Indian Potato and Cheese Patties: Aloo Paneer Tikki

Paneer is a fresh white cheese common in the regions of the Indian subcontinent. It is relatively dry and compressed, and it doesn't melt. Paneer is also referred to as "cottage cheese" by some people from the Indian subcontinent. Paneer looks a lot like feta cheese, and indeed, it is often crumbled for use, as is feta cheese. It can easily be found in Indian/Pakistani grocery stores, and also it is sold in many cheese shops. As with many food items from around the world, paneer was once a rarity, but it is now a product much more easily found, although it's been pretty well known in the UK for a longer period of time, because of the relationship between the UK and some of the countries of the Indian subcontinent having been part of India when it was a British colony. You can certainly use dry cottage cheese as a substitute, although it isn't quite as available as it once was. It usually comes in containers just like regular cottage cheese (some may also come compressed into cakes, just like feta and paneer), but it is "dry;" that is, it doesn't have the milky liquid that regular cottage cheese has. The potato and cheese patties are easy to make, with the only possible "hitch" being the spice blends. Spice mixes, like garam masala, have become pretty easily available in the U.S. and other parts of the world. Garam masala is simply a spice mixture, and in the Indian subcontinent there isn't just one recipe for garam masala, but rather many families have their own homemade versions. It is not really the same as curry powder, another type of spice mixture, but with turmeric being a prominent ingredient. You can easily find garam masala in supermarkets, spice shops and Indian/Pakistani grocery stores. Chaat masala is another spice blend and it may well be a little more difficult to find, although if you live near an Indian/Pakistani grocery, you should have have no trouble. Also some supermarkets may have it; otherwise, you can use the spices I've listed in the recipe below, although you likely don't have dried mango powder, which adds tartness, but there is such a small amount in chaat masala, it's best just to skip the dried mango powder. Just a note, if you use the individual spices in of the garam masala and chaat masala spice mixtures, be sure to use all of the spices I've listed for both (except the dried mango powder, as noted above), even though you'll need to use some spices twice, as they are in both. So there is no confusion here, in the Indian subcontinent, "chili powder" means types of hot red chilies ground into powder, and it is always hot to some degree, but in the U.S., Canada and Mexico, and perhaps countries influenced by these countries, "chili powder" typically is ground chilies, but it is not especially "hot," unless stated as such. In the U.S., the main use for chili powder is to make the famous stew called "chili/chile (con carne)." When I was a kid, the term "chili con carne" was often heard, but then it was often shortened to just "chili/chile," and you may well see both spellings, although in the UK you'll likely see it spelled "chilli." While chili powder in the Indian subcontinent always has a degree of heat, some people use Kashmiri chili powder for these patties, and it is less intense with the heat, but it is nice and red; so, if you have Kashmiri chili powder, give it a try in these patties, or you can use some cayenne pepper mixed with sweet paprika as a substitute (bright red paprika, if you have it).     

You can do these patties one of two ways: first, you can make the potato mixture, and then make the paneer filling. Form the potato mixture into golf ball sized rounds and then flatten the rounds into patties. Then put a "depression" in the middle of the patties and take small amounts of the paneer filling and roll them into rounds of about 1/4 to 1/3 the size of the potato patties. Put the fillings into the depressions and then close and seal the fillings by again forming rounds and then once again press the rounds lightly to form patties. Second, and much easier, and the recipe below, you can mix the paneer and all of the ingredients together, and then simply form patties for frying. These potato and cheese patties can be habit forming!  

 

Ingredients:  

1 very large potato or 2 medium potatoes

1 or 2 green chilies (fresh jalapeños are good), finely chopped

1 teaspoon ground ginger

3 1/2 teaspoons garam masala, or substitute: good pinch black pepper, 1/4 teaspoon ground coriander, 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin, pinch ground cloves, 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon, pinch nutmeg

1 teaspoon chaat masala, or substitute: 1/2 teaspoon ground coriander, 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin, 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper, pinch of dried ground mango powder

1 teaspoon ground red pepper (like cayenne, or 1/2 teaspoon cayenne + 1/2 teaspoon sweet paprika)

1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric

1/2 pound paneer 

1 1/2 to 2 tablespoons cornstarch (called "cornflour" in India)

(optional) good pinch black salt*

3/4 to 1 teaspoon salt

2 or 3 tablespoons chopped coriander

3 or 4 tablespoons vegetable oil + more if needed

 

Boil the potatoes in their skins until just tender (not totally soft and mushy!), drain them and let them cool until you can handle them. Remove the skins and grate the potatoes into a bowl. Then grate or finely chopped the paneer into the bowl. Add the finely chopped chili pepper(s), ground ginger, the spice mixes or the individual spices, the ground red pepper, ground turmeric, cornstarch, black salt (if using), regular salt and chopped coriander. Mix very well, preferably by hand. Heat the oil in a skillet over medium heat. Roll the mixture into golf ball size rounds, then press them into patties. Fry the patties until golden brown on both sides (they should be somewhat crispy on the outside, but still soft inside). Serve with ketchup, mint chutney** or coriander chutney.***  

* Indian black salt, which tends to be more pink or purplish in color, has a sulfur (British English: sulphur) content. It is fairly commonly used in the cooking of the Indian subcontinent. Indian black salt is available in "some" supermarkets, "some" herb and spice shops, Asian shops or Indian/Pakistani product shops, as well as online, but it is becoming more available in many markets and supermarkets. Hawaiian black salt has charcoal mixed in. Both Hawaiian and Indian black salts are believed by some to have health benefits.

 

** This is the link to my recipe for mint chutney: https://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2017/07/indian-mint-chutney.html 

 

*** This is the link to my recipe for coriander chutney:  https://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2018/10/indian-coriander-chutney.html

 

WORD HISTORY:

Stack-This word is related to "stake," the noun meaning "pointed piece of wood," a word from the Germanic roots of English, and it is also related to both "attach" and "attack," with "attach" being borrowed by English from French, after French had gotten the basic word from Germanic Frankish. "Attack" is from the same Old Germanic source, and it too was borrowed by English from French, but French seems to have gotten it from Italian.^ "Stack" goes back to Indo European "steg/stek," which meant "pole, stake, stick, post." The Old Germanic offshoot was "stakon," with the same meaning, and its Old Norse offspring was "stakkr," which meant "haystack," a meaning "perhaps" derived from the idea of stakes being used as measuring devices?^^ English borrowed the word from Old Norse^^^ circa 1300 as "stacke," but the ending 'e' was later dropped, and the meaning expanded beyond hay to include just about any items placed in a pile or heap, with more common usage for objects that easily fit one on top of the other, like books or dinner plates. The verb was derived from the noun about one hundred years later, initially meaning, "to put hay into a heap," then expanded "to pile items one atop the other." The first half of the 1800s seems to have seen the first usage of "stack the deck in card games," meaning "to deliberately arrange the cards of a deck improperly to benefit one player" (later expanded beyond card games). Relatives in some other Germanic languages: Danish has "stak," meaning, "stack, line or row of items;" Norwegian has "stakk," as part of "høystakk" ("haystack"), and also "stakk," a computer data storage term; Swedish has "stack" meaning, "pile or heap of something," also, "an anthill;" and Icelandic has "stakkur," meaning, "stack, pile."  

 

^ The somewhat confusing history of the closely related words "attach" and "attack" are in the "Word History" of this article: https://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2011/03/german-question-part-eighty-six.html   

 

^^ There are also forms in Slavic languages, as for example, transliterated Russian has "stog" ("haystack") and Polish has "stóg" (stack, haystack).    

 

^^^ Old Norse was a language from the North Germanic branch of the Germanic languages. Its most prominent descendants are Danish, Faroese, Icelandic, Norwegian and Swedish.