Gujarati Feast for Dinner!

When we got home from India, my friend & travel companion Jane leant me a couple copies of Saveur magazine featuring Indian recipes. I was especially tempted by one issue with an amazing feature article on the food of Gujarat (a region of India). Gujarat is very much a vegetarian part of India, so all the featured recipes were vegetarian, and most were also vegan - or very effortlessly made vegan.

I picked out 3 of the articles dishes to make - after all, this was a weeknight dinner, so I only wanted to go sorta crazy, not totally crazy!

First I picked the "Spiced Chickpea-Flour Snacks," aka Khandvi. Mostly I picked this recipe because it looked totally unlike anything I had ever had before, and that is the kind of thing that gets me excited to hit the kitchen! Also, I have made various treats over the years with chickpea flour and I usually like them quite a bit.

Step one of making Khandvi was to cook up the batter on the stove top... and once it was appropriately thickened, to spread it out on the back of a cookie sheet. I lined my cookie sheet with aluminum foil, because the back of my ancient cookie sheet is a little funky. (note: I used parchment paper for the first batch, and I wouldn't recommend it - the moisture in the batter made the parchment paper wrinkle a little, which led to varying thickness in my sheet of batter). The batter pretty much just cools on the back of the tray, and then you trim off the ugly edges, cut it into little strips and roll them up.

Here are my little roll-ups!

Finally the roll-ups are adorned with a seriously picante mix of mustard seeds and curry leaves and hot green peppers (yowza!!!) - and topped with grated coconut. I used rehydrated shredded coconut (unsweetened, obvs!). I like spicy food as much as the next guy, but seriously folks, I found myself picking some of the topping off these babies - that topping was super hot! Truth be told, this is not the most delicious thing I've ever made, but it was a lot fun to make, and I thought they were even yummier the next day. I wouldn't be at all surprised to find myself making these again someday.

Next up, I also made the Curried Cauliflower with Tomatoes - simple, pretty quick and very delicious. Mr Vegan Eats and Treats really, really loves tomatoey dishes... AND he has a special love for cauliflower, so this dish was pretty much a no-brainer. It came together quickly, had a great spice profile, and is definitely something I'll make again.

Last up, I made a batch of Spiced Black Eyed Peas with Curry Leaves, aka Safed Chole. Delicately spicey, saucey, and yummy - Mr VE&T called them "Indian Baked Beans," which was actually a pretty great description.

Dinner is served!

I think I finally got dinner on the table at about 10:30 at night! Good ol' Mr. VE&T is always so patient with me and my cooking adventures. At least he got a delicious Indian meal out of the deal (actually - two delicious meals, since we had the leftovers for dinner the following night as well!).

I just love discovering and cooking new recipes, and as should be obvious by now, I had a special love for international recipes. So fun to think that these foods that are new and exciting for me are everyday familiar fare in other parts of the world!