Imagine a Christmas present of a whole new cuisine. That is what I received. My sister and her daughter went to an Indian food store, purchased spices, a spice box, bags of various beans and countless jars of sauces, plus bags of pappadams. Probably 30 items or more items. They individually wrapped them in a huge gift box for me. Yippee!
Every day since than I have cooked at least one Indian recipe. Finally, after years of failing at Indian cooking, I am succeeding. Here is why. This cookbook, From Mom With Love…Complete Guide to Indian Cooking and Entertaining, is perfect for someone starting out. It tells you what to buy and the recipes are foolproof. Go to the dal section and cook the Sabut Masoor Dal Amti or the Sambhar Dal and you will think you’ve found a bit of spice heaven. The book is available on Amazon. Warning: a few of its pages are bound out of order, but don’t worry, they are all there.
For some of the non-dal recipes I reduce the heat of the recipes by decreasing the chili powder and ginger by 2/3. That’s still spicy for me.
It all started when my sister bid and won a school auction for an Indian cooking lesson. (This is a great way to raise funds for a school. Adapt to any cuisine you have.) I was there for the lesson. The woman who gave us the lesson gave my sister this wonderful cookbook, apparently written by her aunt. Later, my sister sent me a copy of the book and all the items. But really, the lesson, though enjoyable, wasn’t necessary. It’s all there in the book.
I loved putting the spices into the spice box. It is handy and beautiful. Just pull it out and scoop the necessary items into the pan.
The back of the book has recipes for some spice mixes. You can buy them, of course. But I chose to make my own sambhar powder, using store bought spices and red chiles from my summer garden.
Every recipe has succeeded beyond my wildest dreams, comparable to the best Indian food I have had in big cities. I even made peshwari naan by adding nuts and coconut to the recipe in the book.