Explicable Flavors

A research project carried out by IIT Jodhpur students revealed much about the innate Indian-ness of the now world renowned concept and the new-fangled word in the Oxford dictioanry, "Curry".

http://www.technologyreview.com/view/535451/data-mining-indian-recipes-reveals-new-food-pairing-phenomenon/?utm_campaign=socialsync&utm_medium=social-post&utm_source=facebook
http://arxiv.org/abs/1502.03815: Original Paper

EXCERPT:

The food pairing hypothesis is the idea that ingredients that share the same flavors ought to combine well in recipes. For example, the English chef Heston Blumenthal discovered that white chocolate and caviar share many flavors and turn out to be a good combination. Other unusual combinations that seem to confirm the hypothesis include strawberries and peas, asparagus and butter, and chocolate and blue cheese.

But in recent years researchers have begun to question how well this hypothesis holds in different cuisines. For example, food pairing seems to be common in North American and Western European cuisines but absent in cuisines from southern Europe and East Asia.

Today, Anupam Jain and pals at the Indian Institute of Technology Jodhpur say the opposite effect occurs in Indian cuisine. In this part of the world, foods with common flavors are less likely to appear together in the same recipe. And the presence of certain spices make the negative food pairing effect even stronger.

Jain and co began their work by downloading more than 2,500 recipes from an online cooking database called TarlaDalal.com. These recipes come from eight sub-cuisines, including Bengali, Gujarati, Punjabi, and South Indian, which together span vast geographies, climates, and cultures in the Indian subcontinent.

Together, these recipes contain 194 different ingredients. The average recipe contains seven ingredients but some can contain up to 40. In particular, the Mughlai sub-cuisine has many recipes with exceptionally large numbers of ingredients, probably because of its royal heritage.

Jain and co then created a flavor network in which ingredients are linked if they appear together in the same recipe. The network can then be studied for interesting phenomenon such as clustering effects.

The question that the team set out to answer was to what extent food pairing is positive or negative. In other words, do ingredients sharing flavor compounds occur in the same recipe more often than if the ingredients were chosen at random.

The results make for interesting reading. Jain and co conclude that Indian cuisine is characterized by strong negative food pairing. Not only that, but the strength of this negative correlation is much higher than anything previously reported.

They also found that specific ingredients dramatically effect food pairing. For example, the presence of cayenne pepper strongly biases the flavor sharing pattern of Indian cuisine towards negative pairing. Other ingredients that have a similar effect include green bell pepper, coriander, garam masala, tamarind, ginger, cinnamon and so on.

In other words, spices make the negative food pairing effect more powerful, a phenomenon never seen before. “Our study reveals that spices occupy a unique position in the ingredient composition of Indian cuisine and play a major role in defining its characteristic profile,” say Jain and co.

That result has some interesting corollaries. In many cuisines, spices add flavor but also prevent food spoilage by killing certain types of bacteria. Jain and co say this medicinal role must have had a significant effect on the way recipes evolved since removing these ingredients would have had health impacts. “We conclude that the evolution of cooking driven by medicinal beliefs would have left its signature on traditional Indian recipes,” they say.

The result also has implications for the future of food. In the same way that Western chefs search for unusual ingredients that share the same flavors, negative food pairing may also drive the development of new flavor combinations and recipes in Indian food. “Our study could potentially lead to methods for creating novel Indian signature recipes, healthy recipe alterations and recipe recommender systems,” conclude Jain and co.

Beyond that, this work shows how powerful network science has become in analyzing disparate aspects of everyday life. Treating recipes as networks has turned out to be a powerful tool that is changing the way we think about food and how we consume it.

Green Corn Sweet n Sour

Babushka! This is the first recipe I am posting WHILE I cook it! And yes, this is an experiment. Yes, a super successful one too. The smooth spinach-based gravy flatters and the occasional sour, earthy bite of coriander teases the taste buds!

INGREDIENTS:

Oil
Cumin Seeds------------------------------------1 teaspoon
Whole Coriander Seeds-----------------------1/2 teaspoon
Fennel Seeds------------------------------------1/2 teaspoon
Onion (Chopped finely)-----------------------1 small
Butter--------------------------------------------1 tablespoon
Bay Leaf------------------------------------------1
Sweet Corn (boiled or softened)-------------2-3 cups
Ginger-garlic paste-----------------------------1 tablespoon
Tomato (Chopped finely)---------------------1 small
Spinach leaves----------------------------------100 gms
Green Chillies (Chopped finely)--------------2-3
Capsicum (Chopped finely)-------------------1/2 (Optional-for the added tang!)
Sour Cream--------------------------------------2 tablespoons
Sugar----------------------------------------------1.5 teaspoons
Red Chilly Powder-------------------------------1 teaspoon
Garam Masala Powder---------------------------1 teaspoon
Turmeric-------------------------------------------1/4 teaspoon
Water-----------------------------------------------1.5 cups
Salt

METHOD:

Soak the washed spinach leaves in water and salt mixture and boil it. Blanch it (After the spinach boils, immediately transfer them to cold running water in a perforated bowl). Let it cool. Transfer the strained spinach without squeezing all the water from it in a blender. Add the chopped green chillies and capsicum in the blender and grind to make a smooth green paste. Keep aside.
Heat oil in a skillet and add the bay leaf, cumin seeds, fennel seeds and coriander seeds. Wait for the seeds to sputter. Then add the chopped onions and fry them till they start browning. Add the ginger-garlic paste and fry till the raw smell of ginger is gone. Then add the chopped tomatoes. Add salt, turmeric and red chilly powder. Fry them till the tomatoes soften. Now add the green paste from the blender and cook on low heat. Once the green mixture starts sputtering, add one and a half cups of water to the skillet. Keep cooking on low heat. Add the Garam Masala Powder, sugar and sour cream. Let it cook without raising the temperature. Now, as the mixture slowly starts leaving oil, add the boiled corn kernels into the green gravy. Let it cook for another five minutes on low heat. Transfer the curry in a vessel and add a dollop of butter for the oomph factor!

Quick Creamy Mushroom Masala (Not an intentional tongue-twister)

This entire recipe was the result of an intuitional 15 minute break between two classes and went on to feature regularly on my Saturday lunch menus! It's that simple, yummy and imperfect!

INGREDIENTS:
Onions (Chopped)--------------------------------1 medium
Tomatoes (Fionely chopped)-------------------1 small
Cumin seeds--------------------------------------1 teaspoon
Whole Coriander Seeds (Sabut Dhania)------1/2 teaspoon
Mushrooms (Chopped)-------------------------3 large portobello size
Yogurt---------------------------------------------1 tablespoon
Sour Cream---------------------------------------1 tablespoon
Garam Masala------------------------------------1 teaspoon
Ginger-Garlic Paste------------------------------1 tablespoon
Sugar----------------------------------------------2 teaspoons
Cumin Powder----------------------------------1/2 teaspoon
Coriander Powder-------------------------------1 teaspoon
Turmeric (a pinch)
Salt (To taste)
Oil (to cook)

METHOD:

Heat the oil in a pan, and add the cumin seeds and the whole coriander seeds. When they crackle, add in the onions, salt and the unboiled chopped mushrooms. Fry till the mushrooms begin to wilt and/or the onions began to brown on high heat. Next, add the ginger garlic paste, tomatoes and all the dry masala powders followed by yogurt. Fry on high heat till all the tomatoes become mushed. Add in the sugar and sour cream together and give it a quick stir. Lower thehat and fry till the curry begins to dissipate oil.

Sesame Egg Sandwich

INGREDIENTS:

Egg------------1
Hummus------1 tablespoon
Butter----------1/4 teaspoon
Bread slices--2
Cheese (Goat)
Salt and Pepper

METHOD:

Crack the egg and fry it in a pan for 15 seconds without any oil. Then add in the cheese and hummus and fry until the egg is properly cooked. Throw in the salt and pepper. Take it off the heat and keep aside. Toast the bread slices with the butter, apply the egg spread on your toast and call it a sandwich!

Sago Khichdi

INGREDIENTS:

Sago pearls(Sabudana, soaked overnight)------2 cups
Cumin Seeds (Jeera)------------------------------1.5 teaspoons
Peanuts(Whole or crushed)-----------------------2 tablespoons
Fennel Seeds (Saunf)-----------------------------1/2 teaspoons
Curry Leaves---------------------------------------1 teaspoon
Red Chilly Powder--------------------------------1/2 teaspoon
Dried Mango Powder(Amchoor)----------------1/2 teaspoon
Cumin Powder-------------------------------------1/2 teaspoon
Sugar-------------------------------------------------2 teaspoons
Salt (To taste)
Oil

METHOD:
Heat a little oil and add the peanuts, cumin seeds, fennel seeds and curry leaves. Fry until the cumin seeds start to crackle. Then add salt, turmeric, red chilly powder, dry mango powder and sago pearls. Fry on low heat for a while and then finally add the sugar! Serve immediately :D

Puliogare Rice

Credits of converting this dish from a mere Mavalli Tiffin Room (MTR) fix to one of the tangiest dish on the party table again goes to the incredibly talented Deepanshi!

 

INGREDIENTS:

 

MTR Puliogare Powder----------------3/4 cup

Black Mustard Seeds (Rai)------------1.5 teaspoons

Whole Red Chillies----------------------2

Curry leaves-----------------------------8-10

Split Black lentils(Urad dal)----------1-2 teaspoons

Peanuts-----------------------------------2-3 tablespoons

Onions(Large and finely chopped)----1

Baby Carrots(Finely chopped)---------8-10

Cooked Rice------------------------------5-6 cups

Red Chilly Powder-----------------------1 teaspoon

Lemon Juice-------------------------------1 tablespoon

Coconut Milk-----------------------------1-2 tablespoons

Turmeric 

Salt

Oil

 

METHOD:

 

Heat oil in a karahi and add the black mustard seeds, whole red chillies, curry leaves, peanuts and urad daal. Wait for the daal to start changing colour. Now add the chopped onions, baby carrots and salt and fry on medium heat till the onions begin to turn pink.

 

 

Add the MTR Puliogare Powder and stir vigorously till the whole mixture starts takes an angry orange color! Immediately add the lemon juice, turmeric, red chilly powder and coconut milk. Keep stirring so that the puliogare powder doesn't stick to the bottom of the vessel. Add the cooked rice to the masala mixture and mix thoroughly.

 

  

 

Serve with fruity curd or smoothie and olives for a balanced palette! :)

Gryffindor Smoothie

It's almost twelve in the night. Posting all my quick-fixes in a row now.

INGREDIENTS:
Gelatinous or low fat yogurt------------1.5-2 cups
Strawberry or strawberry jam----------1 tablespoon
Pineapple (cubed)------------------------5-6 cubes
Honey-------------------------------------2-3 tablespoons

METHOD: Blend all the ingredients together. Period.