Table Of ContentMONISHA BHARADWAJ is a qualified chef and an award-winning author. She
was Guild of Food Writers’ Cookery Writer of the Year in 2003, Stylish
Indian in Minutes won the Guild of Food Writers’ Cookery Book of the Year
and The Indian Pantry won a prestigious silver medal at Germany’s
Deutschland Akademie ausgezeichnet. She runs a successful Indian cookery
school in London called Cooking With Monisha
(www.cookingwithmonisha.com) and teaches at some of the UK’s top
cookery schools. Monisha has been Guest Chef at Benares, a Michelin star
restaurant in London and at the Intercontinental Hotel, Park Lane. She is
often invited to judge food events such as the Great Taste Awards and has
lectured at SOAS, University of London, about ‘The History and Culture of
India through its Food’.
CONTENTS
Introduction
1 RICE
2 FLOURS
3 MEAT
4 POULTRY
5 FISH & SEAFOOD
6 EGGS
7 DAIRY
8 LENTILS & BEANS
9 VEGETABLES
10 SNACKS, SIDES & STREET FOOD
11 GRILLED FOODS
12 SALADS & RAITAS
13 CHUTNEYS, PICKLES & RELISHES
14 DESSERTS
15 DRINKS
Index
Resources
HOW TO USE THIS EBOOK
Select one of the chapters from the main contents list and you will be taken to a
list of all the recipes covered in that chapter.
Alternatively, jump to the index to browse recipes by ingredient.
Look out for linked text (which is in blue) throughout the ebook that you can
select to help you navigate between related recipes.
You can double tap images to increase their size. To return to the original view,
just tap the cross in the top left-hand corner of the screen.
Garam Masala
Sambhar Powder
Goda Masala
Kolhapuri Masala
Panch Phoron
FOOD IS CENTRAL TO AN INDIAN PERSON’S LIFE. IT IS SPOKEN ABOUT ALL THE TIME, IS
A GREAT ICEBREAKER AND IS COOKED AND EATEN THROUGHOUT THE DAY. THE
HIGHEST DEMONSTRATION OF LOVE IN INDIA IS TO FEED SOMEONE.
INTRODUCTION
Indian food needs no introduction. Its rich, delicious flavours and enticing
aroma of herbs and spices have tempted the most conservative palates and
restaurants started by people from the Asian sub-continent have taken Indian
food across the seas and made it available to a wide audience. Attention to detail,
excellent chefs, clever packaging and marketing have ensured that people know
more about it now than ever before.
I grew up in Mumbai when it was still called Bombay, amongst great lovers of
food, then went on to train as a chef at the Institute of Hotel Management,
Catering Technology and Applied Nutrition, commonly known as IHM,
Mumbai. Every evening, I’d be in the family kitchen trying out recipes by
blending spices and practising techniques such as grating a coconut to make
milk. Those were an intensely food-related three years and I loved the chance to
be creative and learn about the diversity of a cuisine that had such a rich history
and so much variety. Mumbai was and still is India’s commercial capital and
therefore attracts people from all over the country. It was wonderful to taste a
wide variety of regional Indian cuisines such as Sindhi, Gujarati, south Indian
and Kashmiri, through friends, neighbours and speciality restaurants. I also tried
a range of regional dishes on family holidays to almost every state of India. I
remember eating Kerala ‘fish molee’ as an eight-year-old and Rajasthani ‘dal
bati’, a rich dough bread served with ghee and lentils, at ten. I still visit India a
few times a year and go on food trips – driving off the tourist track to visit market
towns and villages that hold the secrets to good, wholesome, regional fare.
As a newly trained chef I came to England in the 1980s to study journalism. I
had completed a degree in Indian History in India and wanted to find a way to
combine my interests through writing about Indian food. I arrived from the
warm sunshine of Bombay to a foggy February day in London. I knew that I’d
have to cook a spiced Indian meal to warm up and set off in search of the right
ingredients. In those days, grocery shops still had very seasonal vegetables and
all I could see were parsnips, swedes and Brussels sprouts. Not what I was used
to at all! Thankfully, I could buy a cauliflower and made my first curry with a
few spices that I had brought from India. I learnt that in order to buy a variety of
Indian ingredients, I’d have to go to an ‘ethnic’ area and so made my way to
Southall. Imagine my delight upon seeing coriander leaves, coconut and
turmeric – all ingredients that now, almost 30 years later, are seen in many
supermarkets all over the UK.
There was an interest in Indian food in the UK at the time, but the recipes I
found in books and magazines seemed complex, with long lists of ingredients
and many steps to achieve an ‘authentic’ Indian meal. My cooking was simpler,
quicker and fuss-free. I started my cookery school in London – Cooking With
Monisha – where I taught members of the public, chefs and students of
hospitality management an easy, manageable style of Indian cooking. Cooking
With Monisha is a vibrant school now and I also teach the Indian courses at
several top cookery schools around the UK.
The Indian food that is available in the UK is only a small part of a very vast
and diverse cuisine. This has to do with migration: people from northern India,
mainly Punjab, Gujarat and Bangladesh (which was a part of India until 1947)
brought their food to the West and adapted it to suit local tastes. Dishes were
classified by heat – ‘hot vindaloo’ and ‘mild korma’ – and were named after cities
that were important strongholds of the British Raj – ‘Bombay Aloo’ and
‘Chicken Madras’. Neither of these dishes can be found in India! Today, as more
people travel to India from the West, there is an appreciation of what lies
beyond the samosa and the jalfrezi.
In this book, I have recreated a cookery masterclass at my school. I’d like you
to consider this a personal one-to-one lesson with me standing in your kitchen,
guiding you with tips and hints as we create the perfect Indian meal. The step-
by-step photographs will give you an idea of technique and texture as well as the
different stages of the dishes. Please bear in mind that you can personalise the
recipes by adding more or less chilli, seasoning or oil.
An increasing number of people are now cooking Indian food at home.
Although jarred curry sauces are available in supermarkets, home cooks have
realised that they are often too greasy, overly spiced and full of salt; nowhere
close to the real thing. Cookery schools all over the world now offer Indian
courses and the interest in learning not just how to use spices, but also regional
Indian cooking, is increasing. People who come to my cookery school now talk
about Keralan curries or a Bengali pineapple chutney that they have eaten on
about Keralan curries or a Bengali pineapple chutney that they have eaten on
visits to India. Many tourists have been to Rajasthan and had a ‘thali’, where lots
of dishes are served all together in small bowls, or to Delhi where they’ve
discovered the joys of richly spiced, Mughal curries such as Butter Chicken.
Food is central to an Indian person’s life. It is spoken about all the time, is a
great icebreaker and is cooked and eaten throughout the day. The highest
demonstration of love in India is to feed someone and one of the first questions
older members of an Indian family ask the younger ones who are away from
home is ‘have you eaten?’ Recipes are traditionally passed down from mother to
daughter. However, more and more Indian men are now seen in the kitchen,
especially outside of India. As people travel and TV shows bring India to living
rooms the world over, Indian cookery is receiving attention from newer and
evermore curious audiences.
