Great Balls of Cheese

I'm sporting a little bump on my tummy. Ok, it's more than a little bump. 

It's Thursday night and believe it or not, the bump was from Wednesday night's dinner. I ate way too much. Waaaaay too much. The word 'greed' comes to mind. And 'pig'.  

 I cooked a North Indian dish, Malai Kofta last night. I first ate this dish a couple of years ago while I was on holiday in North India with three of my friends. It was one of my best holidays ever. Great places, great company and great food ...

Great food, but very, very rich food. 

North Indian food is defined by their rich, fragrant sauces and complex blend of herbs and spices. Milk, yoghurt, fresh cream, paneer (cottage cheese), ghee, dry fruits and nuts ..these are key ingredients in North Indian cooking. Often, all these ingredients go into one dish. 

Now, that's about as rich as Oprah, right?  

Well, on my holiday, I was the only vegetarian in the group. But it isn't difficult to be vegetarian in India. In fact, some of the best food is vegetarian food. So my three buddies decided to be vegetarian for most of our the trip. 

Travelling makes people hungry. It seemed like we were eating all the time. We ate at almost-fancy hotel restaurants (almost was all we could afford), tiny dhabas (truck stops) along the highway, fast food joints (we just had to try the McDonalds India's Maharaja Burger!) and popular local eateries.         

Soon enough, Malai Kofta became a favourite dish of ours. We ordered it quite often; for almost every meal. 

What is it? Malai Kofta is a Moghul dish of stuffed vegetarian dumplings in a creamy, spicy, tomato-based sauce. The dumplings are made of potatoes, paneer, (sometimes peas and carrots) and stuffed with cashew nuts and raisins. They are deep-fried and then cooked in the creamy sauce. Oh, the sauce not only has fresh cream but also some paneer.

I don't know what made me crave this dish all of a sudden. Hmmmm.... 

Most North Indian restaurants have Malai Kofta on the menu and it would have been pretty easy to drive out and satisfy my craving. But I wanted to try my hand at it. After all, I had some paneer in the fridge and plenty of tomatoes. I had all the spices necessary and half a box of fresh cream. All I needed to get were some cashew nuts and raisins. 

The first step is making the dumplings. Every restaurant and even home cook would have their own version of the dish. Potatoes, paneer, raisins and cashew nuts are complusory ingredients in the dumplings but you can choose to omit the peas and carrots or add other ingredients like chillies to suit your taste.   

Dumplings:

1.5 cups paneer

2 potatoes, boiled, peeled 

2-3 tbsp corn flour

1 tsp garam masala (Indian mixed spice) 

1/4 cup green peas, steamed till soft (optional)

1/4 cup carrots, cubed and steamed till soft (optional)

salt 

Mash the boiled potatoes with the paneer, peas and carrots till you get a smooth mixture. Add the garam masala, corn flour and salt and mix. Roll into balls (about the size of a golf ball, does not have to uniform in size). Press the balls hard so they don't disintegrate when you deep fry them. If necessary, add a bit more flour.

Heat oil (enough for deep frying) in a pan/wok and when hot, fry the koftas. Try frying one first, to see if it will hold together. Remove and set aside. 

Making the sauce takes a bit longer. First you have to make the sauce base and only then the sauce.

Sauce base

2 tbsp ginger paste

2 tbsp garlic paste

1 stick of cinnamon

3 cardamoms

1 tsp fenugreek

3 cups fresh tomato, cubed and pureed.

1 tsp chili powder (optional)

3 green chillies, chopped

1/2 cup melted ghee or butter

1/4 cup cream/whipping cream

1/4 cup milk

salt.

Preparation:

Heat ghee. Add the cinnamon, cardamom and fenugreek. When aromatic, add the garlic and ginger pastes and chili powder. Mix well. When the ghee separates add the tomato and chili.

Leave to simmer until the mixture starts to leave the sides of the pan. The oil should rise on top and separate.  Add the milk and cream and when well mixed, turn off the heat.

At this stage, you are almost there. Hey... this was a dish for kings, so it should require some extra effort!

2-3 cups of the sauce base (if there is more left over, you can freeze it)

2 tbsp cashew nuts. Soak for 30 mins and grind into a paste

1 tsp sugar

1/4 cup grated paneer

handful of coriander leaves

In a saucepan, heat the sauce base. Add the cashew paste and sugar and let it simmer, covered, for about 15 mins. Flame should be low. Add the dumplings, making sure to coat them with the sauce. Add half the grated paneer and let it simmer for 5 mins. Turn off the heat. Garnish with the remaining paneer and coriander leaves. 

Palak means spinach

Everytime I visit my favourite North Indian restaurant I order the same dish: Palak Paneer or spinach with cottage cheese. In fact, when I was on holiday in Northern India a couple of years ago, I think I ordered this dish almost every night. My three travel mates didn't compain as it was everyone's favourite. The creamy, slightly spicy spinach coupled with the lightly toasted cottage cheese is just perfect.

Unfortunately, because  paneer is quite pricey (you can get a 150gm packet for between RM15 to  RM20) I don't often make it at home. It's cheaper to order it at a restaurant:  RM8 for a side dish that can be shared by 2-3 (depending how greedy you are). of course, it isn't difficult to make paneer at home. In India, most people do. Like ricotta, what you need is whole milk and citric acid or vinegar.

But, as luck would have it, I was in Brickfields last week for a job assignment and took the opportunity to go grocery shopping. As KL's "little India", Brickfields has some really cool Indian grocers that stock Indian cooking produce largely  imported from India. From spice mixes to Indian biccies and snacks, these shops are a cook's paradise (well, if you're into Indian or Indian influenced cooking). I spent about an hour browsing and came away with a 200g packet of paneer (and a whole lot of other things -- I cannot resist temptation) costing me Rm15.

Perfect. 200g of paneer is actually quite a lot, especially since I usually only cook for two. I decided to use just a small portion of the cheese for the Palak Paneer and keep the rest to experiment with later. Palak paneer can be eaten with rice but is usually eaten with Indian flat breads. I like to eat mine alone.

Palak paneer

2 cups chopped spinach

40g paneer, cubed

1/2 onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, chopped

1 inch ginger, peeled and chopped

1 large green chilli, sliced

1 tsp cumin powder

1 tsp coriander powder

salt and pepper

Butter

Shallow fry the paneer cubes till they begin to get golden and crusty. Don't let them fry too long.

Pound/blend the onion, garlic and ginger to a paste. Mix the cumin and coriander powders with the paste. Heat 1 tbsp butter in a saucepan and add the onion/garlic/ginger paste. When fragrant, add the green chillies and soon after the spinach. Cook till the spinach is all soft, then transfer the contents of the saucepan into a blender and blend (if you want it slightly chunky, just pulse the mixture a couple of times. If you prefer it smooth and creamy, blend it for about 2 mins.

Heat some butter in a clean saucepan; add a couple bay leaves. A couple of minutes later add the spinach blend and then the cottage cheese and leave it to simmer for about 5 mins, stirring occassionally. Low heat.

Remove and serve with bread.