If you love chicken tikka, and you love pizza- this is totally your kind of Pizza.
I made it last week for V and me, using some leftover pizza dough I had and both of us really devoured it!
Now, V is not a pizza person. He is mostly a dal roti person, but for this pizza he changed his mind. He actually was sad when it got over and even though he knew there was no more pizza left he was talking about how he felt like having this pizza the next day. He still talks about it. And while writing this post, I wish I had some pizza dough so that I could make this again now.
Vada Pavs: Spicy potato fritters that are sandwiched between two pavs (buns), a sweet chutney, a garlic chutney and green chutney. The potato fritters are gluten free and vegan. By using gluten free buns, and omitting butter, Vada Pav can be an entirely vegan and gluten free option for those with dietary restrictions.
Edited May 2020: The original post went live in July 2012. A print friendly option for the recipe, and a new cover image was added in May 2020. Rest of the images and text is from the original post. You can find the recipe for homemade pavs here.
Original Post:
Once or twice a month we take the four hour drive from our small town to the big city of Phoenix. We generally leave on Saturday and return the next day on Sunday. Since all of our Indian grocery shopping is done in Phoenix and so that the food doesn’t spoil we plan our shopping on Sundays. As a result we get to leave Phoenix a little after lunch, making us reach home around dinner time. And since there is no way I have the energy to cook anything after a hectic weekend, we get two Vada pavs as to-go from Little India to have as dinner. Sometimes we get four vada pavs to-go and use the leftover 2 as breakfast the next day.
Both V and I love them and relish each bite.
Since our trips to Phoenix have reduced in frequency in the recent past, we have to wait longer for our dose of Vada pavs. So over the last few visits, both V and I would dissect the vada in order to replicate the recipe at home. And I think we have finally nailed it.
We went to Phoenix the weekend that just went by. And I am happy to say I wasn’t tempted to buy the Vada pavs. Because now I can make them at home.
Marriage changes you. It influences your personality, and your responsibilities and priorities change. Your partner’s personality rubs off on you a little and vice versa. I have definitely become more calm, and patient after marriage. Things that would bother me earlier, still do bother me, but to a lesser extent. I would not attribute all the changes to V, although his role is undeniable, but marriage brought with it certain changes which have changed me, for the better. So, yes marriage changed me.
I too have adjusted my taste buds to his. From someone who wouldn’t touch bharta with a ten-foot pole, here I am writing about it on GMT.
That’s Change.
That’s Growth.
Baingan bharta is a dish made from roasted eggplants cooked with onions, tomatoes, chillies, ginger and garlic. Some people also add peas and other various vegetables to it.
Baingan (pronounced bane-gun) is what Indians call eggplant in hindi. And bharta (pronounced bhharta with the first “a” in bharta pronounced the same way you pronounce “u” in mud. Pardon me, but phonetic symbols are not my strongest point!), is the hindi word for roughly mashed/pureed vegetables.
This dish can be prepared two ways with roasted eggplant – one with accompanying raw ingredients which typically includes mustard oil and the other with cooked ingredients. The recipe below uses the latter method.
Honestly Baingan ka bharta was my least favorite dish growing up. It was hardly made at home, and when made, I never ate it. I wanted to like it, because eggplants are good for you, but I just found it too slimy to look at.
