summary: meat korma, puffing corn chapatis (based on our recipe for corn tortillas); staying at home gives more time for experimenting in the kitchen; getting inspiration by re-reading back-issues of SAVEUR Magazine;
They puffed!! They puffed!!!
In no particular order, T has been gradually re-reading our back issues of SAVEUR magazine. As he read SAVEUR No.102 (May 2007), “Stars of India: Indian Classics” by Margo True (with the most beautiful photos taken by the inimitable Penny de los Santos), he noticed a photo of goat curry swimming in oil.
India is teeming with cuisines and subcuisines, yet those of us in North America mainly know only two of them: rustic village cooking from the Punjab and the extravagant court cuisine of the Moghul emperors, both from the northern part of the country. […] In 1913, more than 30 years before Moti Mahal introduced tandoori food to Delhi, a Muslim cook named Haji Karimuddin set up a food stall called Karim’s near the Jama Masjid, the largest mosque in India. His ancestors supposedly cooked for the entire line of Moghul emperors, starting in the 16th century, and Karimuddin served the kind of delicate Indo-Persian cooking that epitomized that court’s cuisine. […] Located off a lane lined with gritty food stalls and heaving with humanity, stray goats, and squalling autorickshaws, Karim’s still does a terrific business. To find it you have to look for a small red sign opposite a narrow opening between buildings. Duck through that tight passage into a pocket of warm, spicy, meaty aromas, where you’ll find a tiny courtyard ringed with small dining rooms and a hodgepodge of open kitchens. Directly in front is an elevated platform where breads, including the amazing roomali roti — as thin and soft as a fine muslin handkerchief — are baked. The platform is surrounded by metal pots on burners, in which simmer various meat and vegetable specialties (the oily and delicious goat korma, dark with browned shallots, is a big seller; the burra kebab, a meltingly tender roasted lamb chop, is another).
– Margo True, SAVEUR No.102 (May 2007), Stars of India: Indian Classics, photographs by Penny de los Santos, p77
And T suddenly announced that he would make Indian-style curry – something like Karim’s Korma – for dinner that night. Then came the question: did I want to have chapatis? Or naan?
I chose naan. How could I not?
Naan!! Yes! Because we thought it has become warm enough to fire up the grill.
Bzzzzzt! Wrong. 
Well, not completely wrong. It has become warm enough. But it got cold and cloudy again that particular day.
So we made a sudden change of direction and decided on chapatis. But not the usual “thin and soft as a fine muslin handkerchief” chapatis. T said we would make corn chapatis….
Corn chapatis? Corn tortillas, sure. But corn chapatis?! (continue reading →)
♥ 
