Introduced to Goa by the Portugese, this vegan version of the popular Goan chicken dish features a milder version of a traditionally spicy marinade. Extra firm tofu is baked to perfection, topped with the sharp, full-bodied (and chili-free) coriander based paste. Enjoy with a simple salad of mixed lettuce, raw cut onions, and tomatoes doused with salt and fresh lemon juice.

Recipe Notes

Make sure you press as much liquid as you can out of your tofu. You want solidity here because, remember, the more water you get out of the tofu, the more it will soak back in. The blocks of tofu should soak up all of the cafrael marinade liquid (there’s not a lot, but it’s enough to flavour it substantially). Sometimes I like to cheat and poke holes with toothpicks into my tofu encourage its marinade to really get up close and personal.

And by the way, you don’t need to be that anal with tofu sizes/weights. Just get something vaguely in the ball park.

And now, onto the deliciousness that is cafrael tofu. Seriously, get your bottom in gear and make this ASAP.

A popular Hyderabadi dish, Baghara Baingan is a dish of eggplant (aubergine) cooked into a creamy nutty coconut gravy with the added tang tang of tamarind. If you think you don’t like any of these ingredients on their own, I urge you to try them married together here, in this traditional recipe often served during special occasions and on holidays.

Recipe Notes

While it seems complicated initially, this is a pretty straightforward and easy vegetarian hyderabadi recipe. Recipes and cooking recommendations vary, with some insisting on frying the aubergine in oil first and others demanding the use of chilis (speaking of which, add chili if you want it; I simply don’t because I live in in a place where a chili on the other side of the room will set someone’s mouth alight). Also, technically, you should seek out the smaller rounded variety of Indian eggplant but any small aubergines will do.

If you don’t have a liquidiser (blender) to make the sauce, a food processor, nut grinder, or even pestle and mortar will also work. I used my vitamix for the sauce, but it’s certainly not a necessity to use something quite that powerful. You just want something, at the very least, to crush the dry-fried spices.

I once battled meal worms and moths in my kitchen for well over a year. In the end I threw away many grocery bags full of food, much as I hated to do so. My cupboards, from that point on, became storage receptacles for storage receptacles. Tupperware-style containers were the solution, and any remaining foods with eggs were contained in air tight plastic, making it easy for me to eliminate any further pests without them contaminating more food stuffs.

The point I’m getting at is I have a lot of plastic tubs. A whole lot. So many, in fact, that there’s just not room. This means that when a certain grain is running low, I try to use it up in order to make space for another which is waiting for its new sealed home. I discovered the chana dal in the way back of the stack, and decided it was time to make space for some Israeli couscous, so this recipe was hence born. So as promised, here’s a recipe for chana dal cutlets!

Recipe Notes

Burgers versus cutlets? I intended this recipe to be for cutlets, but as an experiment I tried burgers as well. My preference is still for the latter, but that’s just me. The cutlets are good served with a nice rice dish, like a veggie biryani or pilau.

Don’t use hot broth and don’t over knead the dough. Both of these things will change the texture of the dough, specifically interacting with the gluten to create a more stringy and chewy texture. Of course if you want it to be chewier then knead for longer, but the hot water will make the dough tough from the start.

By the way, a pressure cooker is great for dals!

• Take messy notes, as mentioned above, while making the meal.
• Eat dinner and forget about recipe notes for a week or ten.
• Remember recipe and hunt for it so I can make a blog post.
• Angrily blame husband for misplacing my recipe, because I certainly couldn’t have done that myself.
• Find recipe somewhere I obviously hid it and sheepishly apoligise to husband.
• Glare at recipe with confusion. Cry a little. Tell myself “I will take better notes next time.”
• Amidst the bad handwriting and orange food stains, try to make sense of what’s on that scrap of paper.
• If successful in previous step, post recipe on blog.

I mention those steps because to my shock, when I went back into the kitchen to find this recipe, it was both legible and clean (by “clean” I mean “only has a few orange food stains.”).