#easyindian

So....Indian Food! Yummmmm

Most of us like Indian food and many of us love it. And many of us love it love it love it! But when it comes to cooking it, it seems like such an impossible task that many give up even before trying.

Well, worry not! Your friend here is gonna at the least try and make it easy for you :) Lets begin with the elephant in room - SPICES...Indian spices. Spices are a tricky lot for sure. Less of some won’t make your dish fail but more of some might very well. In this post I’ll begin with only 5 of the spices that you can use to make many many Indian dishes. These are the only five even I use almost 90% of the times. Baby Steps! 

First things first, if you’re not in India, please march over to an Indian store in your area. I hope you all have at least one around you. The reason I ask you to get the spices from an Indian store because not only do you know thats where Indians shop for spices, but also thats where you’ll get the cheapest spices. I’m always surprised by spice prices in your regular grocery chains such as Target, WholeFoods etc.

Now when you go the spice section, you might feel overwhelmed with the variety of brands you’d see for all these spices. And I’m not gonna suggest you to buy the most superior product, because more likely than not, its going to be more expensive too. If you’re a beginner, just get the cheapest! It might not be the best product but it’d still be good. This way you won’t waste a fortune on something you wanted to try just once for example.

An easy way to store your spices once you’ve opened the packets is to put them in air tight containers and put in a cool dry place. But if you cant do that, you can do what I do - store them in the freezer. I can’t say whether its a good way but it does keep my spices fresh and they last for long.

Cool, on with it. Here’s are the basic spices I’d recommend you get. I’d share the simplest of recipes in the subsequent posts.

1. Turmeric powder - adds subtle flavour and beautiful colour

2. Coriander powder / seeds - subtle flavour, use either the powder or crushed toasted seeds

3. Cumin seeds/ powder - strong flavour, use toasted seeds (I prefer) or in ground form

4. Red chilli powder - subtle flavour and heat. I recommend using Kashmiri chilli because while it adds strong colour and flavour, its quite mild in heat.

5. Garam Masala - spice blend

All of the above spices are pretty standard, but one - Garam Masala. Garam Masala is a blend of a bunch of roasted spices such as Bay Leaf, Cinnamon, Cardamom, and such. The thing with it is that its super versatile. There are tens of brands with multiple products each and no two will have the same taste. They’re sold with recipe specific names such as Meat Masala, Chicken Masala, Chole Masala etc. But keep in mind, they’re all just a blend of specific spices.

What I do is buy a few of them at a time, and then see for myself which I like the best flavour wise. In recent times I’ve liked MDH Rajmah Masala a lot. So you can begin with that if you’d like. Rajmah is Kidney beans in Hindi, if you were curious :)