Indian Kidney Bean Curry: Rajma Masala

There are various recipes for kidney bean curries in the northern part of the Indian Subcontinent, with red kidney beans commonly used, including in Nepal and Bangladesh (light or dark red type), but brown type pinto beans are used in some places. In the Kashmir region, onion and garlic are not always used by everyone, and they also use Kashmiri ground red pepper, which is very red, but not as hot as regular Indian ground red chili powder. This regular hot Indian red chili powder is generally used elsewhere in India (it is very much like cayenne pepper). If you don't have Kashmiri chili powder, you can use 2/3 teaspoon sweet paprika (not the smoked type common in Spain) and 1/3 teaspoon cayenne pepper as a substitute, but then still add 1/2 to 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper (or other hot red pepper) in the recipe. I know some folks don't like much heat, but actually this isn't a red hot dish that will cause smoke to billow out of your mouth. A fairly common connection in the various recipes is that the beans are cooked and then some are mashed to varying degrees, and this helps to thicken the curry without any other ingredients being added. 

  

The kidney bean curry is almost always served with a nice portion of rice next to it, and then it is referred to as "Rajma Chawal" (kidney beans and rice), but pickled red onions are another good accompaniment.*  

 

By the way, I've found that this is one of those dishes that improves when the leftovers are put in the refrigerator until the next day; so, the curry is great to serve then too.

 

 

Ingredients (4 to 6 servings):

 

2 cans of kidney beans (14.5 to 16 ounces), rinsed and drained

2 tablespoons vegetable oil or other neutral oil

3 cloves garlic, minced

2 inch piece ginger, peeled and grated or finely chopped

1 small to medium green chili (a jalapeno chili is fine), chopped

1 1/2 cups chopped red onion

1 1/2 cups tomato puree

1 teaspoon ground turmeric

1 teaspoon Kashmiri chili powder (or 2/3 teaspoon sweet paprika + 1/3 teaspoon cayenne pepper)

1/2 to 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper (or regular Indian chili powder)

2 teaspoons ground coriander

1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin

1 tablespoon fenugreek leaves

2 teaspoons salt 

2 tablespoons chopped cilantro (also known to some as 'coriander') 

1 cup warm water

 

Add 2 tablespoons oil to a pan or skillet (I use a 10 inch diameter skillet) over medium heat; add the chopped red onion and saute until the onions just start to brown a bit. Add the garlic, ginger and green chili, saute a further 1 or 2 minutes (the onion should be softened and with some brown color to it). Add the tomato puree, ground turmeric, chili powders (Kashmiri or the substitute + cayenne pepper), ground coriander, ground cumin, fenugreek leaves and salt; stir to mix everything together well and cook for about 4 or 5 minutes; then add the water and mix everything together well. Add the kidney beans, stirring well. Let the curry come to a boil, then adjust the heat to maintain a nice steady simmer; cook for 8 to 10 minutes, then use a fork or potato masher and mash the mixture, so that about a third to a half of the beans are mashed to some degree (they don't have to be totally mashed), then mix all together well. Add the chopped cilantro (fresh coriander) and mix in and cook another 1 to 2 minutes. Serve with either rice, pickled onions or naan bread (or chapati/roti bread), or go for it and serve with rice, pickled onions and one of the bread types. 

    

* For how to make easy pickled red onions, here is the link: https://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2023/03/indian-style-pickled-red-onions.html

  

 

 

WORD HISTORY:

Soufflé (also souffle)-The main part of this word is related to "bladder" and to "blow" (to move air), both from the Germanic roots of English, and to "inflate," a word English borrowed directly from Latin. "Souffle" is formed of two parts, with the first part going back to Indo European "upo," meaning "up, up from beneath, up from under." The main part goes back to Indo European "bhle(h)," meaning "to blow." This gave Old Italic "flao" meaning "to blow" (with the  'b' of Indo European rendered as 'f' in Italic), and this gave Latin "flare" with the meanings "to blow, to breathe." These forms gave Latin "sufflare" meaning "to blow up with air, to inflate," and this passed into Old French as "souffler" (initially 'sofler?') meaning "to blow up, to inflate, to blow out (exhale);" thus, the figurative "to whisper." This gave French the noun "soufflé" from the participle form of "souffler" and essentially meaning "that which is puffed up," and used as a culinary term for "a dish with beaten egg whites that are folded into other ingredients, and which then make the dish 'puff up' when baked." English borrowed the word from French, circa 1815.

Indian Style Pickled Red Onions

Pickled fruits and vegetables are quite common among the various nationality groups of the Indian Subcontinent, and these "pickled red onions" are a frequent accompaniment to foods there. Chili peppers are also a big part of the food cultures of the Indian Subcontinent, and they are added to pickled onions, but they don't typically add mouth numbing heat to the onions. Red onions are the usual choice for pickling on the Indian Subcontinent, and some people there use small red onions, simply peeled and perhaps with a cut or two into the onion to allow the brine to enter, but larger red onions are also used, and they need to be sliced about a quarter of an inch wide so that the pickling brine can do its work. 

 

 

Ingredients:

  

1 large (baseball size) red onion, peeled

1 to 1 1/2 cups water

2 teaspoons white vinegar

1 to 3 teaspoons sugar (depending upon desired tartness/sweetness)

1 teaspoon salt

8 black peppercorns, cracked (not obliterated)

1 inch piece of grated ginger 

1 to 3 small chilies, slit (or use dried chilies, they will re-hydrate in the brine)

3 to 4 beet slices (not pickled)

Add the water, white vinegar, sugar, salt, cracked peppercorns, grated ginger and chilies to a pan over high heat. Stir to mix the ingredients around, Let the brine come to a boil for 20 to 30 seconds, then turn off the heat. Let the brine sit while you peel the onion and slice it into rounds about 1/4 inch thick, and then halve the rounds. Separate the onion half rings. Put the half rings into a bowl or jar (remember: non reactive), then pour the somewhat cooled brine over the onions. Cover (with a lid for the jar or a plate for a bowl) and let sit about 30 minutes, by which time the mixture should be cooled down and ready to be placed into the refrigerator. Leave the onions in the frig for 12 to 36 hours before serving. It's best to use the pickled onions within a week.  

 

WORD HISTORY:

Crowd-This word goes back to Indo European "greud/grewt," which had the idea of "to press, to push (against)." This gave its Old Germanic offspring "krudanan," with the same meaning, which gave Old English (Anglo-Saxon) "crudan" meaning "to press or drive forward or against." This then became "cruden," "crouden," "croudyn," before the modern version. The 1300s saw the noun form develop with the meaning, "the act of pressing or driving forward or against," and by the mid 1500s came the meaning "a large number of people closely collected together in the same area (with the density of people implying that they were pressing and shoving against each other)." As time passed, this meaning lost the notion of "pressing and shoving," and it simply took the meaning of "a group of people assembled in a particular area, often for some type of entertainment or common purpose," and this meaning was unique to English, as none of the other Germanic languages developed this exact sense. German once had "kroten" (press), Lowe German once had "kruden" (pressing, pushing, shoving), Dutch once had "kruien/cruien" (pressing, pushing, overrunning), Frisian once had "kruie/krude."

Jamaican Oxtails

Oxtails were once considered poor people food, but certainly that has not been the case in more modern times. "Generally," an oxtail is cut into about 1 1/2 to 2 inch pieces (that is, segments) by the butcher, and the pieces include the bone. Naturally some segments are larger in diameter than others, as the oxtails taper from the larger part where it connects to the animal, to thinner pieces near the end of the tail. You may well see oxtails packaged and sold in boxes, or perhaps packaged in plastic bags, which is how I tend to buy them. Oxtails are commonly prepared in Jamaica, where there are numerous individual and family recipes. Oxtails are best when cooked slowly; so, that makes a slow cooker a great choice, or just cook them for a few hours over low heat on the stove top in a heavy-bottom pan/pot.   

 

 

Ingredients (4 servings):

 

3 1/2 to 4 pounds oxtail pieces (that's like 1 medium to large oxtail; soaked in vinegar and water, see instructions below)

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

2/3 cup chopped onion

5 green onions (scallions), chopped (including green)

5 garlic cloves, minced

1 1/2 cups sliced or chopped carrots

1 scotch bonnet or habanero chili, seeded and finely chopped (heat lovers: use 2 or 3 scotch bonnets)

1 1/2 cups beef stock

1 teaspoon Gravy Master or Kitchen Bouquet

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 1/2 teaspoons ground black pepper

2 teaspoons ground allspice

1 1/2 teaspoons dried thyme (crushed in the palm of your hand)

2 tablespoons tomato ketchup

2 teaspoons seasoned salt

3 tablespoons water mixed into 1 1/2 tablespoons cornstarch

 

In a non-reactive pan or bowl, mix together 2 tablespoons of white vinegar and enough water to cover the oxtails. Let soak 5 to 7 minutes, then pour off the water and rinse the oxtails in cool water and pat them dry with some paper towels. Add the oil to a skillet over medium heat; brown both sides of the larger oxtail pieces (I don't brown the small end pieces). Put all of the ingredients, except the cornstarch and water, into a slow cooker (or pan, if cooking on the stove top). I have an older slow cooker, so I set it at "high" for 75 minutes, then turn it to "low" for the duration until the oxtails are very tender (generally about 4 to 6 hours); for stove top, you can do similarly by setting the heat on "high" for about 30 minutes, then turn the heat to "low" for the duration (about 3 to 4 hours). Oxtails have a fair amount of fat, so you may choose to skim off some of the fat. Remove the oxtails carefully to a plate from the pan/cooker. I empty the cooking liquid from the slow cooker into a sauce pan and heat it and add the cornstarch/water mix to thicken it (of course, if you cook the oxtails on the stove top, you can just thicken the cooking liquid in that pan). Add the oxtail pieces back into the thickened gravy before serving. I'm a mashed potatoes kind of guy, especially with the rich gravy of the oxtails, but rice is another great choice.

 

 

 

WORD HISTORY:

Detail-This word is related to "tailor," a Latin-derived word borrowed by English from French; more specifically, from the French spoken by descendants of the Normans in England. "Detail" is a prefixed word with the "de" from Latin "dis," in this case acting as an intensifier and meaning, "completely, totally." The main part of the word is of unknown origin, but Latin had the noun "talea," meaning "a narrow or slender piece of wood;" thus, "a stick, a twig, a rod." This gave Latin the verb "taliare" meaning "to cut," and this passed into Latin-based Old French as "taillier," meaning "to cut into pieces," and this then gave French the noun "detaillier," meaning "something or an item cut into pieces," which then became "detail" meaning "(the act of) cutting into pieces;" thus also, "a small piece (of something)," and this then became "détail," meaning "small parts of something, the particulars of something." English borrowed the word around 1600 as "detail," and the verb either came from the same French source or simply developed from the borrowed noun in the mid 1600s, or perhaps more likely something of both. The verb means "to tell something with many or all specifics;" thus also later, "to do work with attention to the smallest particulars."