Spoonbill - Exotic Street Food

2 months later, after having managed to inch closer to my weight loss target, I decided to go ahead with one of the CFG Showcases at Spoonbill, Alwarpet.

It was great to meet the bunch of naughty fellows from CFG and that was something I truly missed.

Without further ado, let me present to you Spoonbill.

Charlie owns and runs Spoonbill. It's a resto-cafe and is open from 11 am - 11 pm. A few more branches will be opened in Chennai, before Charlie ventures into other cities.

As Charlie explained the menu, the gang was super hungry and waited impatiently for the food to arrive. Afterwards, it was literally "digging in". The crepes were torn apart, the burritos butchered and the desserts were squeezed within an inch of their lives.

I cover the veg menu here. Overall I loved all the dishes (or items as Faz called them), except that it was a general opinion that the fillings were a tad salty. Perhaps we are used to less salt in our household?

The first to arrive on the table was the Piadina (OTC & Cheese), followed by mushroom crepes, corn and spinach crepes. We then moved on to the Indian menu - hara bhara kebab and palak paneer kebab. The mexican burritos had a lot of beans and not enough salsa to compensate, so the flavor was lacking. The mozarella + jalapeno empanada from the Portuguese menu was piping hot but again a tad salty.

We then dug into the Turkish falafel salad. The bread (Brötchen) that was served with the non vegetarian dishes was to die for. Slightly hard on the outside but super soft on the inside, it was THE accompaniment.

The nutella and ice cream crepes made the perfect end to the meal.

The dishes are priced Rs 110 upwards on the vegetarian front. The desserts are priced at Rs 180 upwards.

*This post is part of the CFG Showcase. 

** Spoonbill is located in TTK Road, Alwarpet, opp Samsung Showroom.

Wordless Wednesday - Aam Sutra

This post is part of The Chennai Bloggers Club's Thirsty Thursday series initiated to keep the spirit of blogging alive and challenging.

Karadayan Nombu

A celebration of a wife's devotion and love, a remembrance of times when the husband-wife relationship was beyond sacred - the Karadayan nombu is celebrated when the masi masam ends and panguni begins (typically Mid-March). This nombu remembers the day when Savitri fought with Lord Yama to win her husband's life. As he blessed her with "dheerga sumangali bhava", he was trapped by his own words!

The married women fast on this day, and make a delicacy of black eyed peas, rice flour and jaggery (the ingredients that one would normally get when living an ascetic life). They pray to the Almighty to bless their husbands with a good life. The unmarried women undertake this fast so they are blessed with good husbands.

For those who believe in it, you fast the whole day and break the fast at the time the panguni month begins. For those who don't, enjoy the adai!

Ingredients:

Black eyed peas (karamani) - soaked overnight and boiled.
Rice flour - 1 cup + 1 cup
Jaggery - 1 cup
Salt - To taste

To season:
Mustard seeds
Oil
Channa dal
Urad dal
Curry Leaves
Green chilli - sliced finely
Asafoetida (hing / perungayam)

Recipe:

Roast the rice flour until the aroma is released. Make sure it doesn't turn black. Set aside.

Heat oil, add mustard seeds. Once it splutters, add hing, channa dal, urad dal and saute until a nice golden brown. Add chilli, curry leaves. Add 1.5 cups of water, salt and let it come to a boil. To that add 1 cup rice flour and let it cook, until it makes a nice ball and doesn't stick to the utensil. Add the black eyed pea and mix well.

Make patties out of this dough, steam in a idli cooker for 7 - 10 minutes (or more if your patty is a little thick). 

Sweet adai:

Clean the jaggery in hot water and bring it to a boil. Add the roasted rice flour and black eyed peas. Mix well and bring it to a dough like consistency (like the one for the salted variety). Make patties and steam in idli cooker for 7 - 10 minutes. 

Serve with butter! 

Tea or Coffee - Thirsty Thursday

This post is part of The Chennai Bloggers Club's Thirsty Thursday series initiated to keep the spirit of blogging alive and challenging.

Filter kaapi is of paramount importance in any tambrahm family. Even mentioning the word tea is sacrilege. Until my early teens, my fluid intake was Maltova and on rare occasions the quintessential filter kaapi. The rich aroma of fresh brew would always make me beg my mom for at least 1 sip of the kaapi served in a tumbler and dabara.

And then, a family vacation to Cunnoor happened. And that's where tea happened. What better place to taste tea than a tea estate itself! We'd been to my aunt's friend's house - I still remember her name - Padma.  It was a mini bungalow of sorts and she had us seated near the dining table and served tea in cups. Perhaps my first experience with cups as well as tea. I gingerly sipped the tea, for I knew not what tea would taste like, until then. I can still taste that tea after all these years, as if it was a few hours ago. I do not know what brand it was or how she made it. But all I know is I liked tea. And, I have never been able to reproduce that flavor till date.

From then on, it's been a journey to unravel quite a few mysteries of the humble tea. I even attended a workshop on tea tasting a few months ago. I prefer the kadak chai made with milk and I do not like the chai masala.

A few years ago, I discovered green tea and its benefits. And a few weeks ago, I discovered fruit infused tea. I was at a friend's place for lunch and she served mango cinnamon orange flavored tea. I was hooked and smitten. Twinings and Typhoo have such varied flavors but I couldn't find the aforementioned one anywhere here in Chennai.

The last couple of weeks, my mornings and evenings are spent with green tea (with orange infusion) and a cranberry orange infused fruit tea!

Bottomline: I love my tea but my loyalties always lie with the filter kaapi! (in fact my ring tone is the famous leo kaapi tune composed by ARR and the advert starring Arvind Swamy *drool*)

A culinary journey - Shazia Khan

I am a big fan of Masterchef (particularly the Australian edition), as I am sure most of you are. My ex-boss knew better than to call me between 9 and 10 pm when Masterchef Australia used to be aired on Star world. I love George, Gary, Matt (Moran and Preston). I've enjoyed the show and more importantly, the masterclasses. I have a dream - to some day be on the sets of this epic show, in Australia, and cover it on this blog.

But the closest I'll come to all of this, will be this weekend - to interact with and learn from the Masterchef India Season 2 Finalist and Runner up - Shazia Khan. I've been part of various culinary workshops and have learnt from every one of them - be it a recipe from scratch or some new tip; so I definitely look forward to this one.

This event - Make me a Masterchef - is conceptualized by my baker friend Maaria Kulsum Tanveer of Adoniya and managed and executed by one of my dearest friends Tasneem Akbari of Konceptz Galore.

A young homemaker and mother of two dreamed a dream. And that dream morphed into a beautiful reality. Shazia Khan is now a known face in Indian households, thanks to Masterchef India. Cooking is the biggest stress buster, says Shazia. I concur. Her greatest inspiration is her late father, her biggest motivation are her two sons and her strength is her husband. Shazia learnt cooking from her mother-in-law who was more than a mentor and guide to her.

Shazia is a member of the board of management, at Delhi Public School Bangalore North. She is part of the family business that runs many educational institutes in Bangalore. Her school also has a wing called ‘Anubhava Shiksha Kendra’ for underprivileged students where Shazia spends valuable time teaching the kids.

One day, she says, she wants to produce a travel + cookery show that'd enable her travel to the ends of the world.

And if you are in Chennai, you sure don't want to miss this workshop, on the 9th of March 2013, at the Radisson Blu, Egmore. It is a day long event, split into 3 parts - Veg - Lunch - Non Veg. For more details check the event page - https://www.facebook.com/events/608229172526020/