It was with some trepidation that I rolled out 'Indian' this week. There is some history. 21 years ago I went to India having not eaten curry in my life and all too aware of a rather limited diet spanning a couple of decades of fussy eating. The first thing that happened was a delayed flight dumping me in a posh hotel in Colombo. Posh enough to offer western dishes but hey here I was having fled my safe Surrey home life for 9 months on the Indian subcontinent. I was ready to dive in and that evening ordered a curry at random from the confusing menu. Little did I know that Sri Lankan cuisine leaves Indian looking like an insipid cousin when it comes to heat. The up side was that my culinary experiences after that shock were almost all good and I was a curry convert when I returned to the UK.
I brought home precious recipes from friends I made there and over the years have made a mean dish or two. But, lets face it, Indian home cuisine has not moved on much from housewives rising at 5am to grind the spices on a stone in order to marinade the meat in time for supper. I have to admit that the home made curries dwindled and the take-outs increased.
I know plenty of people who raised their toddlers on left over take-out curries, but I could never do it. That might have been because we always polished ours off the night before while she was in bed, or because our eldest has an extremely sensitive palate and can spot a sprinkling of dried chillies at 20 paces, or that I couldn't quite bring myself to serve the glowing, luminous, red gloop to our precious progeny.
Scroll on nearly a decade and I find myself with 3 kids who all, until recently, declared their hatred of curry. Luckily the Eldest discovered (before her vegetarianism) that her favourite school meal was lamb curry. The younger two seem entrenched in their view but I long to take them, one day, to India and so am pretty keen to educate them.
Enough of the backstory. It was a busy week. We didn't even manage to do it on a Tuesday. And we had several friends round a few day before with a great take out which was not entirely polished off. So the home made 'proper' Indian will have to wait: this week it was Anglo Asian curry night with kids!
THE DISH
Poppadoms with (home made) raita and mango chutney
Sag aloo (potato and spinach)
Kodu masala (pumpkin)
Special rice (with all those red garnishes gently dying the rice crimson. What is that about? I didn't see rice like that in 9 months of travel)
Bindhi (okra)
Good old Patak's chicken korma with toasted almonds
THE REACTION
I was surprised to find a lack of protests but this maybe because I sneakily called it Chicken Korma and tried to avoid the curry word completely. Sadly we didn't manage any music, dressing up, or other interesting side activity. I feel like its been a little light weight recently. But Mr M did dive in with delight at being able to eat with his fingers!
THE VERDICT
Mr Middle - I love the rice. I love the chicken.
Youngest - Let's give a silent cheer for the food (followed by much mouth opening and waving of arms. Did I mention that I love their school??)
Eldest - I think she was a little disappointed to find that quorn korma isn't on the menu of any curry houses I know. I think we need to work on those root vegetables. Or maybe I should take her to Rasa? She did polish off the raita!
N - Isn't this what we had the other night? (Um. maybe that's why we never ate leftover curry!)
PUDDING
All too late for that even. I said it was a bit light weight. Mind you I had to admit to the kids that in all my travelling I never really found an Indian pudding I liked. All a bit over sweet, gloopy or dripping in ghee. We had chocolate ice cream instead. Its good to condition in a 'reward' for an Indian curry well received!!
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