Aakhol Ghor, the Assamese Cuisines and Foods from Assam

DISCLAIMER

Some famous Chef of India once said, " India is so unique, one can find three different recipes for the same chicken curry in the three houses lined in the same row. Every kitchen and every cook in India has it's own cook book, unlike rest of the world."
I personally feel it is so well said. Even in my case, you might find small to big differences in your known method of cooking and the ones posted here. I call them true Assamese for two main reasons, one: because of the spices used, and two: my granny knew nothing beyond her village ( she did not believe that cauliflower can be green, which is Broccoli). So whatever she cooked was passed on over generation. And my Mom finds it hard to believe anything can be cooked beyond her traditional methods( she is best at it, though she makes excellent Indo - Chinese things, invented). So please feel free to put in your comments / correction. One thing I can assure is I have cooked all these ( everything) myself with my own hands at least once. So whatever is here is tried and tested. You are always welcome to do your bit of experiment !!!!!

Bamboo Shoot and Lentils

This one is a tiny recipe and on demand from a dear friend Nidarshana! This is a typical quick fix in my kitchen.

Ingredients:
1. Red Lentils - 1 cup
2. Bamboo Shoot - to taste
3. Salt and Turmeric - to taste
4. Fenugreek Seed - a pinch.
5. 2 Green Chillies.
6. Oil - 1 spoon

Method:

Wash the lentils and add in a pressure cooker. Add salt and turmeric and cook with water. Add enough for 4 people and this needs to be a little watery and not thick. Once cook set aside, let the steam go and open the cooker.

In a wok / deep pan, heat a spoon of oil (veg/ mustard.. as you like). Add the fenugreek and let it split. Reduce the flame. Add the cooked lentils, water and all, and add the chillies. Now add two spoons of wet bamboo shoot. Check for taste, if it is not sour enough add some more. But remember, once boiled, the sourness will increase. Let the whole thing bubble a while and you are done. You can garnish with coriander if you want to.

Serve with hot steam rice, crispy fish fry and mesh potato (aloo pitika) or any good mesh/ pitika.

Till Maas ( Sesame Fish)

This one seems to be having hundreds of variety. So giving you the 'my way'.
This is for 4 pieces and you can add quantity as you like. The kinds of fish you can use are: Rahu, Xingi, Magur, Kawoi, Xol, Bhakuwa and similar kinds.

Ingredients:

1. 4 big pieces of fish. Cleaned.
2. Salt and Turmeric
3. Green Chilly
4. Mustard oil.
5. Potato - 2 small, boiled and peeled.
6. Onion - 1 small finely chopped.
7. Black Sesame paste - About 4 table spoon.
8. Hot water - 500ml

Method:

1. Fry the fishes, say 80% and not half, with salt and turmeric.
2. In the same left over oil , not more then 1 spoon, add onions. Fry till golden.
3. Add the boiled potatoes and break.
4. Add chilly, salt and turmeric. Fry for a minute.
5. Add sesame paste to this and immediately add hot water.
6. Let it boil on full heat.
7. Once it boils, add the fish.
8. Keep boiling till this becomes a thick gravy on minimum flame.
9. Adjust salt and taste.
10. Serve hot with steam rice.

Misa Masor Bota ( Ground Prawns)

So since I do not have pictures and people did not tell me what to do.. here I go with a few quicks.

Ingredients:

1. Tiny prawns, the ones you do not know how to eat :). -- Say 250 gms
2. Oil - 2 spoon veg and few drops of mustard oil.
3. Onions - 1 small finely chopped.
4. 2 cloves of garlic and 2 green chillies.
5. Salt to taste
6. Green Coriander.

Method:

Wash the prawns and make sure they are extremely clean.
Heat a wok and put the veg oil into it. Put the prawns shell and all. Keep stirring till they become almost red in color. Take it off the heat.

Mix the prawn and rest everything and grind into a fine paste. Yummy with any deal and sabji and steam rice.

NOTE: add any fish you want, the requirement is for them to be super tiny.

Bhendi aru Dalir Bor diya Tenga - Lady Finger and Fritters in a Sour Curry

INGREDIENTS:

Soaked Rice - 2 Table Spoon
Soaked Red Lentils - 1 Cup
Panch Foran - A pinch
Raw Mango - 2 Small, washed peeled and chopped.
Lady Finger - 6 to 8 (or as many people)
Salt, Turmeric & Sugur- to taste
Rice Powder - 1 Table spoon mixed with 1/2 cup water.
Water & Oil

METHOD:

Make a coarse paste of the rice and lentils. Mix with a bit of salt and check for taste. In a deep fry pan heat oil. Make small portions of the paste and fry in a medium flame until golden brown. [Tip: if you are not sure if it is cooked, then take one out and eat, you will know for sure]. Keep these fritters aside.

Now is another pan, take out about 1 table spoon oil and heat. Add the panch foran. Once these cracks, add the chopped Mango, turmeric, and a bit of Sugur. Mix well and cook untll the Mangoes are translucent on a low flame. Add ample water and leave it to boil. Lower the flame and add the Rice flour mixure.

Now add salt to taste. Add the Lady Fingers and the Fried Fritters. Let this boil till the water becomes half. As I always say, make sure you add double the amount of water as your required curry.

Serve hot with steam rice and fried fish and potato on the side.

Courtesy: My aunt from Kamrup District of Assam.

Sojina Ful, Xoru Alloo Koni Bhoja

Well, this one is a quick fix. I do it when sometimes I need a side dish very fast. Translating the Name to English, Drum Stick Flower, Baby Potatoes and Eggs!

Ingredients:

Drum Stick flowers - 2 cups, cleaned.
Baby potatoes - 1/2 cups, cut in half.
Onion - a small one. Chopped.
Salt and Turmeric - To your taste.
Egg - 1, beaten.
Oil - 3 table spoons.

How to do it:

Heat the oil in a wok.
Add onion and fry till light brown.
Add the potatoes and cover. Let it cook till half.
Now add salt and turmeric and mix it.
Add the flowers and mix. Let it cook for a while. Do NOT cover.
Keep the flame low and let it cook till the potatoes are cooked completely.
When the potatoes are cooked, add the beaten eggs, mix and remove from the flame. Let the egg be fried.
Serve as a side dish. We call such dry preparations "Bhaji".

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Inside The Assamese Kitchen & eating Culture !!

I thought of giving all my reader a little inside story of a traditional Assamese Kitchen. Some essential items you are sure to spot if you ever take a peek into a Assamese kitchen
The staple food, rice, pure golden mustard oil, spices, dals and ghee. And almost all seasonal Vegetables.

Among the cooking vessels, the keraahi (iron woks) where most of the cooking and frying is done, the tawa (griddle) on which rotis and parotas are made, the handi - a special large pot for cooking rice and the handleless modification of the sauce pan - the rimmed, deep, flat-bottomed dekchi are all hallmarks of the Assamese kitchen. And of course you will also find the pressure cooker which is indispensable to any Indian kitchen.
As for the other utensils you absolutely can't do without the hetaa or Koroch (ladle), the khonti (metal spatula), the ghutni (wooden hand blender) , the wooden belona (round pastry board and rolling pin).

A FEW EXPLANATION ON THE WORDS USED IN THE RECIPES:

KHAR : A curry mixed with the juice of banana soots. Please refer to the detailed process on how to make it.

TENGA : A sour dish, normally a curry made with various soring agents.

BHAJI : Anything dry or deep fried, either by itself or in batter.

BHAPOT DIYA : Fish or vegetables steamed with oil and spices. A classic steaming technique is to wrap the fish in banana leaf to give it a faint musky, smoky scent.

PITIKA : Pitika is a side dish made of mashed vegetables or fish (grilled, roasted or boiled; vegetables or fish) seasoned with mustard oil, salt and pepper.

SOBJI : Tiny pieces of one or more vegetable, usually flavored with panch-phoron or whole mustard seeds or kal jeera. Chopped onion and garlic can also be used, but hardly any ground spices. Not completely dry neither semi gravy.

JHOLA : Literally, hot. A great favorite in Assamese households, this is made with fish or shrimp or crab, first lightly fried and then cooked in a light sauce of ground red chilli or ground mustard and a flavoring of panch-phoron or kaal jeera.

JHOL : A light fish or vegetable stew seasoned with ground spices like ginger, cumin, corriander, chilli and turmeric with pieces of fish and longitudinal slices of vegetables floating in it. The gravy is thin yet extreamely flavorful. Whole green chillies are usually added at the end and green corriander leaves are used to season for extra taste.

Bor : Dal or Ground meat or vegetable croquettes bound together by spices and/or eggs.

PORA : Literally, burnt over charcoal. Vegetables are wrapped in banana leaves and roasted over a wood or charcoal fire. Some, like eggplants (brinjals/aubergines), are put directly over the flames. Before eating the roasted vegetable is mixed with mustard oil and spices.

TORKARI : A general term often used in Assam the way `curry' is used in English. Originally from Persian, the word first meant uncooked garden vegetables. From this it was a natural extension to mean cooked vegetables or even fish and vegetables cooked together.

PITHA : Typical Assamese snack, prepared from powdered sticky rice called Bora Saul. This snack is sweet as various sweetners like sugar, jaggery, crated coconuts are added. This snack is well accompanied with a cup of refreshing Assam tea. They are unavoidable requirement of any Assamese Festivals.

Eating and Serving Assamese Food

The Assamese people are the greatest food lovers. A leisurely meal of many items which requires long hours of labour, preparation and ingenuity in the kitchen has long been a major part of Assamese culture. The traditional way of serving food is on the floor, where individual pieces of wooden stool, called piras,, are layed on for each person to sit on. In front of this seat is placed a large platter made of bell metal/steel or on a large piece of fresh cut banana leaf. Around this platter a number of small metal or earthen bowls are arrayed in which portions of khar, dal, vegetables, fish, meat chutney and dessert are served. In the center of the platter sits a small mound of piping hot rice flanked by vegetable fritters, wedges of lime, whole green chillies and perhaps a bit of Kharoli and khorisa (a pickles made from bamboo shoots).

The approach to food is essentially tactile. As in all of India, Assamese eat everything with their fingers. What, after all, could be better to pick out treacherous bones of fish like hilsa and kaoi? Apart from this functional aspect, the fingers also provide an awareness of texture which becomes as important as that felt by the tongue. The various mashed vegetables or different rice or varieties of fish we eat are all appreciated by the fingers before they enter the mouth. The other peculiarity about the Assamese eating scene is the unashamed accululation of remnants. Since succulent vegetable stalks, fish bones and fish heads, meat and chicken bones are all meticulously chewed until not a drop of juice is left inside, heaps of chewed remnants beside each plate are an inevitable part of a meal.

Whether you have five dishes or sixty, the most important part of eating in Assam is eating each dish separately with a little bit of rice in order to savor its individual bouquet. The more delicate tastes always come first and it is only by graduating from these to stronger ones that you can accommodate the whole range of taste. Khar dishes are the first item followed by dal, perhaps accompanied by fries or fritters of fish and vegetables. After this comes any of the complex vegetable dishes like, followed by the important fish jhol as well as other fish preparations. Meat will always follow fish, and chutneys and ambals will provide the refreshing touch of tartness to make the tongue anticipate the sweet dishes.

With all these delicious flavors combined with textures to be chewed, sucked, licked and gulped with suitable chomps and slurps (the better the meal the louder the sounds of appreciation) an Assamese meal usually ends with a great fortissimo burp!Later on betal nut and betal leaves with little lime. It leaves a taste in your mouth that lingers for a long time.

Khaar - Traditional Assamese Cooking Soda

Well Khaar is an integral part of Assamese cooking.
Ingredient : A small banana Tree and loads of fire.

Remove the outer most flaps of a banana tree. Take the inside flaps and open the tree up as much as you can. Cut then into strips and let them dry for a few days under the hot sun, unless they are almost dry and turns brown.
Now take these dry strips and burn into a heap of ash. Put this ash in a container, preferably a glass or china pot. Be care full not to pick up the dust. To avoid such problems, you can take a little big iron pot or a heavy earthen pot and burn the strips inside.

Take about 4 to 5 spoon of this ash and soak in about 500ml of water over night. Take a fine muslin cloth and separate the water and the residue. Now use this water as Khaar whenever needed. You can do the soaking process periodically. And store the dry ash for future use.

Paa(n)ch Foran - Or a Mixture of five spices in solid.

Bora Saul - One special Kind Of RICE

Bora Saul has its own presence in assamese delicacies.
This is a sticky variety of rice. In India, you get it only in the North Eastern Part. When cooked, this is a super sticky rice with a sweet flavour. It has two variety, one is Red and the other is White in color. The other classification can be according to its flavour, One you get with a very strong sweet flavour, the other one is mild in flavour.

Out side India, you get one variety very close to Bora Saul, in Thailand and Japan. I do not have much idea about other places. Bora Saul is used in a lot of things, starting at pitha, breakfast porridge to a variety of rice beer !!!! Bon apatite.

Keep checking this place for all the delicacies with Bora Saul.

Bamboo Shoot.... Some Basics

I belong to Assam, where you could easily get fresh bamboo shoots and sometimes even dig them up oneself.

All bamboo shoots are toxic when raw. They contain hydrocyanic acid which in most countries is removed by boiling the bamboo shoots and then discarding the cooking water. The length of time required depends on the variety and the freshness of the bamboo shoots (the older they are, the more hydrocyanic acid is developed) and can be as little as ten minutes or as much as several hours.

As a rule of thumb, if you are buying whole raw bamboo shoots from a grocery store, they will be a type which requires less preparation time, and should be peeled, sliced then placed in cold water, brought to a boil, then drained with the water being discarded. Repeat three times, then cook as the recipe directs. Don't cook for too long after bringing to a boil each time, as the bamboo shoots will lose their crispness. I would personally feel a little unhappy about only soaking them without any cooking, as it is unlikely that you are going to have access to bamboo shoots of the same type and freshness.

However, once you've done this cooking process, don't worry about toxicity. After all, there are also plenty of other vegetables which are not okay to eat raw, but are perfectly fine once cooked (arbi springs to mind, for one), it's just that you are probably more used to cooking the others.

If you are in an Asian grocery in the US and they are selling bamboo shoots loose, they will be raw only if they are being sold whole and unpeeled, with all the outer layers of husk intact. If they are already peeled, sliced, and soaking in water, they have already been cooked and can be eaten as is.

If you are using canned, a very brief blanch in boiling water should help remove any unpleasant taste from the cans.