Papaya Khar - Omita 'r Khar

April 2008 saw us in The Netherlands. Haagshe Markt in Den Haag is an absolute treasure trove of ‘exotic’ vegetables and fruits and it was fabulous to find fruits and vegetables that we had not tasted for many years.

fresh vegetables and olives in a stall

one of the fish stalls with an impressive array of fresh fish

One 'treasure' we bought in the market was raw papaya. Mother-in-law, Mrs Shanti Gogoi, taught us how to cook a typical Assamese dish made with raw papaya - ‘Omita’r Khar’. Alas, we had no access to the traditional alkali used to spice up the dish and bicarbonate of soda was substituted in its absence.

The traditional alkali is made with the skins of certain species of bananas – athiya kol or bhim kol - in our ancestral village home of my paternal grandfather. The banana skins are dried for a few days and then burnt to an ash on a wood fire. The ‘ash’ is then soaked in water and filtered to give a blackish liquid which is the ‘khar’ or alkali used for cooking.

Does the absence of such a traditional ingredient make a difference to the dish? To the connoisseur, yes. But then we have to adapt and modify according to where we live. And even to the discerning connoisseur, the slight difference in taste is acceptable. And I hear that these traditional ingredients are also difficult to come by even in the cities and towns of Assam, as town and city dwellers are in favour of more modern ingredients!!

A helping hand for mother-in-law by sister-in-law, Mitali

Recipe for Papaya Khar – Omita’r Khar

1 raw papaya, peeled, seeded and cut into chunks

handful of skinned mung dal, washed (about a third of a cup)

3 cloves of fat garlic, sliced

1 tbsp oil, sunflower or vegetable ( I use sunflower )

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda or 1 tbsp of the real kol khar liquid

salt to taste (about 1 tsp)

250 ml water, approximately

1 tbsp mustard oil, optional and if available

Method

1. Heat the oil in a pan. Then add the garlic and fry for a few seconds until the slices turn a golden brown. Do not let the garlic burn!

2. Add the papaya chunks and stir until coated with the oil. Then add the mung dal, salt, the bicarbonate of soda or the kol khar alkali and give everything a good stir.

3. Add the water, bring to the boil and cook on a low fire until the papaya chunks are butter soft and nearly broken down and the mung beans too are soft. The mixture should be like a thick soup. Stir from time to time.

4. Take off the heat and transfer to a serving dish. Drizzle the mustard oil if using and serve.

dinner in TGI Fridays

Long working week. Celebrated the end of the week with a hard earned rest for NKG in the kitchen by going to TGI Fridays. I really do not like going out to eat at weekends - too busy everywhere and a mad mad rush that seems to escalate when one goes out.

The food in TGI Fridays was unremarkable - ribs and burgers the flavour of the evening. I was not allowed to take photographs of the food by the girls once again but did get a click of the cocktail drink that elder daughter BG is now allowed to have a sip of. At least this is one of the very few restaurants where I can get a non-alcoholic cocktail.

It is rare that at home we mix different fruit juices to make our own 'mocktail' but a trip to TGI Fridays does fire up the brain cells and I usually try to make one of my own sometimes. I have tried asking for a mocktail when going out to other restaurants - even those with a bar - and also in pubs but I end up getting strange looks. Daughters have told me not to ask for the impossible. What exactly is so special about mixing up a few fruit juices and serving the drink in a tall glass with a straw and a few pieces of fruit on a stick?

Found in the fridge - a bottle of grenadine from our visit to France, some oranges, full fat natural yoghurt and of course some sparkling mineral water. So my own version of cocktails are born - no names for them as yet!

For the first one, I poured a dash of grenadine into a tall glass followed by some sparkling mineral water and then some freshly squeezed orange juice. The layers do not remain stratified even when poured gently. A garnish of a twisted slice of orange on a straw in the glass and my first tipple was ready.

For the second mocktail, a twist on lassi, an Indian yoghurt based drink, came to mind. I used the yoghurt with some plain tap water and some of the freshly squeezed orange juice - a dash of salt made it a foul tasting concoction. No margarita for me!

roasted rhubarb creme brûlée on a cold winter's day

Cold cold winter's day. Days are short and the darkness seems to invade the deepest corners of the soul.

Magh Bihu - the Assamese harvest festival - in the middle of the winter and little in the way of celebration for those Non Resident Indian Assamese (NRIAs). Assam celebrates with enthusiasm and folks abroad can only reminisce. The late night communal feasts followed by the early morning bonfires - meji - and all those fabulous Assamese pithas - memories and dreams!

How does one celebrate when family are far away and most are recovering from the excesses of the festive season? Hmmm... and NG insists that he wants to cook. Well. let the man cook and just think of desserts. Easy. Decadence. Creme brûlée - with some tart roasted pink rhubarb to relive those cold winter days in Assam. Get it all in the oven the first night and then sit back and relax and let the kids have fun with a blow-torch the next day or night!

Recipe for Roasted Rhubarb Creme Brûlée

Equipment

1 flat oven tray lined with a silicone mat

1 large deep oven tray

6 ramekins (150 ml sizes are suitable)

whisk

wooden spoon or wire whisk

2 large bowls

or 1 large bowl and one saucepan

blow torch, if available

Ingredients :

8 large free range egg yolks

1 pint / 500 ml double cream

1 vanilla pod

3 ounces caster sugar

400 grams of pink rhubarb, chopped into 2 cm lengths

about three ounces of caster sugar (or more!) to sweeten the rhubarb

extra caster sugar for the caramelized sugar topping

Method

1. Heat the oven to 180 degrees C.
2. Spread the rhubarb on the flat tray and sprinkle liberally with the sugar.
3. Roast the rhubarb for about thirty minutes until the rhubarb is soft - the sugar will have melted and there will be a sticky pink syrup. Remove from the oven and let it cool.
4. Turn the oven down to about 150 degrees C.
5. Get the ramekins ready on a large deep oven tray. Distribute the roasted rhubarb equally between them - mathematically impossible?
6. Heat the double cream in a pan or in a deep bowl in the microwave with the vanilla pod until it is just about to boil. Remove from heat and set aside.
7. Beat the sugar and the egg yolks together in a large bowl with a wooden spoon - using a whisk will make too many bubbles which are not wanted.
8. Slit the vanilla pod lengthwise and scrape the seeds into the egg and sugar mixture.
9. Add the hot cream to the egg and sugar mixture slowly stirring with the wooden spoon or wire whisk all the time. The mixture will thicken slightly like a runny custard. Carefully pour the mixture into the ramekins fairly equally. Some rhubarb pieces may float to the top - does it really matter? No!
10. Put the tray into the oven and pour boiling water into the oven tray so that the water comes up to about half to two-thirds of the height of the ramekins. Bain marie is the term.
11. Leave the ramekins in the oven for about thirty minutes - the custard should have a slight wobble when the ramekin is tilted gently. Hot hot hot! use an oven glove to do this. If the custard is still too runny, leave for another ten minutes. But do not let the custard set hard - it will be a horrible creme brûlée.
12. Take the tray out of the oven and then lift the ramekins out to cool. Once the ramekins are cool, put them in the refrigerator till you are ready to eat them - hopefully within the next day or two.
13. A few minutes before you are ready to eat, take the ramekins out of the fridge. Take a tablespoon of caster sugar and pour it into a ramekin. Swirl the sugar around and tip the rest into another ramekin - keep swirling and pouring and adding more sugar until all the ramekins have a layer of sugar.
14. Get the blow torch ready and caramelise the sugar on the top. Move the blow torch around gently until the sugar melts and bubbles away. Be careful that the sugar does not get burnt. If you do not have a blow torch, get the grill really really hot and caramelise under the grill. Purists will sit the ramekins on a bed of ice so that the custard does not boil over.
15. Let the sugar cool down and harden into a golden brown stained glass effect. Serve with some extra roasted rhubarb if you wish.

Tap tap tap with the back of the spoon to break and get through the caramel and carefully get a spoon into the ambrosial dessert. Heaven.

The egg whites from making the creme brulee were not thrown away - made snowy white meringues studded with dried rhubarb pieces the next night! 

Cala Pi, Mallorca

Miserable grey weather in winter with little sunshine meant that the extended family decided that going away over the christmas holidays for some much needed sunshine would be the best way to spend time together. None of the older generation wanted to enjoy the snow in France or anywhere else.

During the long cold evenings of October and November, all four sister-in-laws in different towns and villages, would get busy after the children were in bed to discuss holiday destinations and flights.  On the phone to sister-in-laws MB in the Nederlands, JB in London and RB in Kent and on-line too. Decided that as we had already been to Portugal one winter not long ago, Mallorca seemed a sunnier option.  Accommodation booked on-line.  Only flights needed booking.  Found cheap flights for seventeen of us to Palma.  And then just as one was about to send the payment details, realised that the resort was in the island of Mallorca and the flight was going to another Palma - in Tenerife!!! Phew! just in time a major disaster was avoided.

Beach in La Palma - empty! in late December

Four different self-catering apartments in a resort called Cala Pi was home for a week. We got together for all meals whether eating in the apartment or eating out. The resort was very quiet as it is out of the way but with a car, no town was too far away.  Built on the rocks, the small beach was just a little walk down.

The market in Llucmajor was small - just a few stalls in the square. Only a few intrepid 'explorers' went to market before breakfast - brothers AB and PB, parents, nephews Rohin and Sami and myself. The range of fresh vegetables and fruits in the middle of winter was amazing. Green, orange, brown, white, purple, red - a fabulous palette of colours. Piles and piles of clementines still with their leaves and a variety of wild mushrooms too. A milky looking local 'hooch' was also being sold by some of the stallholders. Breakfast for us ended up being fresh bread from a bakery with mountain cheese bought from a cheese stall and some air dried ham from the delicatessen van. We returned to the apartments with food enough for an army but without the whole leg of ham that I thought would be good to bring back to England :( I did bring a leg of air dried ham back from Spain one summer - it lasted forever it seemed and everyone got bored of eating the same ham :) hence the lack of enthusiasm from family members.

vegetable stall in Llucmajor

mallorcan clementines : fresh and drooly juicy

Wild mushrooms for sale : delicious stir fried with plenty of garlic and some chillies

the range of sausages and hams in a van

Lively chirpy chickens were being sold from the back of a van - not sure whether they were for breeding or for the pot. Our thoughts were for the pot.

for the pot or garden?

One of the best days we had was in La Palma, the capital. We found a fabulous bar serving incredible tapas. Each plate of tapas had a toothpick in it. The bill was calculated by the number of toothpicks that were left at the end of the meal!! Unfortunately brother SB was out of action with flu for the entire week and he missed out.