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ALTERNATIVE CONTENTS

Great first-timer recipes

Something for the weekend

Midweek meals (30 minutes or so)

Cooking in advance

Quick things to have on the side (10 minutes or so)

Get the kids involved

Store-cupboard curries

Party food

Low-fat

Vegan

Best for tiffins (packed lunches)

For the freezer

Gluten-free (and good with rice)

Dairy-free

List of Recipes

Introduction

An Indian kitchen can be anywhere in the world. Mine just happens to be in London.

I’ve never lived in India, but I grew up in England eating the same food my ancestors have eaten for hundreds of years and which I still cook in my kitchen, every day.

My family’s home cooking is unrecognizable from a lot of the food that is served up in most high-street curry houses across the UK; ours is all at once simple, delicious and fresh. Real Indian home cooking is largely an unknown cuisine, and it’s my love for what we Indians really eat at home that has led me to share these recipes with you now.

My grandparents’ kitchen started in Gujarat, where this story begins. Gujarat is the area north of Mumbai and south of Pakistan, with Rajasthan to the east and the Arabian Sea to the west. The Arabian Sea is where my grandfather Mathuradas Lakhani happened to be looking when his curiosity to find out what lay across it got the better of him. Along with his wife, his father and his brother, he set sail for Kenya to begin a life there, taking with him all the family recipes.

Africa back then was a land of opportunity for anyone with a good idea. He had many, and, along with his father and brother, he set up Kenya’s first printing press, a Coca-Cola bottling factory and, later, when he moved to Uganda, a grain mill. With his new-found prosperity he employed a cook, and so my mother grew up not cooking, but being cooked for, until she arrived in England.

My family’s arrival in this country was sudden and part of a well-documented episode in British history. Idi Amin, tyrant, dictator and then-president of Uganda, woke up one day in 1972 and gave all Asians living there 90 days’ notice to leave the country before he would start to kill them. Along with thousands of others, my family left everything: their homes, businesses, money and friends. They arrived in Lincolnshire with one suitcase between all five of them and £50 with which to start a new life.

While the backdrop to their lives changed in every way – the country itself, the language, the people, the culture, the weather and local ingredients – their food did not. My grandparents went to work, and my mother reassembled our Indian kitchen in Lincolnshire and carried on cooking the family recipes.

She met my father, had me and my sister, and continued to cook, day in, day out, to feed her growing family, arranging whatever she could afford into various pots and pans to magical effect, conjuring up tastes and smells of the past and linking us, in an instant, to our ancestral home.

At the same time, she started to use local ingredients. Indian cooking can be adapted to any place by encompassing whatever ingredients are available. As we lived in Lincolnshire, a county that abounds in local produce, she was able to use gorgeous beetroot, rhubarb and squash in her cooking, as well as fish from the nearby docks in Grimsby and local meat (including the famous Lincolnshire sausages).

Whichever vegetables or meat she used, every day there would be fresh hot chapattis – made in minutes, gobbled in seconds. She would cook dishes so fragrant with cloves, cinnamon and cumin that they’d make your mouth water and your belly rumble, and her sweetly spiced puddings filled the house with smells that would make you weak at the knees. All these dishes were cooked with love, instinct and her trusty wooden spoon – the same spoon that she bought just days after arriving in the UK with barely a penny to her name.

My mother’s spoon cast a spell over me from a young age, and it is to her that I owe my love of cooking. Using all the culinary knowledge that she passed on to me, I’ve created this collection of recipes so that you can make the same delicious, fresh-tasting food in your own home.

Some of the dishes in this book are ancient family recipes which have never been recorded or written down until now. They were passed down from woman to woman in our family, with easy-to-remember anecdotes for when cooking alone, with sayings such as ‘the mango should be as hard as a cricket ball’ and the dough ‘as soft as your ear lobe’, or ‘when the spoon sticks up in the mixture, it’s ready’. Many measurements were in ‘handfuls’, ‘bowls’ and unique boxes and tins.

Other recipes are my mother’s, all of which apply Gujarati know-how and techniques to local ingredients. A couple of her recipes are Ugandan.

And a few are mine and have come into my kitchen (and heart) by way of friends, my travels far and wide across India and my experimentation in the kitchen using Indian flavours.

Not everything in this book is a ‘curry’ (a term I use loosely for dishes with sauce), and there are no set rules. Many dishes are frugal and thrifty, turning humble vegetables, store-cupboard ingredients and even leftovers into something delicious.

I hope this book will allow you to experience what we consider to be real home-cooked Indian food, and will also give you a greater understanding of different ingredients and techniques so that you can come up with your own recipes using your own instinct, with just a few key spices and whatever happens to be in your fridge.

On my last birthday, Mum passed her treasured wooden spoon over to me as a present. With it was a note that simply read, ‘Happy cooking’. I hope, like that spoon, this book fills your kitchen with the same happiness as it has done ours.

A word on Indian cookery

Indian food has a reputation for being intimidating and complicated, but this is a myth. The majority of Indian home cooking is fresh, simple and quick, and I’m on a mission to show you just how easy it is.

This book is written for everyone, from first-timers to seasoned cooks, and for those who love Indian food but don’t know where to start.

Most of the recipes can be cooked quickly, in around 30 minutes, and you should be able to pick up the majority of ingredients in your local supermarket on the way home from work without having to go on a wild-goose chase (there are no wild-goose recipes in this book).

How to use this book

In order to help you, I’ve laid out a section that introduces you to Indian ingredients here, explaining what each one tastes like and how to use it, along with shopping tips. There is also an Alternative Contents here, which will help you to pick what to cook depending on the occasion or your mood, and there are some menu ideas here.

Try your dish at the start, middle and end. Add something, stir and taste, and if it’s a spice or chilli you’re adding, add it little by little. The more you taste, the more you’ll be able to understand your ingredients, how they behave and what you enjoy.

Recipe titles and the names of spices are given in English, with translations in Gujarati and the odd adopted Hindi or Swahili word, unless the dish or spice is better known by its Indian name, in which case the translation is in English.

Kitchen equipment

Although there are many items specific to a traditional Indian kitchen, the truth is that very little special equipment is needed in order to get started. When I left home to come to London I took with me a spice tin, a sharp knife, a lidded pan, a saucepan and a wooden spoon. I cooked in a kitchen the size of a phone booth. All went well – I’m still friends with the people I cooked dinner for back then – and I’ve not added a huge amount of special equipment to my kitchen since.

• Some pans: a wide-bottomed frying pan with a lid, or two frying pans if you cook a lot. One with a tight clear lid is very useful when you’re cooking rice (so that you can look in without letting the steam escape). A deep saucepan is essential too.

• A rolling pin, if making breads. Indian rolling pins, velans, are thin and light and easy to manoeuvre (see Recommended suppliers, here).

• A large, heavy pestle and mortar for crushing garlic, ginger, chillies and bashing up spices.

• A chapatti board (a patlo): inexpensive and available online (see Recommended suppliers, here), it will help you to roll perfect round chapattis because of its circular shape.

• A wooden chapatti press: this small disc-shaped press has a short handle attached at one side, and allows you to press your chapattis and other breads so that they cook quickly and evenly.

• An electric spice grinder: although it does a similar job to a pestle and mortar, if you’re cooking a lot it’s worth the investment as it will transform whole spices and nuts into a fine powder in seconds. A wet and dry one will allow you to whizz up garlic, ginger and chillies into a paste too.

• An Indian spice tin (a masala dabba), to keep all your favourite spices fresh and to hand (see Recommended suppliers, here).

• A blender or food processor, for making light work of frequent tasks such as chopping vegetables and blending chutneys or tomatoes; especially useful when cooking in large quantities.

• An ice-cream maker, if tempted by the recipes in this book. While you can always churn by hand, an ice-cream maker does all the hard work for you. The small ones are relatively inexpensive to buy now, and make ice cream an easy and quick dessert to whip up.

Helpful weights and measures

Appetites will vary (so plan accordingly), but as a general rule allocate 50–60g of dry rice per person. As for pulses, allow 100g of the dried variety per person, or 200g of soaked or tinned.

Around 150–200g of meat or fish is a good amount per person for a main meal, alongside other things such as bread or sides.

A good rule of thumb if you’re using meat on the bone is to buy a third more than the weight of boneless meat given in a recipe. For example, if a recipe calls for 600g of boneless meat, buy around 800g of meat on the bone.

You might find the following measures helpful if grinding whole spices for powder.

Eat like an Indian, think like an Indian

Without wanting to generalize too much, before you start to cook like an Indian, here’s how to think like an Indian:

Always look like you’re studying hard when your parents are around, no matter how old you are.

Never waste food. Offer it to neighbours, the postman and the birds before putting it in the bin.

Always turn up an hour late for an event, or set the time of your event an hour early to ensure your guests arrive on time; this is called ‘Indian Time’.

As an Indian host, you must feed your guests until they beg for mercy – it’s the ultimate hospitality.

Believe that almonds have the power to increase your IQ, even if it’s not been scientifically proven.

No matter how many people in your family, make sure everyone piles into the same car, whatever the length of your journey.

Spend at least an hour at the door when saying goodbye to people you’re visiting.

Do not come back from India with baggage under the weight limit – it is a faux pas.

Make good Tupperware part of the family, and never waste a good container. Mum’s chapatti-flour tub is a Vitalite one from the 1990s.

Cling-film your remote control and don’t take the covers off the posh sofa, no matter how many years you’ve had it.

Call any Indian woman older than you ‘Aunty’, and any older man ‘Uncle’.

Be naturally suspicious of any food which is not home-cooked. Always take your own food with you wherever you go, even if you’re not going far.

Assess the suitability of your sister’s or friend’s new date by first asking how much they earn and what their parents do.

If one member of the family is going on holiday, gather the entire family to say goodbye at the airport.

Every Indian man must have a Mercedes, and every car must have a gilded tissue box.

STARTERS AND SNACKS

Indians are always nibbling; in fact, India has one of the biggest street-food and snacking cultures in the world. With a lot of passion for food and very little regulation about who can sell food and where, streets thrum and resonate across the country with the calls of a thousand food hawkers selling their snacks. Whether it’s from their bikes turned into kitchens, from bins turned into ovens or from baskets perched on their heads, food is sold everywhere.

In the far north in Amritsar you’ll find queues of turbaned Sikhs waiting for the legendary Amritsari fish, a spiced deep-fried kingfish, and in the winter the mustard-seed curry ‘sarson ka saag’, topped with freshly made butter and mopped up with cornbread. Travel down to Delhi and you’ll see spiced potato tikki (see here), dressed with tamarind chutney, and delicious blackened kebabs served with ‘roomali roti’ – chapattis as thin as hankies and as big as car wheels. In Mumbai, they love pav bhaji (see here), a rich mash of vegetables eaten with bread, chicken tikka (see here) and chaat (see here). Head east to Kolkata for a ‘kati roll’ – an egg-fried wrap of meat or vegetables; west to Gujarat for some fluffy ondwa (see here) or moreish pea kachori (see here); and south for dosas, thin crispy pancakes made from rice and lentils.

What might have started out as an idea on the street can now be found in the homes of many Indians, recreating the famous dishes they first tried on a hot, dusty street corner and adding them to the snacks already served in their homes.

My favourites are the ubiquitous samosas (see here); the chilli paneer (see here), which I first encountered near my grandparents’ home in Leicester; and the corn on the cob (see here), which our family has eaten in the same way in Uganda, in India and in Lincolnshire, where it grows as tall as me.

There is so much variety, the only tough decision you’ll face is what to eat first.

PEA KACHORI

Pastry-encased cinnamon-spiced peas

These delicious balls of pea-green joy are an old Gujarati delicacy. They are often served at family functions because they’re very easy to wolf down when no one is looking. Baked in the oven, they are best served on a bed of sharp lime-pickled onions (see here), alongside some mint and yoghurt chutney (see here).

A food processor is ideal to make the kachori mixture, but if you don’t have one, you can use a pestle and mortar and a potato masher. Amazingly, pea kachori can be made almost entirely from items you’ll probably already have in the freezer and store cupboard.

MAKES AROUND 25 KACHORI (TO SERVE 5 TO 8 PEOPLE)

For the filling

4cm ginger, peeled and roughly chopped

2 fresh green chillies, roughly chopped (deseeded if you prefer less heat)

600g frozen petit pois or garden peas, defrosted

rapeseed oil

1 teaspoon mustard seeds

1¼ teaspoons ground cinnamon

1¼ teaspoons garam masala

½ teaspoon ground turmeric

1¾ teaspoons salt (or to taste)

½ teaspoon chilli powder

For the pastry

300g plain white flour, plus extra to dust

½ teaspoon salt

1½ tablespoons rapeseed oil

175ml hot water

Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas 4 and lightly grease a tray with some oil.

Place the ginger and green chillies in a food processor and blitz into a paste, or bash them up using a pestle and mortar. If using a food processor, remove the paste and set to one side. Briefly blitz the peas in the food processor and set aside, or mash up using a potato masher.

Put 3 tablespoons of oil into a frying pan on a medium heat and, when it’s hot, add the mustard seeds. When they start to crackle, add the ginger and chilli paste, stir-fry for a couple of minutes, then add the peas and cook for a further 5 minutes.

Now add the cinnamon, garam masala, turmeric, salt and chilli powder. Cook for a further 2 minutes, or until there is little to no moisture left but the peas are still bright green. Transfer to a bowl and put to one side.

To make the dough, put the flour into a bowl, make a well in the middle and add the salt and oil. Rub through with your fingers until the flour resembles fine breadcrumbs. Pour in 120ml of the water and add the rest little by little, kneading it into the dough until it feels nice and firm. Pour a teaspoon of oil into your hands and pat the dough with it to keep it moist.

Before rolling out the pastry, get your station ready. You will need a clean floured surface, a bowl of flour and a rolling pin. Now pinch off a blob of dough roughly the size of a marshmallow. Dip your dough ball into the bowl of flour and roll out to a circle roughly 10cm in diameter (the size of a bottom of a mug). To speed things up, you can divide the dough into the small balls before rolling and stuffing them.

To make the kachori, pop a heaped teaspoon of pea mixture in the middle and bring the sides of the pastry up tightly around the peas. Seal the pastry at the top by pinching it closed, then pinch off any excess pastry, roll the kachori into a ball and put it on a plate. Then make the rest. The first one you make might look a bit odd, so mark it out for tasting when it comes out of the oven.

Roll the kachori balls around on the baking tray to coat them in the oil and bake in the oven for 20 to 30 minutes, or until golden brown.

Pea Kachori

CHILLI PANEER

Every now and then, when we were growing up, Mum would find me and my sister wherever we were hiding in the house, whip us into the car and take us to Leicester on a sari shopping expedition. Our only consolation (aside from secretly unravelling beautifully folded saris in the shops) was a dish of freshly prepared chilli paneer from one of the nearby food stalls or cafés afterwards.

This dish is as popular with kids as it is with grandparents. Here’s Mum’s recipe for this spectacular street food.

SERVES 4

1½ teaspoons cumin seeds

400g paneer

rapeseed oil

4 cloves of garlic, crushed

1 fresh green chilli, very finely sliced

¾ teaspoon ground black pepper

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon tomato purée

½ teaspoon sugar

4 spring onions, finely sliced into rings

lemon wedges, to serve

Throw the cumin seeds into a pestle and mortar and roughly grind them to a coarse powder. Next cut the paneer into 2cm cubes. Pour a thin coating of oil (2mm) into a large frying pan and bring it to a high heat. Fry the paneer in batches, turning the pieces until golden brown on each side, and transfer them to a paper-towelled dish. Watch out, as the paneer may spit; if so, half cover the pan with a lid.

Put 2 tablespoons of oil into the pan, followed by the garlic, green chilli, cumin, black pepper and salt. Sauté for around 3 minutes on a low heat, stirring occasionally. Add the tomato purée and sugar and stir, then put the paneer back into the pan along with a splash of water. Cover the pan and simmer for a further 5 minutes.

Take the lid off the pan, add the spring onions and simmer until there is no water left. Serve fresh and hot with a squeeze of lemon.

Chilli Paneer

FIRE-SMOKED AUBERGINES

Ringra nu orro

I used to bake my aubergines in the oven for this recipe, but after seeing my aunt smoke hers to perfection over a direct flame in her kitchen in Porbandar, I can’t go back to my old ways. She holds the aubergine by its green stalk over the stove until the skin chars and the soft, creamy white flesh begins to peek through. Then she peels off the blackened skin and cooks the aubergine in a garlic and tomato sauce.

It’s a gorgeously rich, smoky mash of flavours and one of my all-time favourite dishes. I eat it hot or cold with chapattis, chapatti crisps or fresh naans.

SERVES 4 TO 6 AS A DIP

4cm ginger, peeled and roughly chopped

5 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped

1 fresh green chilli, roughly chopped

salt

2 large aubergines

3 tablespoons rapeseed oil (plus extra for brushing the aubergines with)

1 onion, finely chopped

2 medium ripe tomatoes, finely chopped

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon ground coriander

a small bunch of fresh coriander (20g)

To serve

Greek yoghurt

chapattis or chapatti crisps (see here)

Put the ginger, garlic and chilli into a pestle and mortar along with a pinch of salt, bash to a pulp and set aside.

Pierce the aubergines in a few places with a sharp knife so that they don’t explode when cooking, and lightly brush them with some oil. Hold them one by one with a pair of tongs over a naked flame on the stove. Keep turning them until the skin blackens and the aubergine collapses and goes floppy. This should take around 15 minutes for both aubergines.

When the aubergines are cool enough to handle, peel off the charred skin, scoop the flesh out into a bowl and mash using a fork, then set aside.

Put the oil into a wide-bottomed, lidded frying pan on a medium heat. When it’s hot, fry the onion for 8 to 10 minutes, until soft and golden. Add the tomatoes, cover the pan and allow them to cook for another 4 to 5 minutes. Then add the ginger, garlic and chilli paste and leave to cook for a couple of minutes before adding the aubergine mash, cumin, ground coriander and ¾ of a teaspoon of salt.

Cover the pan, and cook for a further 5 minutes until all the ingredients have come together into a lovely thick mash. Taste for salt and spice and adjust if necessary.

Chop the fresh coriander and stir into the mash, then serve in a large sharing bowl or in individual bowls with a dollop of yoghurt on the top and some small chapattis or chapatti crisps on the side.

Fire-Smoked Aubergines

CORN ON THE COB WITH CHILLI GARLIC BUTTER

Sekeli makai anna marchu

Corn has followed my family on our journey halfway across the world. It grew in Porbandar in India, where my grandma grew up; in Kampala, Uganda, where Mum grew up; and in Lincolnshire, where I grew up. We still eat it in the same way, no matter which country we’re in: blistered on a fire until it becomes deliciously smoky, then slathered in chilli butter with a squeeze of lime to finish. The garlic is my addition: I think it tastes great melted into spicy butter.

Try to buy your corn when it’s as fresh as possible, and with husks if you’re not eating it straight away, as corn starts to deteriorate the moment it’s been harvested. It should feel tender, bouncy to the touch, and juice easily when you press it.

SERVES 4

For the chilli garlic butter

100g salted butter

4 fat cloves of garlic, crushed

1 fresh red chilli, very finely chopped

a little salt, if need be

4 fresh corn cobs

1 lime, quartered

To make the chilli garlic butter, cut the butter into cubes and put it into a small pan on a gentle heat. When it’s melted, add the garlic and chilli, stir and leave to cook for around 5 minutes, then pour into a bowl. Leave to one side to cool down.

Take the corn cobs out of the fridge around 10 to 15 minutes before cooking to get them to room temperature. Pull out any hair-like strands, as they can catch on fire when cooking.

Turn the gas hob to a medium to high flame and, taking one of the cobs, hold it over the heat with a pair of tongs. Rotate it every 30 seconds until the kernels start to blacken and char. If it starts to pop, turn the heat down a little bit and carry on. It should take around 5 to 6 minutes to cook each cob.

Keep the cooked cobs warm by wrapping them tightly in foil until you’re ready to eat. Serve with the chilli garlic butter spooned over the top, a sprinkle of salt and a squeeze of lime.

Tip: I love to make a big batch of this chilli garlic butter and keep it in the fridge so I can add a spoonful to whatever I’m cooking.

Corn on the Cob with Chilli Garlic Butter

ONDWA

Semolina bread with spiced vegetables

The ultimate Gujarati all-in-one snack, ondwa is a type of bread made with yoghurt and semolina, studded with vegetables and topped with a layer of glimmering mustard seeds and sesame seeds. In Gujarati households it’s pretty much expected that you have a running supply of ondwa in your fridge in case friends or family pop by (although all the better for you if they don’t).

This recipe benefits from the savoury taste of older yoghurt, to give it a slightly sour tang, so the longer you’ve had yours, the better.

MAKES 12 PORTIONS

For the ondwa

2 tablespoons rapeseed oil (plus extra to oil the cake tin)

225g coarse semolina

250ml whole-milk yoghurt

1 courgette (200g), grated

2 medium carrots (180g in total), grated

100g green peas

1 onion, finely chopped

4cm ginger, peeled and finely grated

½ teaspoon ground turmeric

½ teaspoon chilli powder

¾ teaspoon salt

1½ teaspoons baking powder

100ml water

For the tarka

2 tablespoons rapeseed oil

1 fresh red chilli, finely chopped

1 tablespoon sesame seeds (plus extra to sprinkle)

½ tablespoon mustard seeds (plus extra to sprinkle)

Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F/gas 6 and lightly grease a 25cm × 30cm cake tin with oil.

Put the semolina into a large bowl, pour in 2 tablespoons of oil and mix together. Add the yoghurt, courgette, carrots, peas, onion, ginger, turmeric, chilli powder, salt and baking powder. Mix thoroughly.

Pour in 75ml of the water, then add the rest little by little, until the batter takes on a thick, custard-like consistency. Taste the mixture – although it will be raw, it will give you a good idea of salt and chilli seasoning – and adjust if necessary.

THE BEGINNING

CONTENTS

ALTERNATIVE CONTENTS

Great first-timer recipes

Something for the weekend

Midweek meals (30 minutes or so)

Cooking in advance

Quick things to have on the side (10 minutes or so)

Get the kids involved

Store-cupboard curries

Party food

Low-fat

Vegan

Best for tiffins (packed lunches)

For the freezer

Gluten-free (and good with rice)

Dairy-free

List of Recipes

Introduction

A word on Indian cookery

How to use this book

Kitchen equipment

Helpful weights and measures

Eat like an Indian, think like an Indian

STARTERS AND SNACKS

PEA KACHORI

Pastry-encased cinnamon-spiced peas

CHILLI PANEER

FIRE-SMOKED AUBERGINES

Ringra nu orro

CORN ON THE COB WITH CHILLI GARLIC BUTTER

Sekeli makai anna marchu

ONDWA

Semolina bread with spiced vegetables