Cooking Class # 2

BBQ Chicken
-make spice mixture of red chile powder (1 tsp), coriander powder (1 tsp), chicken masala powder (1 tsp)
-make ginger and garlic paste, add spices to paste
-mix one egg white and lemon juice and stir in spice mixture
-add black pepper and marinade chicken pieces for 5 hours
Grill on BBQ for one hour and squeeze fresh lemon juice prior to serving.
Fish Curry
-fry mustard seeds and curry leaves in hot coconut oil
-make a paste on stone using sliced red onion, salt, coconut and 1 or 2 small tomatoes, add to pot and fry
-add red chile powder (1 tsp), turmeric powder (1 tsp), coriander powder (1 tsp) and one tamarind (cut in 2 or 3 pieces)
-add fish pieces and cook through

Cooking Class # 1

I had such a great time taking cooking classes in Thekkady! The classes were held at the home of a local family that consisted of Sheril and his wife Asha, Sheril's parents Jaya and Sukumaran, his sister Sherin and their son Anishik. Anishik had such a great time posing for my camera! I took 3 classes and each class cost 350 rupees which is about $8.50 Canadian. The classes were about 3 hours long and after a fabulous evening of preparing the food, we got to enjoy the delicious food! I will do my best to record the recipes for the dishes we created.
Okra curry
-heat coconut oil in pot
-add mustard seeds and a small handful of fresh curry leaves (stand back as these explode when they hit the hot oil!)
-add finely sliced red onion, salt, and one sliced green chili
-cut off tips of okra, cut in 3 or 4 pieces and then quarter each of these lengthwise
Add to pot and stirfry!
Beans curry
-same process as above in adding mustard seeds and curry leaves to hot oil
-make a paste on a stone using onion, 1 chile, grated coconut, cumin seeds, and garlic; add turmeric and salt to paste
-cut 1 kg. green beans into small 1 cm. pieces and add them, sliced onions and one glass of water to the pot and cook for about 10 minutes
-add paste and cook a bit more
Chicken Curry
-same process as above in adding mustard seeds and curry leaves to hot oil, then add fresh coriander leaves, sliced onions and salt
-make a ginger and garlic paste on stone and cook for 10 minutes
-combine red chili powder (1/2 tsp), coriander powder (1/2 tsp), turmeric (1/2 tsp), and chicken masala powder (3 tsp) and making centre in pot, add oil, heat, and add spice mixture to pot and roast 3 minutes
-add pieces of one chicken (with bones) and salt mixing 5 minutes
-add water to top level of chicken mixture and cook 20 minutes
-add 1/2 coconut mixed with water (or coconut milk)and cook for 3 minutes
Pineapple Curry
-same process of mustard seeds and curry leaves in hot coconut oil
-add sliced red onions and with finely diced pineapple and one glass of water, fry
-make paste of one green chile, 1/2 coconut, cumin seeds, garlic and 1/2 tsp of turmeric and add to mixture
Porotta (okay this is a hard one!)
-add 1 spoon of salt, 1 spoon of sugar and 3 cups of water to 1 kg of flour (hollow centre of flour and gradually add liquid to centre and fold in flour)
-pound the heck out of it for a long time!
-make balls of dough, throw down on counter
-add oil to counter, roll balls in oil and flatten edges of ball to make pancake shape (but not the centre)
-flip and pull pancakes until it is a huge disc shape (the size of a pizza, yes, this is the difficult part)
-pick up and make long stretch of dough (see photo), twist, gather and tuck last part of dough under it, again, throw on counter, then grill in pan. Good luck!
Alu (Potatoes)
-slice potatoes in thin slices, then cut across to make matchstick potatoes
-add salt, chicken masala powder, red chili powder, coriander powder, and anise seed
-mix spice mixture with potatoes and sit for 30 minutes (drain water from potatoes)
-fry in sunflower oil

ENJOY!

Abraham's Spice Garden/Connemara Tea Plantation

It was an enjoyable morning visiting a spice garden and a tea plantation. Krishna was my guide at the spice garden and he showed me many of the spices and native plants of South India. It was very interesting to hear how each of these spices/plants are used not only in cooking, but also how they are used medicinally to treat many ailments. I also had a tour of the Connemara tea factory where we got to see the process of how tea is manufactured right from the picking of the leaves to the packaging of the leaves and powder. The tea industry employs about 2 000 000 people in India with about 80% of the tea remaining in India. The Indians love their tea, however, most enjoy the powdered tea that is stirred into hot milk and it is sweetened with sugar. This is not my favourite way to enjoy tea and it is difficult to get a good cup of loose leafed made tea. The women work very hard picking the tea leaves in the fields. They work 8 hour days and for this they receive 20 rupees (50 cents) per day! A very hard life they have!

Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary

Had a great day at the Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary! Periyar is South India's most popular wildlife sanctuary encompassing 777 square kilometres. It contains a 26 square kilometre man-made lake created by the British in 1895. I took an 8 hour hike through the jungle with an Ecotourism company. It was 5 hours of trekking and a 3 hour paddle on a bamboo raft. Some of the wildlife we saw included elephants, wild boar, bison, sambar, monkeys and 2 mating cobras! There are approximately 40 tigers within the reserve but they inhabit the part of the sanctuary that is off limits to people. Only about 60 sq. km. of the 777 sq. km. sanctuary is available to explore. A highlight of the day was a visit with some of the tribal people who were fishing in the lake. As you can see, they use pretty primitive methods for catching their fish. They catch a variety of very small (minnow like fish) which are then dried in the sun and brought to the market to be sold late in the day. Typically they can catch 3 to 4 kilograms of fish per day which they can sell in the markets for 120 rupees (3 Canadian dollars) for the whole family! These were obviously very poor people and lead a life that it hard to believe!

Thekkady

I had a very nice week in Thekkady! Thekkady is 185 km inland from Cochin and is 2700 feet above sea level. I stayed at the Club Mahindra Tusker Trails and stayed in my own hut designed in the traditional Indian "machan" style. It was situated in a thickly wooded plantation of coffee, cardamom, pepper as well as teak and fruit trees. I was quite entertained all week by the monkeys that swung from tree to tree above my hut even though they were early risers and could be quite loud so early in the day. It was a great place for walking and visiting the spice markets in the village. There were some great restaurants where I enjoyed many fabulous Indian foods. I also took 3 cooking classes but you'll read about that later. The temperature was also very nice being at such a high altitude. I enjoyed escaping the high temperatures and extreme humidity of Cochin.