Info. wanted: Chutneys
Packman, Aaron I.
but not much else. I'm tempted to just go out and buy a jar, but I though
that I'd try to get more info. and see if I can make some myself. Can
anyone help me out with recipes for chutneys, recipes using chutneys,
and anything else that might be useful? Any advice would be much appreciated.
aaron packman
p.s. My tastes don't run to lots of chili powder or similar spices. I don't
know the range of flavors for chutneys, but would prefer to stay away from
anthing that's really hot.
Shankar Bhattacharyya
>I'd like to get some informations on chutneys...I know the general concept,
>but not much else. I'm tempted to just go out and buy a jar, but I though
>that I'd try to get more info. and see if I can make some myself. Can
>anyone help me out with recipes for chutneys, recipes using chutneys,
>and anything else that might be useful? Any advice would be much appreciated.
Well, given recent interest in chutneys, here is a bigoted overview. These
are my opinions, and they are undoubtedly parochial.
First, I disclaim comprehensiveness.
Chutneys cover a sizable range. At one end are the condiment chutneys, such
as those from coriander, mint, tamarind, and coconut, which get used as
dips, or get added to idlis and dosas (comments on which I will leave to my
southern compatriots). These are usually intended to contribute flavour,
and that is it. They are our logical equivalent to ketchup.
A fair number of recipes for these have been posted recently.
I'm not sure I would call the onion and pepper stuff a chutney. I'd
probably call it the onion and pepper stuff. That's probably parochial.
Then there are the dessert chutneys, which are real dishes, served towards
the end of meals, before the deadly serious desserts. In some communities,
as in mine, they would get served before yogurt and dessert.
Dessert chutneys can be made from a wide range of things. Popular items are
tomatoes (very popular in eastern India), pineapples, plums (usually dried
plums, which I'm told are identically equal to prunes), and other fruits.
Tomato chutney ranges from rustic to elegant, and is terrific stuff.
Pineapple and plum chutneys are elegant. The plum product is one of my
favourite dishes. Pineapple chutney has prestige, but I find it somewhat
bland. Besides, it is probably immoral to eat pineapples in any way that
does not involve getting the juice all over your shirt-front.
Dessert chutneys could also be served as a snack, often with puris.
You then slide over into murabba's, which are sort of like preserves. I
particularly like those made from mangoes, and from some Indian fruits for
which I don't have English names (awla or amloki, and chalta).
Then there are some things, like the Gujarati chhunda, which is a sweet and
spicy preparation of shredded green mango, of which I am enormously fond,
but I'm not sure whether I would call that a chutney, or a pickle, or a
murabba. Hey, I'm just a consumer. I won't attempt to categorize someone
else's dish. You can buy that in the stores, but that's only so-so.
I like chhunda on a chapatti. Pita serves for me, since I'm too lazy to
make chapattis, and I can't bring myself to buy them.
Finally you have things like Major Grey's. Those are an abomination unto
the lord, and are likely what you get if you buy a bottle of chutney. No
offense, Aaron, I confess to bigotry on the subject.
Actually, I rather like them on a sandwich, and they don't taste bad at
all, but they're not much like any other chutneys I know. I'm simply
pulling an authenticity kick here. Only because I am in a confessional
frame of mind am I even admitting that I kind of like these abominations.
Of course, no one else need take that bigotry too seriously. I think there
is a point to the authenticity police in terms of standards of identity,
but there is no reason to let a name interfere with whether one likes a
dish.
I would not consider buying something like that in India, where real
chutneys are abundant, but over here I confess to buying a bottle every
few years.
If there is interest in the desert chutneys, I'll post recipes for the
tomato and plum jobs. I have posted them before, and have a copy on
my machine.
- Shankar
Bob Brunjes
>In article <8APR1992...@juliet.caltech.edu> aa...@juliet.caltech.edu (Packman, Aaron I.) writes:
>
>>I'd like to get some informations on chutneys...I know the general concept,
>>but not much else. I'm tempted to just go out and buy a jar, but I though
>>that I'd try to get more info. and see if I can make some myself. Can
>>anyone help me out with recipes for chutneys, recipes using chutneys,
>>and anything else that might be useful? Any advice would be much appreciated.
>
>Well, given recent interest in chutneys, here is a bigoted overview. These
>are my opinions, and they are undoubtedly parochial.
>
you can impart great depth to a subject without seeming overbearing.)
>
>If there is interest in the desert chutneys,
>I'll post recipes for the
>tomato and plum jobs. I have posted them before, and have a copy on
>my machine.
>
>- Shankar
Bob Brunjes Applied Microsystems Corp
Redmond, WA
r...@amc.com
Shankar Bhattacharyya
Here are recipes for a pair of dessert chutneys, with some preliminary
verbiage. These are not related to the condiment chutneys used as dips for
pakoras and such.
I have posted them before, so if you have a case of deja vu, you'll know
why. There has been minor editing, to reflect stuff I've learnt since then.
Indian sweets are served as snacks more often than as desserts.
Dessert is served in more formal situations, ranging from the family
special occasion to the formal banquet. When chutneys are served, they are
served up towards the end of the meal, followed by yogurt, and then the
dessert proper. That is how it is in my part of India, anyway.
Most meals do not include any kind of dessert.
The basic technique is rather similar for a variety of chutneys. So the two
recipes I provide below are somewhat redundant. I could easily provide just
one, plus a small diff file. Anyway...
The basic spicing is done with panch phoron. This five spice mixture
contains approximately equal quantities of fennel, mustard, and cumin,
and rather less nigella, and even less fenugreek, all as seeds. For
chutneys I prefer a bias towards fennel and mustard, and away from
fenugreek. (For regular vegetable dishes I prefer a bias towards mustard,
with rather less fennel.)
The mustard should be the purple stuff one gets in the South Asian stores.
Don't get heavy-handed with the cumin. That guarantees the "all Indian food
tastes the same" nonsense, much as if you were to flavour all Italian food
with just oregano.
Black jeera = kalonji = nigella, although I don't know what it has to
do with cumin.
For either recipe, estimated time : about 30 real person-minutes, about
1 hr by the clock. If you are really efficient, you could cut it down to
about 15 person-minutes. Allow extra time to refrigerate the product.
The units are American. Quantities are not critical.
1 teaspoon = 5 ml, 1 tablespoon = 15 ml, 1 cup = 237 ml, 1 lb = 454 g,
within precision sufficient for any kitchen needs.
TOMATO CHUTNEY:
Materials:
ghee or oil 1 to 1.5 tsp
panch phoron generous pinch
finely minced ginger 1.5 tsp (strongly recommend a very sharp knife)
tomatoes 2 lb
dried hot red pepper 1
raisins 3 tbsp
sugar 0.5 cup to 0.75 cup
salt 0.5 tsp
water 0.25 cup
lemon juice 1.5 tbsp
For an elegant preparation, peel and seed the tomatoes. For a more
everyday preparation, do not. If you do peel and seed them, recover the
juices by straining off the seeds and set the juices aside. Allow extra
time to do this. I usually get some unfortunate slave to do this, so it
is not real time, anyway. I hope none of my friends see this, or I will
have recalcitrant slaves the next time round.
Ideally, slice the tomatoes into thin wedges. Alternatively, chop
coarsely. When I am lazy, I just drop them in the food processor and abuse
them for a few seconds. They should *not* get homogenized, just chopped
up.
Heat the oil, add the panch phoron. Stir fry for a few seconds.
Add the tomatoes, ginger and red pepper, and cook at high heat for 2 min.
Note that some spattering may occur when you add the tomatoes to the hot
oil.
Add any reserved juices, water, sugar, and salt. Cover, and cook gently
for 10-15 min, or until the tomatoes are tender. Add the raisins somewhere
along the way, depending on how cooked you like your raisins.
Uncover, and heat at high heat to thicken the chutney. A gauze cover may be
useful, since this will bubble and pop like thich pasta sauce while you
are boiling it down.
Remove from heat. Add lemon juice. Refrigerate and serve, either by
itself, or with puris. Failing puris (which are a fair bit of work), nan,
which you can buy, or warmed pita bread, at a pinch.
Puris go especially well with thick implementations, served as a snack. My
judgment is that those implementations need a bit more sugar.
Yield: 3 cups, serves six people.
Comments:
The tomatoes need to be of good quality. Many of the tomatoes one sees in
American supermarkets simply don't have enough flavour. Poor tomatoes
cannot be overcome. Maybe one should start with tomato seeds and a seed
tray.
The final product should have just a hint of pepper. And it should be mildly
tangy, but not seriously sour.
The consistency of the refrigerated product should be such that it pours,
with just a suggestion of gelling. If it is intended as a snack, it can
be thicker.
**************************************************************************
ALOO BUKHARA CHUTNEY:
A major source of aloo bukhara used to be Afghanistan. Not really
surprising, really, for something with "Bukhara" in its name. The war
disrupted Afghanistan rather a lot, of course, and I don't know where it
comes from now.
The aloo bukhara is, as far as I know, identically equal to the plum.
Nita Goyal, at Stanford, tells me that this is so. She has tried this with
fresh plums, and reports that the product is right. My sister, who knows
such things, also agrees. Prunes, I am told, are identically equal to dried
plums.
However, prunes, as bought in the US, are not quite like the aloo bukhara
I'm used to. They are too sweet. I find it useful to throw in a bunch of
apricots to cut the sweetness. There are some other differences in the
taste, but it is close.
Of course, the chutney is usually made from the dried fruit, and since in
my part of the world it is dried without benefit of sulfites, it is not
much like the prunes one gets in the US. Perhaps that is the entire
difference.
If possible, use unsulfited fruit. The product tastes more like what I
remember. Also, at least a few people are seriously sensitive to
sulfites. I'm not, but I don't like the taste.
South Asian stores sometimes carry aloo bukhara.
I will use "aloo bukhara", since it is entirely unambiguous to me.
Materials:
water 16 fl oz
aloo bukhara 8 oz, dried, preferably unsulfited
oil or ghee 1 - 1.5 tsp
panch phoron generous pinch
finely minced ginger 0.75 tsp
chopped dates 4 oz.
salt generous pinch
molasses 2 tbsp (optional; or just increase the sugar a bit)
brown sugar 0.25 cup, perhaps less (see comments)
raisins 0.25 cup
lemon juice, if necessary, to taste
Bring the water to a boil. Add the aloo bukhara, simmer for about 3 min.
Separate from the water and allow to cool. Set the water aside.
If the aloo bukhara are small, leave them whole. Otherwise, cut them in half.
In my judgment the texture is far superior if they are left whole.
Heat the oil, add panch phoron, stir fry for a few seconds. Add the ginger,
stir fry for another few seconds. Add the dates, and continue cooking for
about a minute.
Mix in the aloo bukhara, salt, and the water in which the aloo bukhara
were blanched. Cover and simmer till the fruit is tender, and the sauce
has begun to thicken. I would estimate about 10-15 minutes.
If it shows no sign of thickening when the aloo bukhara have become tender,
declare victory and proceed. The fruit should not be allowed to
disintegrate.
Add the sugar, molasses and raisins, cook for another 2 minutes. If the
product is not tart enough, add some lemon juice. It should be fairly tart,
and only moderately sweet.
Remove from heat, allow to cool, refrigerate, serve. Preferably with
puris. I think this really needs puris, or, at any rate, it rates them.
Not that it is bad by itself. This is the most clearly magnificent of the
dessert chutneys.
Yield: about 3 cups.
Comments:
The aloo bukhara should be in a sauce which is thick enough to adhere to the
fruit, but not much thicker than that. Some people like it almost as
thick as preserves, but they obviously failed to learn proper values at
their respective mothers' knees.
Both of these chutneys are desserts. They are not condiments. Don't go
dipping pakoras in them. That would be sacrilege.
- Shankar
Siddharth Dasgupta
unfortunately I have not been able to make (but someone else might).
It requires raw papaya, not the orange-yellow flesh of the ripe
papayas we get in the supermarkets in LA (someday I will have my very
own papaya tree ;-)). If you have access to this, here is a way to
consume these.
Papaya chutney
1 - raw papaya
2 tsp - oil
panch phoran - see Shankar's post for details - 1 pinch
water - 1/2 cup
sugar - to taste
lime juice - to taste
1. Slice papaya thinly - this is critical - it ideally should be wafer
thin. Boil in water for 5-7 minutes - till they soften. Drain.
2. Heat oil in wok. Add panch phoran. Now add the papaya and coat once
with oil. Now add the sugar and water. Boil till the papaya becomes
almost transparent or the water dries up. Squeeze lemon juice.
(The amount of sugar to be added depends on one's taste - this is
expected to be slightly tart from the lemon juice and somewhat sweet too.)
Shankar Bhattacharyya
>ALOO BUKHARA CHUTNEY: (i.e. plum chutney)
> aloo bukhara 8 oz, dried, preferably unsulfited
I meant to say, but forgot: if possible, get them with the pits still
inside, and leave the pits in. The process of removing the pits exposes the
interior to the cooking fluids, and texture suffers.
You just have to get over any reservations as to the politeness of spitting
pits out at the dinner table.
- Shankar
Brent Thompson
>In the same spirit as Shankar's posting on chutneys here is one that
>unfortunately I have not been able to make (but someone else might).
>It requires raw papaya, not the orange-yellow flesh of the ripe
>papayas we get in the supermarkets in LA (someday I will have my very
>own papaya tree ;-)).
Here in the San Francisco Bay area most Vietnamese markets usually have green
papaya, both whole and shredded. There must be plenty of markets in LA/
Pasadena catering to SE Asian community -- maybe you'll be able to find
green papaya there. No hope looking, of course, in markets for Yankees.
--- Brent