Asian Spiced Tuna Steaks with a Black Bean and Red Wine Butter Sauce

Joe: We bought some nice tuna steaks at the Reading Terminal Market and I decided to try something new. This recipe is a variation of a recipe from Ming Tsai. He uses fermented beans and serves the steaks on a bed of potato salad. I used regular black beans and did a presentation where I layed strips of tuna steak on deep fried potato slices.

First I cut a potato very thinly. I fried the slices in some canola oil until they were nice and brown. Drain and set aside.

I ground three tablespoons of peppercorns (assorted if you have them), a tablespoon each of black cumin, cumin and coriander seeds and a teaspoon of chili powder in a mortar and pestle. Salt the tuna, and then coat in the spice mixture and set aside.

Slice one shallot and some ginger. Heat a small pot or saucier over med to med high heat. Add the shallots, ginger, a half cup of red wine of your choosing, a quarter cup of black beans, salt and pepper. You want to reduce the wine completely. After the wine is about gone, pour in a quarter cup of cream. When the cream comes to a boil remove from the heat to a blender. Blend on high. Add 3/4 pound of cold butter in one inch slices until the sauce is smooth. You can keep this warm in a double boiler.

Put a small amount of canola oil in a pan and get the pan very hot. Saute the steaks until the spices turn brown. You are looking for a nice crust and medium rare inside.

To serve, cut the steaks on a bias. Arange the potato slices on the plate and put a slice of tuna on each potato. Drizzle sauce on the tuna and on the plate.

Sarah: This was a tasty dish, and beautifully presented. I think the spice crust was a bit much-- it tended to overwhelm the tuna. This probably would work better with a thicker tuna steak-- ours was only about an inch thick, which makes it hard to get a nice sear and still be rare inside, and I think that a higher ratio of tuna to spices would balance the flavors better. Amazing sauce, though!

Serious spices at Chung King Garden

Strictly speaking, this is a cooking blog, and as such should not contain restaurant reviews. But why impose arbitrary limits? This is a blog about good food, and learning about cuisines that are new to me and possibly to you, and believe me, this restaurant delivered on both counts.

Chung King Garden is in Philadelphia's Chinatown, a few convenient steps away from Market East Station. When we lived in New York, Joe and I loved to explore Chinatown on the weekends, but when I was diagnosed with a wheat allergy we stopped going, with heavy hearts. Now that I know it was a misdiagnosis, I'm thrilled to be able to eat my way through Philly's Chinatown.

This particular spot comes highly recommended by my friend Lynn, who grew up in Taiwan and loves spicy food. Chung King is known for super-spicy, authentic Szechuan cuisine. She suggested we try out Chung King and get lots of different dishes, and if you know me you know I'm not about to turn down an offer like that. So Lynn, my friend Joel, and my husband Joe and I met up last night and started ordering.

The menu is long and involved, with sections for dry-panned meats, water-boiled items, soups, etc. There's also a page at the very back with "American Chinese Food," which is clearly for the tourists. I don't know how Chung King's General Tso Chicken rates, and I don't care. This is Chinese food far above and beyond what corner takeout joints deliver.

Joel is a vegetarian, so we ordered a mix of meat and veggie dishes. Lots of the vegetable dishes here do contain meat, but when Lynn asked in Chinese, the servers were happy to leave it out.

Ma Po Tofu: I've had this dish in its gloopy American form, and wasn't impressed, but this was divine. Cubes of creamy, silky tofu came in a light but fiery orange sauce, with dry spices sprinkled liberally on top-- black pepper and anise, definitely, and I think possibly cloves as well. They left the pork out, and I'm curious what that would be like, but the dish certainly didn't suffer.

Quick Fried Lamb: Visually, this looks the most like what Americans expect: a meat stir-fried with vegetables and served with rice. The lamb was sliced thin and surprisingly tender for having been quickly stir-fried. There were fried pieces of garlic and ginger as well as bamboo, and some seriously tasty wood-ear mushrooms. The heat was slow but intense. (Joe had the leftovers for lunch today and says that it got even hotter overnight.)

Bok Choy with Mushrooms: A non-spicy dish. This was very simple, just bok choy, mushrooms, and a basic white sauce, but the ingredients were fresh and the mushrooms had a savory, deeply satisfying flavor.

Loofah: Yes, like the sponge. This dish wasn't on the menu, but apparently it's a special fairly often, and Lynn asked for it. This is the outer part of the live sponge, stir-fried in a light white sauce. It has the color and texture of a honeydew melon, but the taste is more savory and green-vegetable-like. Lynn, who's had it before, said it wasn't the best example she'd had-- it gets slightly bitter if it's not very fresh. We all ate and enjoyed it anyway, though.

Chicken with Spicy Peppers: This is the dish I'm still craving today, even though my body is punishing me for eating so much of it. I've never had such a flavorful, addictive variation on popcorn chicken! The dish is simply tiny breaded chunks of chicken meat and pieces of dried red chilies, apparently fried quickly at very high heat. There's no sauce, and there doesn't need to be-- you just pick out golden brown bits of fried chicken from their hiding places among the peppers. It's very hot, and absolutely impossible to stop eating, even when you are very full.

We washed everything down with $2 Tsingtao-- I'm not normally much for lagers, but this had a pleasant fruity quality and really matched the spicy food.

Oh, and the bill? $63, for four of us, alcohol included. Can't beat that. The service was on the slow side, but they were friendly and helpful. It's a clean, pretty, roomy restaurant, and we spotted a karaoke room in the back. And it didn't hurt to have such excellent company!

I'm definitely looking forward to going back and experimenting-- there are lots of creative soups (tomato and scrambled egg soup? I'm in!) and after a couple of Tsingtaos you might even talk me into trying some organ meats. Maybe. Either way, I need more of that spicy chicken, just as soon as my system recovers!

Pork chops cooked with whole spices and tamarind juice; Maya's Potatoes with Yogurt

It's a lazy Sunday in Fishtown, Mythbusters is on the tube, and the weather is cooling off. Time for some nice Amish pork chops and potatoes. I was raised on meat and potatoes; this is just a more interesting variation.

First of all, you have to get good pork chops. We get ours at L. Halteman Amish Foods in the Reading Terminal Market. The preparation is really easy-- time-consuming, because of all the simmering, but not difficult. (Which is actually a common theme in the dishes I'm making.) You heat just enough oil to coat the bottom of your stockpot, and brown the pork chops. Jaffrey says to do this in two batches, but I was halving her recipe-- she called for 8 pork chops, and there are only two of us. Still, I had trouble fitting all four pork chops until they cooked down and shrank a bit. Brown them, take them out, put them on a plate for a minute. Put in two whole garlic cloves, a cinnamon stick, a couple of dried red peppers, and some cloves, peppercorns and cardamom pods. Fry for a few seconds and then add a bit of salt and a cup of water. (You have hot oil going here, so I'd really recommend shielding yourself with the pot lid while you do this.) Re-introduce the pork chops and simmer for half an hour, turning occasionally. Things will be smelling really good right about now. When the half hour is over, time for the remaining ingredients. Jaffrey doesn't tell you to do this, but I took out the pork chops for a minute while I whisked in the tamarind paste, sugar and salt-- it just seemed like a real pain to mix otherwise. Reintroduced the pork chops and simmered for another half hour, turning occasionally.

Now for the potatoes. I didn't start them until I had the pork chops simmering, which was a bit of a miscalculation-- the chops were done well before the potatoes. Best to start these at the same time. I made these potatoes back at the beginning of this blog, and they were quite tasty. But between then and now, I've made a few spice-buying trips, so I had things like dried chillies, fenugreek, caraway seeds, and fennel, which were missing before. I also decided to do the variation with yogurt. (Jaffrey has you prepare Maya's Potatoes and then adds a paragraph about adding the yogurt.) You fry your potatoes till they're nice and golden brown, then drain the oil. If you're me, you'll lose control of the heavy cast iron pan and end up dumping some potatoes into the sink and almost burning your hand. If you're not me, you may be able to avoid this.

Next, fry your spices. Now, technically, you're supposed to make this mixture in the stockpot, then introduce the potatoes from the frying pan and simmer in the stockpot. However, my stockpot was busy simmering pork chops, so I had to be creative. I made the spice/tomato mixture in a small saucepan-- fried the spices, then added the onion/garlic paste from the blender (no ginger this time) plus turmeric, fried that for five minutes, added tomatoes and sugar, and fried that for five minutes. The mixture smelled absolutely incredible. I added it back into the frying pan and coated the potatoes. I added in a pint of water, then remembered that I was supposed to be halving the recipe and that it should be half a pint. Yeah, I'm not too bright. I compensated by cooking this uncovered for longer than called for, then covering. This gets about 20 minutes of simmering, all told.

When that's done, turn off the heat and let the potatoes cool for a few minutes. Jaffrey says to mix in the yogurt and heat on low heat, not enough to boil it (that would curdle the yogurt) but enough to heat it through. I found that the cast iron pan retained enough heat that merely folding in the yogurt and waiting for a minute was enough to heat the whole thing through.

Served with Flying Fish HopFish Ale. The pork chops had a nice flavor, but were a little dried out. Spooning the pot juices over the chops helped, but I'd shorten the cooking time next time.

As for the potatoes-- holy shit, you guys. We both ate too much because we couldn't keep away from these potatoes. I can't tell you how much of a difference having the right spices made. We could taste the fenugreek and caraway seeds. It had this wonderful toasty, complex flavor that wasn't there before. So nice. Oh my.

Notes for next time:
-Don't cook the pork chops for the full half hour each time. Not necessary.
-Remember, Sarah: cast iron pans are heavy.
-Spiciness! One of my continuing critiques throughout these posts is that whatever I make "could have been spicier." I'm thinking that Jaffrey, in writing an Indian cookbook for Brits, decided to be really conservative with the hot spices. She usually gives a range-- one to three chili peppers, to taste (optional). And when she does, I use three-- and it's still not that spicy. Screw that. Next time she tells me one to three, I'm adding four.

To be clear: I'm a recovering spice wimp. I grew up eating food with no spices whatsoever-- maybe some garlic salt if we were feeling really adventurous. When I went to college and started hanging out with Indians, my friend Deepa used to make her kebabs especially mild just for me, and I'd still be sweating and tearing up while I ate them. I've evolved since then, and I love spicy food, although I'm not a hot-sauce daredevil like my stepbrother AJ. In the last year or so, I've been deliberately trying to train my palate to tolerate hotter spices-- I plan to visit India in the next few years and I don't want to die! So: spice levels are going to rise. Be prepared.

I'm leaving on Thursday for the Socialism 2007 conference, and the food at the hotel is not allergy-friendly, so I'll be making several dishes this week to pack and take with me to Chicago. There's a big grass-fed chuck roast from Livengood Farms waiting for me, and some Fair Food Farmstand lamb stew meat that's going into a chana dal recipe. Mushroom dal is also on the agenda. Stay tuned.

Chicken with Tomato Sauce and Butter (aka Butter Chicken) and Chapatis

Hello again! Joe and I have had rough stomachs for a few days, so we haven't been doing much cooking. But I've been enjoying this experiment so much that I actually got a little twitchy after not cooking for a few days! I'm really finding it relaxing to cook-- I put on my apron and my music and just get into my "zone," you know? And I'm really becoming much more confident in the kitchen. I read a new recipe, in the New York Times or whatever, and I think "that would be easy." I'm more competent every week-- and it's such a gratifying skill to learn!

Anyway. On to dinner. I made this dish-- Butter Chicken, Chicken Makhni, or in Jaffrey's case, Chicken with Tomato Sauce and Butter, it seems to be pretty much the same dish wherever you go. This dish was popularized by a restaurant in Delhi called the Moti Mahal, which seems to be mentioned in just about every article about Indian food as it appears on non-Indian tables. Apparently the Moti Mahal introduced this dish in the eighties, and pretty much immediately went from being a no-name hole in the wall to being a famous, tourist-destination hole in the wall. That's exactly the sort of restaurant I seek out in New York City, so the Moti Mahal is definitely first on my list of things to do when I get to Delhi (whenever that will be). (On that note: if you're in New York, check out Fresh Dumpling in Chinatown, Kabob King in Jackson Heights, Jorge's in Ridgewood and Tacqueria la Fonda in Morningside Heights.)

This dish takes a while, but it's pretty simple. Indian mirepoix (onions, ginger, garlic) goes into the blender, along with lots of whole spices. There are several spices in the mix that are normally cooked whole and taken out-- bay leaves, red peppers, cinnamon sticks-- that are crumbled and put in the blender in this dish. Whole cloves, peppercorns and cardamom pods also go in. Blend all that into a paste.

Brown the chicken in the bottom of the stockpot. (You're supposed to use breasts and legs, but we used tenderloins from Trader Joe's, chopped into cubes.) Take out and set aside. Put the blender paste in and fry for 5 minutes. Add a pound of chopped/crushed tomatoes (we used canned organic tomatoes), half a cup of water and a teaspoon of salt. Boil, cover, simmer for half an hour, stirring periodically. Then add the chicken, simmer and stir periodically for another half an hour.

In the meantime, make your chapatis. I rolled them thinner than before, and they puffed up beautifully when Joe put them over the flame. He brushed them with butter (a bit too much, I think, given the buttery nature of the chicken dish) and kept them in foil.

When the second half hour of simmering is over, take 4 tablespoons of butter, cut into pats, take the pot off the heat and stir in the butter until it's melted. This changes the color of the sauce from red to orange, which is cool. Serve over rice, with chapatis. I had it with a Flying Fish Belgian Dubbel, 'cause that's just how I roll.

This was very tasty and very rich. Jaffrey has you put the spices whole into the blender, but I think next time I'll grind them with the mortar and pestle before I put them in. They didn't really break up in the blender, and we spent a lot of time trying not to bite into whole peppercorns. I probably could have gone heavier on the red chillies, as well. That, and not so much butter on the chapatis. But definitely a success.

So full...

Next up: masoor dal with assorted local mushrooms. Yum!

Lamb Chops in Yogurt with Whole Spices; Potato Patties (aloo-ki-tikiya)

For once, I actually made a lamb dish with lamb! Very exciting. And my dear husband Joe made a trip to the Indian grocery store, so we filled in a few of the gaps in our spice cabinet. (International Foods at 42nd and Walnut-- check them out!) I finally have cardamom pods and fenugreek seeds! Woo! And let me tell you, cardamom pods? They're magical. They smell wonderful and they add so much flavor to a simmering sauce... I'm actually a little annoyed with myself for making so many recipes with crappy-ass cardamom powder instead of the real deal. Sigh. No matter-- I have lots of pods now!

The lamb had to simmer for an hour, so while Joe was out returning our car, I started chopping. This was a deceptively simple dish. Here's what you do: Mix 4 tbsp yogurt with water and set aside. Brown your lamb chops in the pan. Set aside. Fry the spices-- a cinnamon stick, a red pepper, cloves, peppercorns, and a bay leaf. (We also got some decent dried red peppers-- the old ones from the grocery store in Queens just weren't giving off much flavor. These, on the other hand...) Put in your chopped ginger and garlic. (My ginger got moldy, so I had to break out the emergency jar. Yes, that's right, I keep an emergency jar of ginger in my fridge. What are you laughing at?) Fry for a minute, then throw in your chopped green coriander. Let it wilt for a bit, then put the lamb chops back in. Pour the watered-down yogurt into the pan, add salt, bring to a boil, then turn down the heat and cover. Check it every ten minutes, stir a bit, whatever it seems to need.

That's pretty much it. This was nice and low-maintenance. The lamb came out really tender and moist and just a hair above medium rare. I realized just now, while writing this, that in halving the recipe, I got a bit confused and added too much water to the yogurt, which may be why the sauce was really thin. I didn't treat it like a sauce, more like a poaching liquid, and that worked out well.

Then there were the potatoes. Madhur Jaffrey recommends boiling the potatoes whole two hours before dinner, then chopping and mashing them about half an hour before showtime. But I had to work late tonight, and Joe had to run to South Philly to pick up a package from UPS, so our potatoes got chopped, boiled and mashed in quick succession. They sat for maybe twenty minutes while I dealt with their filling.

The filling: this is a recipe that requires some advance planning. You have to soak 3 tbsp of urad dal for 24 hours. The problem with such recipes is that I'm a total slacker, and if it's been a rough day and I have cramps and I worked late, I'm liable to put off the dinner I'd planned and order takeout. Which is what happened yesterday and the day before. So by the time I got around to making this dish, my dal had been soaking in a glass of water on the counter for three days. There was a funky, bubbly skin of lentil starch that had formed at the surface of the water, and the whole thing smelled like it might have fermented just a bit. But they looked fine and the texture was right, so I decided to give it a shot. (Very unusual-- I'm normally a bit of a paranoid freak when it comes to food safety. I've had some bad experiences.)

Turned out the urad dal was just fine. I put a few fenugreek seeds in hot oil-- those smell great too, by the way. Then I added chopped onions and a pinch of cayenne pepper-- the recipe calls for green chilies, but we didn't have any. You're supposed to let the onions get just a bit brown at the edges, then put in the coriander. I cooked everything at the correct heat, etc., and put the coriander in just as the onions got brown at the edges, but I found that by the time I'd reached for the coriander the onions were close to burning. I had to turn the heat down very quickly to save them. I was using the cast iron pan, which I suspect conducts heat better than the average frying pan. So dear readers, if I have convinced you to use cast iron (which, I admit, is one of the secret goals of this blog), keep that in mind. OK, so you fry all that for just a little bit, then put the (drained! not wet anymore!) dal in the pan and keep stirring for five minutes or so. Madhur says it'll all turn into one big lump in the pan, but that didn't happen-- I suspect she used a smaller pan than I did.

While you're doing that, your potatoes are resting. Wake them up and bring them over to a cutting board or other useful surface. Divide them into balls-- Madhur Jaffrey calls for 12, I halved the recipe and did 6. Now take a ball and flatten it in your palm. Take a spoonful of the dal mixture and put it right in the center, then gently, gently form the potatoes into a ball with the dal at the center. Then flatten it out (again, gently) so that you have a nice little potato pancake with a spicy dal center.

Meanwhile, put just a bit of oil in your cast iron pan, which you cleaned out after making the dal. Once it's hot, put the patties in. Make sure to leave them some room. I had six patties, but ended up only making four because I didn't have time to do two panfuls. (Pansful?)

Once the patties are in the oil, LEAVE THEM ALONE. 8-10 minutes. Just let 'em sit, with the heat on medium low. My potatoes were a bit less thick than I'd like, probably because we made them at the last minute, and I was concerned that things were so liquid-y that a crust wouldn't form. Silly me, I should have trusted in the amazing crust-forming abilities of my cast iron pan. The crust was lovely and golden brown. Once that forms, it's time for a flip-- a fish spatula (flat, slotted metal) is ideal, just be eeeever so careful when you turn them over. These have a tendency to break if you're not really gentle.

There it is, that's your dinner. Plate and serve. We had this with a Flying Fish Belgian-Style Dubbel, which I think went particularly well with the potatoes. The potatoes had a nice little kick from the cayenne, and the combination of crunchy crust, smooth inside potato and spicy, slightly crunchy dal was delicious and fun to eat. It went well with the lamb, too-- I still can't believe how tender that lamb was! We got it at Trader Joe's-- I'm always happy with their lamb chops.

Things to consider for next time:
1. When halving the recipe, halve the freakin' recipe. If you accidentally use twice as much water as you need, your sauce will be too thin. Duh.
2. Real spices make a real difference. As does freshness.
3. If Madhur says to do something ahead of time, she probably has her reasons. I saved the two patties I didn't cook tonight-- I'm going to make them this weekend and see how their time in the fridge changes their behavior in the pan. Purely for scientific inquiry, of course, it has nothing to do with the way they melt in your mouth... mmm... aloo ki-tikiya...

If attempting to describe a tasty meal turns you into Homer Simpson, that's a good sign, right?

There had been talk of grilled mangoes (Mexican, we still haven't landed Indian mangoes) and ice cream for dessert, but we ate late and then Joe fell asleep on the couch, so I think we'll have to save that for tomorrow.

Nargisi Kofta with Chapatis

This is fancy food: beef kofta (meatballs) with a hard-boiled egg on the inside, in a tomato gravy, served with rice and chapatis. (I know, you're not supposed to serve both, but I'm obsessed with starches.)

It wasn't entirely successful-- good, but not as spectacular as I'd hoped. The chapatis were great-- easy and tasty-- but two things to improve on the kofta. First, the yogurt sauce separated, which is often a problem for me; second, the meat separated, exposing the egg, which I suspect could have been avoided if I'd used more meat. So it wasn't as pretty as I'd hoped it would be, but it was damn tasty.

I started the chapatis first, since the dough had to rise. It's easy to see why this is such a staple food-- it's just flour and water. Luckily, I am able to tolerate reasonable amounts of spelt, so instead of whole wheat flour, I used spelt flour, which behaved pretty much the same. Knead the dough, let it rise for half an hour or so, knead again, then separate into small balls and roll then out. I was surprised at how well the dough stayed together-- I guess I'm used to crumbly, sticky gluten-free flour, but this stuff was really easy to work with. Roll 'em nice and thin. I don't have a tava, but I do have an awesome all-purpose cast iron pan. I got it nice and hot, and did about 30 seconds on each side. The dough cooked quickly and was easy to pick up with tongs. Once it starts bubbling and puffing, throw it on an open flame (you need a gas stove for this) and let the steam puff out of it. This part is fun. The whole thing was simple and easy. We brushed them with butter, wrapped them in foil, and threw them in a warm oven ten minutes before we sat down to dinner. Tasty! I'm going to make these all the time.

The nargisi kofta: Jaffrey says that "nargis" is the narcissus flower, and these are named for the yellow and white of the egg, visible when you cut the kofta open.

First, a word about spices: you can buy just about anything you want at the supermarket or Whole Foods, pre-ground and in a clear bottle or a spice rack to sit on your wall. Do not do this. Pre-grinding and exposure to light both rob your spices of their flavor. Buy whole spices and grind them yourself when possible, and keep everything in a nice dark (and dry) cabinet! We have a marble mortar and pestle and use them quite regularly. It takes very little time to grind them, and you can taste the difference.

So I ground lots of things-- allspice, coriander seeds, cumin-- and assembled everything in little glass dishes, in the stages in which I would be adding them. This is called a mise en place, although I'm sure I am butchering the French. It means setting everything up and having it ready to go ahead of time, so you're not desperately grinding coriander or chopping tomatoes at the last second. I learned this from Alton Brown-- Alton, you're my culinary hero.

OK. So you mince the meat nice and fine in the Cuisinart, mix in the spices and two tbsp yogurt, and wrap this mixture around the eggs so you have four nice oval meatwads. Put some oil in your pan and throw in two bay leaves, a dried chili pepper, and the cardamom pods I will buy as soon as I find them. Then put in your meatwads-- er, kofta-- and brown them as evenly as you can. When I do this again, I plan to make a little more of the meat mixture than I need, and keep a little reserved on the side, so that if the meat on the kofta starts to separate I can repair as needed.

In the meantime, blend onions, garlic and ginger to a fine paste in the food processor. Take your kofta out and set aside, and add this mixture to the pan to simmer. Now, here's where I made another mistake. The recipe didn't say anything about draining the oil (in fact, it said not to), but it seems like the oil really has to be drained. Otherwise, this mixture gets really oily. The thing is that everything you're putting into the pan-- onions, tomatoes, etc-- sweats. When you cook them, all the water stored inside the veggies comes out into the pan. And oil and water don't mix, so how can you expect your sauce not to separate? This, I'm going to do differently next time.

Anyway. Simmer all that for ten minutes, then start spooning yogurt into it. Hopefully, if your mixture isn't oily like mine, your yogurt will be nice and creamy and not curdle. Once you've added 6 tablespoons of yogurt, put in your tomatoes, paprika, salt and water, bring to a boil, and simmer for ten more minutes. Then add the kofta and let the whole thing simmer for half an hours so the meat is cooked through, turning a few times. The juices will also be draining from the meat as it cooks, which means the meat will shrink. If your kofta aren't meaty enough, the meat will retract until you can see the egg, and your kofta might fall apart. Mine didn't quite fall apart, fortunately, but clearly more meat was needed.

Once that's done, serve with rice, chapati, whatever you've got. Because the sauce had separated, we attempted a rescue operation once we had removed the kofta-- Joe added some cream to the sauce and whisked the whole thing very energetically for a while. This helped, but it separated quickly.

It did, however, taste DELICIOUS. This is a really, really rich dish (it's usually served for weddings or other special occastions, according to Madhur Jaffrey) and neither of us could finish more than one. I tried to eat a second but got waaaay too full. The chili pepper and cayenne gave it just a little kick-- it wasn't at all hot on first taste, but a little heat did build up as we ate. And the spice mixture in the meat was really flavorful and delicious. I really want to make this again now that I understand the process a little better!

So, next thing to master: yogurt sauces that don't separate.

Next up: I'm making chicken korma (it's supposed to be lamb, but I don't have any lamb!) for Gagan and Anthony tomorrow night! And if I'm feeling ambitious, I might try my hand at parathas this weekend. I will also be doing my trademark guacamole for a party (possibly two parties) this weekend, so I'll post that recipe too!