Payesh

Having Bengali friends around and not posting a single Bengali recipe was not going so well with me. I have tried making a lot of Bengali dishes lately of which Baingan Bhaja and Payesh are my favourites. Aloo Poshto tastes lip smacking too, but i havent tried making it yet. Guess that's this weekend menu, since i do have khas-khas (poppy seeds) in my kitchen! 

Every cuisine have their own distinct flavours and methods of preparation. Let's take Payesh - a kheer made from rice and boiled milk. There are so many different ways of preparing it. Some would boil the rice and milk together, some would boil the milk and then add rice. Some would add jaggery, and some would add sugar or a mix of both. People even make it with condensed milk or a mix of all. A friend of mine doesn't add jaggery but a paste of cashews and sugar. As they say...the food, water, taste changes every few kilometers in India.

I always feel that a particular dish tastes different related to a lot of factors. Lets say a simple bread butter toast would taste different sitting at home or at a dhaba or sitting by the riverside on a picnic or some 5 star hotel. The ambiance, the weather, the people you are with everything matters for the food that we eat. The taste also matters in regard to who is it cooking , and in what frame of mind. The same dish would taste different if i am cooking it with feelings of anger/frustration or so of happiness/ calmness. And it applies to the one eating it too. A dish would taste different if my mind is preoccupied with something else, or if i am watching television while eating or if i am reading a book or watching nature. Don't you all feel so? Give it a try.

Well, coming back to the post. A dear friend of mine got me some nolen gur (Date palm jaggery)during her visit back home. 

Since it was Sankranti yesterday, i thought of making Payesh. I couldn't post any recipe/picture yesterday, since my internet was down for almost 2 days for some reason. Yes, i definitely did make Til-gul (which i had posted last year), and here's wishing you all "Til gul ghya goad goad bola" :)

Payesh, as i made it with Nolen gur (Suggestions from 2 bengali friends):

Ingredients:

Full cream milk - 1 litre

Rice (i took Basmati rice) - 1/4 cup

Nolen gur (Jaggery) - little less than 1/2 cup (add according to taste)

Cardamom powder - 1 tsp

Bay leaf - 2

That's it! 5 ingredients and you are done!! You can add nuts, nutmeg powder, sugar etc according to your wish but i preferred keeping it basic.

Recipe:

Wash the rice till water is clear, drain and keep aside.

Bring the milk to boil and keep boiling it on sim to reduce it. 

Make sure you keep stirring it in between, and also scraping the cream from the sides.

After about 10 minutes, add the 2 bay leaves to the boiling milk.

Once milk reduces to 3/4th, add the rice. Now let the milk boil till rice is fully cooked. The milk will start changing colour to little yellowish.

Once the rice is cooked, the milk will have reduced to almost half. Now add the cardamom powder and mix.

Turn off the stove. Now add the jaggery (Add little pieces or grated jaggery and stir - it will melt automatically when you stir- no need to boil/cook it).

Payesh is ready!!! This one was loved by hubby's colleagues at office :) The nolen gur takes the taste to almost another level, but you can add normal jaggery instead too. 

Happy cooking :)

Bengali cuisine : Dinner at Joey's :)

Ghar ka khana : Foodies, as we are, we love to gorge on different cuisines. Being Maharashtrians, all that we have eaten of Bengali food is at specialty restaurants. So, when our Bengali friends in Delhi invited us for dinner, we jumped at the idea!!! Bengali food, cooked at home, that too with a touch of "Maa ke haath" ( Mom's food )... it all sounded a perfect Sunday evening.

Woofs from Joey : I had mentioned about "Aloo Poshto" to my friend just last month, and she had promised me then, that she will make it and invite me for dinner. So this was definately on the menu :) After a warm welcome from all of them ( we were meeting their parents for the first time, who are basically Bengalis from Bihar), and lots of licks and jumps from our sweetheart Joey-Poey ( My client from pet sitting ), we had some dhoklas as a starter.

Minimalism is not lack of something, Its simply the perfect amount of something : As the saying goes, we loved that the dishes were minimalistic...That way you get to taste it wholeheartedly and it lingers on your tongue for quite a while ! The main dishes.... Chicken ( for hubby dearest, who loves it to the core ), aloo poshto ( specially for me ), Chane ki daal, salad and Jeera Rice followed by the desert of the evening - Gur ki Kheer .

The Nolen Gur( new jaggery) or Gud, as it is called is Jaggery made from Khajoor (Dates ). It is known as Bengali's jaggery, as it is made from the sap of date palm trees found in Bengal. It tastes different than the normal jaggery, the aroma is heavenly and is slightly costlier than the original jaggery. Though a winter speciality, is found these days all year round with a special technique of preserving the jaggery in solidified form for months. 

There is also a different type of rice that is used for making the kheer. It's tiny and aromatic. Looks like this :

So, the basic way to make the kheer would be :( As told to me by aunty )

Ingredients :

Milk - 1 litre
Rice - 3/4 cup ( 2 handfull)
Nolen Gur (Jaggery) - Add according to taste
Cardamon powder - 1 tsp
Cashews/ raisins - chopped  to garnish

Recipe :

Boil Milk and rice together. Cook till the rice becomes soft and keep stirring in between.

Then add the jaggery and mix it all well and cook for another 5 minutes.

Lastly add the cardamon powder and cashewnuts.

If you find it too thick, add a little milk, or else it can be eaten thick as a pudding too.

Refrigerate if you like to have it cold. 

With our tummies full, we came home and went off to bed to have some "Mishti " ( sweet ) dreams !!! :))

The Chefs of the evening : 

Thank you for such a wonderful meal !!