whisper "home" while we made a pledge to survive on only rum balls the entire life.

Perfect to be described as "kalojiire ar alpo aadar ros, kNachalonkar kuchi diye ekta machher halka refreshing jhol ranna korlam, sathe seddho chaaler jhorjhore bhaat" -- Kuntala

In the US, if you have access to an Asian Market, I would insist you get fresh fish like Striped Bass or Buffalo Carp cut in steak sized pieces from there. They taste awesome in this gravy. Even Pomfret or Butterfish from there will work well. Rohu from your Bangladeshi Fish seller works very well too. If everything fails try with fillet of Tilapia or Rainbow Trout.

Never, ever make this dish with Mahi Mahi like I did this Sunday. It took away all the taste of the dish. Also no Salmon. Sweet water fish works best for this kind of light gravy.

I blogged about exactly this dish in October when I just started blogging way back. Things don't change that much foodwise.


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Tomato diye Macher Patla Jhol

Serves 3 adults. About 6-8 pieces of 2" x 3" fish pieces.

Wash the fish pieces in warm water, pat dry & and smear them with half a teaspoon of turmeric powder and salt. Keep aside for 15-20 minutes

Heat Mustard Oil in a Kadai/Wok till you see smoke just coming out, indicating it's hot enough.
Fry the fish in hot oil till it turns light golden on both sides, kind of deep fry. The only draw back of this is most of the oil goes to waste as you discard most of the oil after frying. You can also save this oil for frying fish again next day as my Ma would do.

If you are using fillet of fish you can shallow fry them in much less oil.

Heat Mustard oil to smoking in Kadai/Wok.

Temper the hot oil with a little less than 1/2 tsp of Kalonji/ Kalo Jeera and 4-5 hot Indian green chillies slit through the center.

Puree or finely chop two medium tomatoes of good quality. I used about 1 cup of fresh tomato puree.

Saute till they become a fine pulp, kind of mushy and you see the oil seeping out on the edges. The raw tomato-ey smell should be totally gone.

Add 1 tbsp of freshly grated ginger and saute for a minute

Now add a pinch of turmeric powder and 1 cup of water. Add salt to taste.

Simmer till the gravy comes to a boil.When the gravy comes to a boil add the fish pieces.

Add a fistful of fresh chopped coriander leaves.

Cook for a few more minutes and you are done. The gravy is light and is best enjoyed with white rice.

Chocolate Marble Pound Cake -- science of baking

Because it is December and we are in the Northern Hemisphere where December == Cold Winter, I have decided to crank up the oven on Friday nights to give us the much needed warmth.

This will also help me work on my non-existent baking skills. My goals aren't lofty. I just want to bake something decent that BS and LS might love and their children might enjoy and 200 years later the family fondly remember Great Grandma Bong Mom's Pound Cake while beating eggs 300 strokes by hand. Ahem.

So far, BS loves the Chocolate Brownies and the Better Than ... Chocolate Cup Cakes. I haven't told her the name and yet she loves them. They are really rich and chocolate-y.

Before Thanksgiving I made the Zebra Cake which looked really nice with the zebra patterns. But it was a little less sweet and not very rich in texture. Me & D liked it because it was less sweet and more bread than cake like.

BS didn't really show much enthusiasm.

Now honestly BS's showing or not showing enthusiasm does not mean much except a snub on my "I am the best" feeling. She could have ga-ga'ed over the same cake if it was at her best friend's house and might even come back and eat this two months later. You never know.

Last Friday, my project was Chocolate Marble Pound Cake from Sailaja's Kitchen. Pound Cakes have loads of butter but since it is December, I said ok and went ahead. While baking I am trying to understand the science that goes behind all that creaming and beating and it would be really nice if I could experiment more and flush the product down anywhere but my throat till I get the perfect cake.

This particular cake was rich and dense. When had the next day it needed to be nuked for 10 secs to get the moist taste.Also the batter was thicker and more spreadable than pourable. That I learned was not a source of panic but the norm for pound cakes. Really ? Is that true ?
I also needed 1/4 cup more milk than the recipe asked for to make the batter moist. The cake again was a little less sweet for the kid's liking but they enjoyed it with some preserves.

Since I am trying to find meaning in this madness of baking, I will have my two cents on baking science right here. None of them are my theories, they have been sourced from here, here and here.

Let me put some jam on this

Most buttery Pound Cakes start with a step called creaming. What happens when you cream butter and sugar ?

The first step in making a pound cake is to take lots of butter at room temperature and beat it with an electric mixer. This incorporates air bubbles. Sugar is gradually added to the butter. As the sharp sugar crystals cut into the butter, tiny pockets are formed and fill with air as the mixer blades pull more butter over the top of the hole to close it. This makes the butter double in volume and become creamy in texture, which is why this procedure is called “creaming.”

While creaming you know you have reached there: when you're no longer able to see sugar granules, but you can still feel them if you rub a bit of the creamed fat between your fingers.(from the God of Such Things Alton Brown)
Here is a "one bowl" or "quick method" pound cake that skips this step

What's the fuss all about ?

How to add eggs ?

Eggs should be at room temperature before they are added to the butter-sugar. Never happens with me, I will put them in luke warm water for 5 mins and proceed. Ok, maybe I SHOULD bring them to room temp.
Add eggs one at a time to the creamed butter and sugar and beat. Now Alton Brown says, adding eggs one at a time is silly. It must be. Anything one at a time sounds silly to me. Just dump all together and get it over with, I say.
It is better to mix the eggs together first so that the water in the egg whites can hook up with the emulsifiers in the yolks. Did that even make sense ? Whatever.

Now this is easy to understand.The eggs adds more volume and allows the mixture to hold even more air. Beat until the mix is smooth, light in color and the volume has increased to look fluffy.
The texture of the cake is dense if the eggs are added whole and much lighter if the egg whites are beaten separately and then folded into the rest of the batter.

I want lots of that gooey purple stuff. Much more than Didi has.

How to add the dry ingredients ?

First sift all the dry ingredients, i.e. the flour, the baking soda or powder. Then add the dry ingreds first, usually alternating with liquid(which in this case was milk) till it is well blended. The protein in flour, the gluten is what makes the cake hold its shape but too much of it will make the cake tough.So do not overbeat as that will produce more gluten.When you start with the dry you cover the flour particles with fat and so water can't get to the flour and there won't be any gluten. This ensures a tender cake. Whoa !!!

The baking soda or powder when comes in contact with liquid or when heated, releases carbon dioxide that forms bubble in the batter. So you get more air pockets or holes in the batter. This one thing is elementary science at least.

Ooopsie Daizy !!

What happens in the oven ?

As the batter heats up in the oven, bubbles(remember air pockets formed during creaming) expand and the batter rises. As the carbon dioxide breaks down, the moisture in the cake forms steam, which fills the air pockets our sugar made. Eventually, the steam evaporates, but by this time the protein in the flour has had enough time to set, thus making the cake hold its shape.

Just as heat makes steam and carbon dioxide expand, coolness causes contraction. So if you open the oven door before the cake is set, a draft will burst the tiny bubbles and the cake will fall.

This is Messy

What is it about cake pans ?

The size and shape of the cake pan plays an important role in baking. Apparently all cakes cannot be baked in all kinds of pans. Size and material does matter. Most cake recipes work well for cup cakes too. To make pound cake cup cakes try this.

I am not eating any more of this stuff. I am done.

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Chocolate Marble Pound Cake

What You Need

AP Flour -- 2 cups
Baking powder - 1&1/2 tsp
Salt -- a pinch

Butter ~ 1 cup
Sugar ~ 1 cup

Egg ~ 3
Vanilla extract ~ 1 tsp

Milk ~ 1/2 cup(Original recipe said 1/4 cup)
Cocoa powder ~ 2 tbsp

How I Did It

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease and dust a 9" round pan with flour.

Sift together the Dry ingredients

2 cups of AP Flour
1&1/2 tsp of Baking Powder
Pinch of salt

In a mixing bowl add
1 cup = 2 sticks of unsalted butter
With the aid of your mixer beat the butter.
Add 1 cup of sugar gradually.
Beat till sugar and butter mix is light in color and fluffy.

In a small separate bowl add
3 eggs
and beat lightly with a fork

Add the egg mix and 1 tsp Vanilla extract to the creamed butter and sugar and beat with your mixer(for 2-3 mins) till you get a smooth mix.You could also add eggs one at a time to the sugar-butter mix, beating for 30s -- 1 min each time.

Now add 1/3 of the dry ingredients to above, gently mixing. Follow with a little of the milk. Continue this ending with the dry.

Remove a cup of this batter in a bowl and combine with 2 tbsp cocoa pwd. Mix it gently. My batter was thick and not easily pourable.
Pour a tbsp of white colored batter into the greased and floured pan. Alternate with a tbsp of cocoa batter. Continue through out till both the batters are finished.
Smooth out the top with a spatula.
Take a knife and swirl it around the batter in a zig zag fashion, 3-4 times.

Put in the oven and bake for 40-45 mins. Check with a toothpick to see if it is done. Take out of the oven and cool for 10 mins. 

Louisiana Style Pasta -- Cheesecake Factory kind

I don't know about you but I love the Louisiana Style Chicken Pasta at Cheesecake Factory. I love it so much that it is the dish I always have when I am there.

Not that I am there a lot.

I mean I would love to be there always but they have this 40 minute waiting time and my kids are not really the waiting kinds and though I can wait till infinity to have that pasta, my kids have better things to do.

Maybe I just have way too much time on hand. Maybe I should find myself better things to do.Like ordering a dessert next time I am there. This Pasta makes me so full that I always skip dessert.

Or like googling for Louisiana style Chicken pasta instead of waiting for it. Taking matter into my own hands.Having my Pasta and eating it too. Not all kinds of pasta. But hey Louisiana, here I come.

So this is the star recipe that came to my rescue. I will be eternally grateful to this lady for coming up with this thing and though I mangled her recipe and put my signature touches all over it, the credit goes only to her.

Also I totally skipped the chicken part since there was none. I asked the other adult to get me some chicken breasts when I started cooking this, which is 9:15 PM yesterday night to be exact. But he ignored. I didn't even ask him to hunt for it, to just get it from the grocer's but he still ignored. Men just aren't the same anymore.They don't gather food, they just eat it.

Heat 2 tbsp Olive Oil in a skillet. Recipe said 1 tbsp butter but you know me.
Chop 3/4 th of a small red onion in small pieces and add to skillet.
Follow suit with 2-3 cloves of garlic minced.

When the onion is soft add
1 red bell pepper chopped in small pieces
1/2 of a green bell pepper or 1 small yellow bell pepper chopped in small pieces.
1 cup of sliced mushroom

Saute for about 4-5 minutes till the veggies soften.

Now the spices.

Add
1 tsp crushed red pepper or 2 Dry red chili crushed. Adjust as needed and increase if you have no fear of red pepper.

More spices. Since this was Cajun cooking D decided we need to skip Basil which the recipe had and add these spices instead. Again we did not have Basil and at 9:15 PM yesterday D ignored my plea to get basil from the grocer's so he came up with his theory about Louisiana people not using Basil and such.

1/4 tsp of Dry Roasted Cumin powder 
1 tsp of All spice roughly crushed(optional)
1/2-1 tsp of fresh Black Pepper powder
Note: If you have a store bought Cajun spice powder, you can just use that instead

Saute for 2-3 minutes

Add
1/4 pint of heavy cream + 1/2 cup Milk -- Recipe said 1&1/4 pint of whipping cream
1 cup of water -- Recipe said 1 cup of chicken stock
Simmer until it comes to a slow boil. Now cover and at medium heat let it simmer for 5 minutes or so till sauce thickens a little.
Note: You need to add the cream as per the original recipe if you want a creamier sauce. I liked my low cal version though.

Meanwhile cook Bow Tie Pasta according to package directions

Back to the sauce.

Recipe said to add 4tbsp of Minced fresh basil which we skipped because no Basil @home.
Add about 1 cup of grated Parmesan cheese to the sauce. Stir to mix.

Check for seasonings and adjust salt and pepper. This is a must, the adjusting.

Simmer sauce till it thickens. Should not be runny.

Drain and add pasta to the skillet tossing gently to mix the pasta with the sauce.I added the pasta gradually mixing to make sure that the sauce was enough to coat the pasta.

I did not use the whole box, about a cup of cooked pasta did not find its way into the sauce.

The delicious Pasta is ready, sitting there hot and pretty.

Eat it and fall in love. You deserve it. Maybe add some more grated Parmigiano. Life in December is all about good food.

I will send this in to join Presto Pasta Night started by Ruth and hosted by Rachel at The Crispy Cook.