Indian food fun and easy

This is a very interesting interview of Anjum Anands. She's actually a very great author and in fact I was able to read her previous works and it was like actually eating something while reading it. Credits to the writer Kristine Hansen of Journal Sentinel.

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She's been called "the Indian Nigella Lawson" by Vogue - a very high compliment in food circles.

Anjum Anand's approach to developing recipes is as colorful as her past. Born and raised in Switzerland and London, she flies back and forth to Calcutta and Delhi often to see family.

Her first two books - "Indian Food Made Easy" (2008) and "Indian Every Day: Light, Healthy Indian Food" (2005) - were published in England and garnered her many fans, in part due to her approachable, fun style. Yet she's also spent time in the kitchen: at Café Spice in New York; and Tommy Tang and the Mondrian Hotel in Los Angeles.

Anand's latest cookbook, "Anjum's New Indian" (Wiley, $25), published in October. It details how to prepare easy-to-make regional Indian dishes, from raitas and chutneys to velvety mango mousse and dried pomegranate chicken. In May, her show "Indian Food Made Easy" debuted on the Cooking Channel, the Food Network's new sister station.

She recently talked about Indian comfort foods, her latest book and what it's like to cook on television.

Q. Where do you find inspiration for creating a particular recipe?

A. I'm inspired when reading about the ingredients of a region, and also by its history. . . .  A good example is when I wanted to create a menu for an episode in my second series, which was based around food from the region of Punjab and was to be filmed in Scotland.

The next day I saw someone eating a cranachan, a traditional Scottish dessert made with oats, cream, honey and whiskey. People from Punjab are known to love Scotch and also creamy, milky desserts. I put the two together and made an almond cream, into which I folded some whiskey and layered it with toasted oats and blackberries. It was absolutely delicious.

Q. Your book focuses on Indian food that's quick to make. What are your favorite weekday recipes?

A. It really depends on my mood and the season. I crave hearty curries when it's cold and lighter ones, grills and salads when it turns warm. My husband and daughter are vegetarian, so the meals are normally of this nature.

I make lots of one-pot dishes and lots of rice dishes. I regularly cook a brown-rice pilaf, which has both protein and vegetables. I love different earthy lentil curries and spiced soups. My current favorite is carrot, ginger and coriander soup. In the summer months, I often also add some substantial salads to my diet, like a spice-grilled mushroom salad with goat cheese or a tandoori-chicken salad with a delicious pistachio dressing.

Q. Can you suggest easy ways to incorporate Indian spices into a meal?

A. Marinate your red and white meats in freshly ground spices before cooking. Try a spice-roasted chicken, or make a marinade with ginger, garlic, yogurt, lemon juice and garam masala, and coat some lamb or lamb chops in this mix overnight. Grill or barbecue the next day.

Heat some oil and sizzle some simple spices before adding seasonal vegetables. Try potatoes with cumin, nigella, fennel and brown mustard seeds, or carrots with brown mustard seeds and buttered spinach with carom seeds.

Soups are a great foil for spicy flavors, so add spices as you cook, or add a little garam masala at the end.

Q. If you were to host a spontaneous dinner party this weekend, what would you serve?

A. I like to cook chicken or fish, as they are really quick and easy to make but still delicious. My favorites are a black pepper and ginger chicken or a North Indian, tomato-based fish curry.

I would then cook a low-maintenance, spice-crusted new potato dish and choose a seasonal green or even peas or some simple sautéed spinach dish to go with them. . . . 

The whole meal shouldn't take more than an hour to cook. Dessert would probably be a thick, saffron-scented yogurt dish with some seasonal fruit or, if time is really tight, good quality ice cream or sorbets, which are cooling and refreshing.

Q. What do you consider Indian comfort food during the winter season?

A. Hearty curries, stuffed shallow-fried Indian breads, crisp samosas and pakoras (vegetable fritters), sweet milky puddings and lots of sweet, milky spiced tea.



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