- 2 days ago
Rick Stein's India - S01 - E05
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00:00In my search for the perfect curry I've read quite a bit about India and I've
00:08noticed that the most consistently overused phrase from travel writers has
00:12been a land of contrasts well indeed it is and sometimes I find the contrast
00:21quite mind-boggling in a country where it seems to me that a good chunk of the
00:26population doesn't even have a roof over its head a politician from Lucknow
00:31builds this acres upon acres of huge stone carved elephants along with a
00:38memorial featuring her proudly clutching a designer handbag when I asked some
00:45local people about this they just shrugged good-humouredly and said well
00:49that's just how it is here and indeed there's no getting away from it India
00:55really is a land of contrasts
00:59that's a mind-blasting thing
01:06that's a mind-blasting curry Rikki
01:30this is Mayo College it's known as the Eaton of the East it was built by the
01:48British in 1870 by the then Viceroy of India Lord Mayo purely and simply to
01:55educate the sons of the landed gentry the Rajputs and the Maharajas when you think
02:02about it it's rather a clever move because these boys will grow up to be
02:06powerful rulers and hopefully will have ingrained in them a love and
02:11understanding the ways of the British which means of course having allies in
02:16high places we thank God for what we have received I'm in
02:23well today we've got some Western foods we started with cream of vegetable soup then
02:41we've got carrot and green peas saute followed by cauliflower and white sauce
02:46veg fried rice grilled paneer veg cutlet cabbage salad a dinner roll bread butter
02:54and sauce not quite sure the sauces and cake and custard for a pudding I've been
03:02talking to one or two of the chefs here through an interpreter of course and I
03:05discovered that many of them that go back two or three generations of cookie here
03:10and I really like that about a lot of Indian kitchens I've been in that
03:14people would hand over the jobs would it with us back in padstow is all I have to
03:19say but none of them sadly go back to 1875 when the college opened and when the
03:27first student arrived and naturally he arrived with a whole entourage of servants
03:36tutors tutors guards and 150 elephants
03:41well it's been a long time since I've had a school dinner probably too long a time to be honest but I'm I'm really enjoying this I'm it's
03:58nicely cooked it's nicely seasoned they've just given me some chopped liver which is
04:05apparently the school this is a school favorite isn't it the chopped liver on
04:10toast dates back from the from the Raj days I guess so well pleased
04:17truth to tell I was a bit surprised not to have a luxuriant curry sauce or a spicy biryani
04:25but I was more interested in what the pupils felt about food because if Mayo School is anything like our
04:32Eton the future rulers could well come from here and who knows that might have some significant bearing on
04:39India's culinary future well I need to explain to you the reason I'm here is I
04:45make programs about food I'm a chef back in back in England and I'm very keen to
04:51talk to you because well first of all hands up who likes pizzas well there you go I
04:57mean it's a bit of a sort of litmus test because I feel if I'm asking you it's sort of
05:03giving me an idea of the way the country's going the younger people about what what you
05:07might be eating in the future I mean how do you feel about your traditional food
05:11then if you go out for pizzas on a dinner that's not a dinner going for a dinner
05:16means going to a proper Indian restaurant and having a problem me Indian food is
05:21what gives us like real satisfaction and that's when we feel that yeah we have had
05:25something it's but how do you see the food of India changing in the next 20 30
05:31years there's a thing in India every 10 kilometers you go the dialect changes the
05:35water changes and the food habit changes so you know we've got very like diverse
05:41very diverse country so it will take some time to change but you know the
05:46franchisees they're coming we have McDonald's who's you know who's adjusted
05:51to our country and they bought up a vegetarian restaurant which is like which is
05:55like the first veg restaurant first veg McDonald's in the whole world thing is
05:59we really value and value our traditional food we really love it and that's one
06:05thing that we're gonna hold on to because given a choice between a pizza and a
06:11normal Indian filling meal I would go for an Indian meal anytime anywhere
06:16I've just been watching some polo ponies over at Mayo School and just came by here and just thought
06:46well I've got to show this because it just shows a complete contrast there is in India between the
06:52rich and the poor I mean this looks dreadful to anybody's view and over here we've got a
06:58brand new cinema complex just nearing completion but that's India I mean you there's nothing you can do
07:05about it interestingly I was rereading a book by Mark Tully called no full stops in
07:10India which I've always enjoyed and right at the beginning he says people go to his apartment in
07:16Delhi and say how do you cope with the poverty and he just replies I don't have to the poor do
07:23Rajasthan is the land of the Rajas the land of the Kings it's so different from the lush south this is
07:40mostly desert mile off to mile of sand and scrub goats and shacks
07:55when I had the idea of doing a series about India I thought would be really nice to drive around India
08:00myself I'm not sure that the crew would have been so wholeheartedly in approval of that in some of the
08:06past series maybe my driving skills aren't so wonderful but in India it's a total no-no I believe
08:13there's some sort of order but when you see an enormous truck laden with sacks or bales of wood
08:19or bales of straw coming straight at you and at the last minute it goes off in one direction you just go
08:26as a passenger it is truly scary at times wherever I go in the world I always try to
08:35stop at a motorway service station because I think the food there is a sort of culinary litmus test and
08:41sometimes it's a lot better than posh restaurants
08:45well I think I'll go for the tucker dal I just want dal and roti really and a cup of masala chai sweet sweet spiced tea would be perfect just for a light lunch
09:09this I think I'm right in saying is your average truckers lunch a vegetable dal with bread or roti
09:18certain members of the film crew were wondering if they did two sausages baked beans fried eggs at
09:25least three rashers hash browns and a cup of tea great I told them not to be so silly
09:33I will me and kill me in places like France or Spain we like to stop whether the truck driver stops you get
09:42the best meal thinking the same is probably true here in India I must say this is really good this dal
09:49as is the roti I've just chosen a very simple salad of onion and chilies which I love very simple wholesome
09:58food lovely I really like these standard salads in India which is basically onion and chili but
10:07because I'm European they normally just give me a tomato and cucumber salad I have to say no no no I want the chili
10:14as soon as I saw this I thought of that all-powerful mogul emperor immortalized by Coleridge in his famous unfinished poem
10:36in Zanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decree where alf the sacred river ran through caverns
10:48measureless to man down to a sunless sea now I know that's about a place in China but it's all about
10:58the fact that these mogul rulers who dominated northern India could do pretty much as they liked and this
11:06the Amir fort epitomizes all that power but the reason I'm here is that there's a restaurant just
11:13opened by an extremely wealthy man who reminds me of what a mogul emperor was probably like Sanjeev Bali
11:22you must be Sanjeev how are you I'm very well I mean this is amazing I mean they told me it was going to
11:30be quite something but I had no idea how incredibly great to have you thank you very much he fought tooth
11:39and nail with the local authorities to open his prize restaurant within the fort he's really proud of his
11:46kitchen recreating long-forgotten local recipes I asked him to cook his favorite one jungly mass jungly
11:55meaning jungle and mass meaning meat jungle meat I think it's called jungle mass jungle mass when you
12:06went on a hunt and you basically need only five things to make this dish but very simple in the jungle and
12:12it was more fun because you did it yourself it used to be the game meat but now we're using lamb so
12:17I'm told hunting's bound now in India yeah why why is that then it was basically because people were
12:24just killing animals left right and center and there was no balance left and earlier it was done for a
12:30sport when you had bent out hunting and you kill what you like to eat and to serve your guests and enjoy
12:36with the family but suddenly people are not bothered they would just go randomly killing across the boat
12:42that's why you see the Tigers vanishing from our country the tiger the population of the Tigers are
12:48going down and there's nothing for them to eat nothing to eat and hunting was banned all across the country I can
12:54understand that it's only got five ingredients meat water ghee salt and dried chilies what we do is we
13:05take this chilies which come in from a place called mathana so while putting the chilies we de-seed them
13:11so they don't get to get extra spicy so like we put the chilies and now what we do is there's water in
13:19there so we keep on adding water and ghee simultaneously slowly it's really simple but I mean I like it for
13:27that so what would you say was the sort of essentials of Rajasthan cuisine then where's it all come from the
13:33recipes were actually created by doctors in those days it had to have certain aryurveda medicines which
13:41were added to the food so the ayurveda excuse my pronunciation that really means that the chefs and
13:47doctors are working together to make it a perfect for your digestion for your for your eyesight for
13:53everything for the whole body good and the chefs would make it into something very tasty to eat
13:59because you know indulgence used to be huge in those days so they had to balance it out some way
14:05or the other so you virtually had to have a doctor as part of your part of the kitchen team oh interesting
14:11now this is a real genuine lesson in less is definitely more it was splendid and would be right up there in my
14:22top ten that's really good yeah thank you I mean the chili makes it of course I mean to tell you the
14:35truth what I like about it is it is so simple I mean I've been tasting so much food Indian dishes
14:43that actually just having the chili and nothing else and tasting the mutton is oh I know and a lassi
14:51too at times you don't believe that there are no many ingredients spices going to it and could be
14:58that simple as no I think that's really nice thanks a lot we're enjoying it a great deal one of the other
15:07dishes I really liked at Sanji's restaurant was this curried lamb cutlets and I know that people
15:14watching will love them too so back at my lovely bungalow on the lagoon it was time to cook there
15:24are lamb cutlets but first of all the lamb was poached in milk so just going to put a large amount of
15:32milk into this pan you bring that to the boil and I'm going to infuse the milk with some whole
15:37spices first of all just bruising a few cardamoms put in there and then we've got these other whole
15:44spices as well fennel seeds bruised cardamoms black peppercorns cinnamon and Indian bay leaves and some
15:55ground ginger so all that goes in like that give that a bit of a stir and infuse the milk then I'm
16:04going to use that infused milk as the liquid in the batter that's going to go on the lamb chops I'm
16:13not going to cook them for too long I want them to be a bit pink in the middle because I'm then going
16:18to fry them they need to be in there so they absorb the flavors say around five minutes they're just
16:27about ready now so just lift them out with my trusty tongs you'll see they look a bit disheveled
16:36trust me it almost adds to the look of the final dish so just let this infused milk cool down because
16:47I'm going to use it in the batter so first of all we can start making up the batter I've got some
16:53flour in here and I'm just going to add some corn flour and whisk that together a little bit and then
17:00virtually the same spices as went into the infusion peppercorns ground up fennel seed ground up ground
17:09ginger and cardamom seeds ground up and then I'm just going to put some salt in here quite a
17:17lot actually quite a sort of heaped teaspoon there we go just those things all together and
17:24finally and I do think this is the real sort of best thing about this batter quite a lot of green
17:30chilies three or four green chilies seeds and all into the batter next I'm just going to whisk up a couple
17:39of duck egg whites so get a little bit of them a bit of foam happening with these egg whites just
18:00make a little well in the middle of there just add the egg whites and now to add the infused milk which
18:06should have cooled down enough by now a few tablespoons of this delicious infused milk I'm
18:16looking for the consistency of single cream double cream something like that
18:28perfect now then we'll just get some hot oil happening and now I'm going to dip my chops so
18:36first of all conveniently handle these chops in the batter and then in the oil we get about four or five
18:48in at a time they're only little so just leave those to brown and then I'll turn them over actually Rajasthan is a
19:01very big meat-eating region of India a country largely made up of vegetarians so those are getting
19:10very nicely colored now I mean that looks really lovely and as I said I like the knobbliness of them
19:18I'm enjoying this I mean them I do like cooking you see people say to me um you know you cook every day
19:28you must get tired of it I don't I think the real reason I don't is because you're always hungry and
19:34I'm always hungry I'm always anticipating yet another lovely meal I must say these chops are doing just
19:41that for me so there we go those are now cooked so we will serve them up and I'm just when I dish them
19:50all up I'm just going to sprinkle a little chat masala over them which is basically a simple garam masala
19:57with the important addition of some amchor which is dried green mango and some black Indian sea salt
20:05good let us proceed
20:08they're very nice I must say a hint of chilli for most green chillies and lovely taste of fennel which I love
20:22black taste of sort of general curry flavors but in a very convenient little bit of finger food it's uh
20:29crying out for a glass of beer actually
20:33I stayed at some memorable places in Rajasthan breathtaking and so full of history
20:49take this place in Davegar a Rajputs Palace and now a hotel
20:56it was perfect in every way except I kept getting lost
21:04well as um places to stay go this is pretty pretty exceptional I mean um this is only part of it the
21:15bedroom the bathrooms twice as big as this is I think actually it's where the Rajput lived himself it must be
21:21because it's so grand and there's all these pictures of ancestors here all with their hands on a dagger or a sword
21:29I mean just look at this it is just fabulous
21:32I mean I just love the way the light comes through all that colored glass and all that lovely mirrors and the silveryness of it
21:40and now I started thinking well I wonder what this room was used for and well over there is the Rajputs harem so I was sort of slightly nautily thinking maybe this is where he entertained his concubines
21:55I got up at five in the morning to see the local farmers pick cauliflowers
22:03this northern European vegetable seems so out of place amongst the palm trees like hummingbirds on Bodmin Moor
22:11and of course it was the British who introduced them along with the cabbage
22:16presumably to go with their roast beef and Yorkshire puddings
22:20however the good old collie has acclimatized well and it's a key player in all the wonderful vegetable curries here
22:41I must say after so many days of being in busy Indian cities it's really nice coming to a market like this
22:47very simple not a lot of produce but everything straight out of the fields
22:51and I was talking to the guy that owns a hotel I'm staying in and he said that quite a lot of Europeans come here to rural Rajasthan
23:00not to eat meat and I'm sort of quite in tune with them because I've probably had enough mutton curries to shake quite a few sticks out
23:10but vegetarian food is what they come for and things like cauliflower aloo gobi which is just potato and cauliflower
23:18a bit of masala and just a tiny bit of chili it's very good for the stomach
23:24I always find something in a market like this to interest me it's metti or fenugreek and I've I've never seen this as a vegetable or a herb
23:35either or I've just seen it as those little brown seeds you get back in the UK first time
23:41it's absolutely gloriously savory it's sort of like would be the center of a vegetarian dish it's just
23:53got lots and lots of sort of almost legume like you know peas and beans flavor no wonder they all adore it
24:00I wanted to see how the locals made the famous aloo gobi potato and cauliflower curry
24:20they start off by frying garlic and onion in ghee and cook it until it softens the masala now that's
24:30made from salt chilies turmeric cumin onion seeds and coriander
24:36sort of thinking back home you know you go to your local Indian the order as ever too much you
24:45know probably two or three curries between two of you and you think oh I better have some veg so you
24:50think we'll have some rice and some poppadoms of some naan bread oh and throwing an aloo gobi too you
24:56know it's almost like an afterthought but here it's like a main course and quite rightly so I mean
25:01that's all I want for a main course I mean I am becoming vegetarian Rajasthan isn't a rice growing
25:12area so traditionally they accompany a curry with roti a flatbread made from either wheat or corn flour it's an
25:20unleavened flatbread without yeast now she puts in some tomatoes for a little touch of sourness I've
25:30just been thinking while she's been making that and having come from that market this morning I can tell
25:35you this dish enough for at least three people would cost less than 10 p well I feel very close and
25:54personal to this dish because I was up about five o'clock this morning watching them pick the cauliflower's
26:00that's gone into it and then I saw the rest of the ingredients in the market so this is aloo gobi with
26:06a corn flour roti it's absolutely wonderful it's very nicely seasoned it's quite spicy but I'd be quite
26:20happy to eat this anywhere incidentally when I was in the market I noticed I mean the cauliflower's but
26:27were fetching only three rupees each which is about three and a half pence talking via interpreter to
26:34the the auctioneer there and he was saying to vegetarians cauliflower is like meat and to me
26:40it's like the sort of fillet steak the vegetarian world go anywhere in the Middle East and rosewater
26:54will be a distinct flavor as it is here in Rajasthan whose dishes still hark back to the days of the
27:01Mughal Empire I love rosewater to me it's a lovely exotic backdrop to many a biryani pullout or Indian
27:10pudding this family in Pushkar have been making it for generations in exactly the same way that the Arabs
27:18and Persians did over 2,000 years ago watching the women painstakingly pulling the petals away from the bud
27:26made me feel I was on a film set for a commercial for Turkish delight sometimes when you're into the smells
27:35aren't so good but it's more than offset by this so all the whole roses are going into this still
27:45to make the rosewater the petals they're going to make the jam from and the smell is overpowering but
27:55it's the simplest still I've ever seen and actually if you wanted to make your own moonshine you could
28:01have one of those in your back garden I was joking constable and the way they extracted the essence
28:08from the damask rose petals was indeed timeless they boil the petals in water in sealed copper pots the
28:17heavenly steam rises and escapes from the pot but the cold water from the pond turns it into pure essence a
28:24perfumed rain falling into the pot beneath the surface no doubt there'll be a modern computerized
28:31stainless steel version of this somewhere in the world but this will do for me well I've been waiting
28:41for this all morning so charmed have I been by that by the smell of rose petals but just thinking
28:46actually I don't think I could ever get tired of that scent it's just perfection and this is the jam so
28:53I'm just going to taste it it's just made with sugar and rose petals it's there the center of roses is
29:02right there I'm told it's really good with chapatis I'd like to take some home and have it with toast
29:08but this is what I came to see and to take back to my kitchen by the lagoon because the subtle
29:16background hint of rosewater is the key to India's most popular rice dish biryani I think quite difficult
29:27to get right I think it's the hardest dish to make in Indian cookery really but I think the most important
29:34think about a biryani is keep it simple a lot of them got far too many ingredients and far too many
29:40stages this one is simple when you're frying onions like this even when they're they've got to the right
29:50stage they'll feel soft until you take them out and put them on a plate and then they'll crisp up
29:55I'm just going to marinate my chicken but first of all some ginger and garlic then a couple of chillies thinly sliced
30:06and finally some yogurt about 200 millilitres of yogurt there we go and I'm just going to leave that for about
30:16half an hour it's a very important thing to do this because chicken can be a bit dry but with all
30:23this yogurt in there it's going to be exceedingly moist and now to temper my spices first of all a few
30:31cardamoms and then a nice piece of cinnamon and then some cloves and then a teaspoon of popping a bit
30:43cumin and finally a couple of Indian bay leaves now then I'm just going to add my ground spices now
30:56first of all half to three quarters of turmeric and then chili powder and finally some ground coriander
31:06and some salt just stir that in now immediately I'm going to add my marinated chicken
31:13and now I'm going to add just a tiny bit of water so it is still slightly catching on the bottom
31:27looking lovely I must say I think it's very important in a biryani that the chicken should
31:34be absolutely encased in unctuous very flavorful masala now some tomato I want this this chicken to
31:46be cooked almost dry so that the masala really clings to it but never pre cook it let it go cold I cook
31:55the chicken and make the chicken and make the biryani now that's coming down very nicely do you see it's
32:05almost as dry as something like a beef rendang by dry I mean that everything's clinging to the chicken
32:11so I'm just going to put that out of the way while I cook my rice I cook the rice with cardamom cloves and
32:21salt but I only cook it halfway through it's important the rice is still hard in the center
32:27because the next stage is cooking it again with the chicken and no one likes mushy rice right so now
32:35to layer up my biryani first of all a fair bit of ghee in the bottom of the pan that's to stop it sticking
32:44a little bit of water too just to induce the steam right at the beginning first of all a layer of rice
32:52so here we go nicely cooked flick some saffron over the rice there we go and now rosewater
33:02and on top of that I'm going to put some of my chicken there we go half the chicken
33:12crisp fried onions on top of that very exciting to me this I love making a biryani it's quite tricky
33:23but very rewarding so it's layer after layer of rice saffron infused milk and the splendid rose
33:34water fried onions chicken and you keep repeating it till all the ingredients are used up I'm just
33:44putting a little bit of ghee right around the side so it doesn't stick to the rice doesn't stick to the
33:50side of the pan and now for the lid so now wait for about 30 minutes and serve it up I'm exceptionally
34:02keen on biryani and I can tell you that this dish 500 years ago would have pride of place at many a
34:09banquet table finally I adorn the dish with more fried onions toasted pistachios and cashew nuts I think
34:19that's fit for a Mughal emperor I met lots of tourists while making these films in India and nearly all of
34:32them have been here to the famous palace in Jaipur the capital of Rajasthan I think it must be the second
34:39most popular tourist attraction after the Taj Mahal this is the Hawa Mahal or the Palace of Winds it's
34:48actually not a palace at all it's actually quite a narrow building more of a gallery it's where the
34:54Rajputs wives and many wives and many concubines used to go used to wear a veil and go and look through
35:01the myriad of windows they're all lattices to the processions in the street below the Rajputs
35:07entourage could not be seen part of being a Rajput was you're a meat eater and meat eaters were held to be
35:16strong and you needed to be strong to be a hunter and a warrior and somebody virile of course would
35:23have a large number of wives and concubines indeed a harem I suppose no matter where I am here I seem to
35:34spend quite a bit of time gazing out from forts or palaces to a more mundane and prosaic world beyond
35:41everywhere you see glimpses of poverty not far away from a picture of utter opulence that's India for you
35:55take this village in rural Rajasthan it's called Kanota this might well be perfection in someone's eyes but to
36:04me it's like a thousand villages here a dusty main street concrete shops selling everything from
36:12saris motorcycle bits cooking pots there's the usual sort of chaos about it and yet drive through this
36:21gate and you enter a totally different world the world of the Rajput a sort of English country squire
36:30meets military ruler this estate once belonged to a polo-playing Indian general in the British army Amar Singh
36:43his passion was collecting recipes from the world over and he said well-cooked English food is just as
36:51much to my taste as the Indian I might say that if there is Indian food and one has to eat it with knives and
36:58forks there is no fun in the same way if there is English food and one has to eat it without knives and
37:05forks then it loses its enjoyment the estate is now run by his grandson Thakuman Singh a Rajput and a real foodie
37:19this is fabulous just looking at these that I thought they're railway lines on there just says
37:27Darlington there must be British railway lines Thakuman Singh welcome Rick very very nice looking forward to
37:38you're cooking us some of you yeah yeah yeah I'm cooking some special dish for you thank you very much
37:44Rick this is my family room wow this is the all the ancestors and all this is Amar Singh out here with
37:53his nephew this is your grandfather yeah so he traveled all over the world in the in the British army it's
38:00very event he collected the recipes did he cook the recipes did he like cooking or he had his man used to
38:07cook yeah he used to sit there and supervise did he yeah yeah he he didn't cook himself
38:12Thakuman Singh is going to cook Kima divada Kima means mince and this is mince mutton just simmered
38:22and ground by Thakuman Singh's faithful servant not much change there then so what's going in there first
38:33then onion paste okay now we've got garlic so the salt yeah yeah this is the favorite one for Indians
38:45yes how do you like it I love red chili and we'll see that now you might go red what's that ginger dry
38:55yeah yeah dry ginger coriander is it or no fennel fennel okay fennel now I'm sure that's garam masala
39:06good have you got the recipe or is it a secret you have to smell it and find out oh gosh cumin
39:16coriander coriander yeah cinnamon you're wrong somewhere oh you're not going to tell me maybe
39:26maybe the secret garam masala secret never get the recipe I'm sure well that meat with those spices is
39:37fine as silk and now he adds coriander and we roll it into little balls the size of walnuts
39:45haven't quite got the technique of getting the perfect roll your hand like this yeah and now
39:52they're ready to fry so now this is the frying that's a really nice-looking karai what are
40:00you going to use then gear I said g she said oil okay so which are you going to use that's a still
40:07argument going on I said g she says oil can I give you a bit of advice yeah make it oil make it
40:13oil they always win more healthier in health or in many ways clear butter doctor says no thank you
40:20this dish came from his grandfather's recipe collection so it could go back hundreds of years
40:29he covers the kofta the balls of spice vince with a creamy yogurt and adorns that with a variety of
40:41ground spices chili cumin salt some black pepper and strands of saffron finally splashes of rosewater it
40:52looks like something befitting the tables of the powerful Rajputs in the days when their word was law
40:58what are you do it because I'm not sure where which goes where I appreciate you using a fork from us westerners
41:09mmm it's lovely I love the yogurt so this would be a typical lunch or yeah here we prefer chapatis
41:25also in it at lunch Sunday what's it like being married to her to a Rajput I was a I'm also Rajput
41:34and don't believe in a intercaste marriage so but what's it like being married to he knows how to
41:40cook first of all so I am free that means you know that's the only quality in me no no but first I said
41:48first quality and which is the second one I can just be a guest to him eat away and go only so that helps
41:58me because I don't have to cook then that quality you found in me how does it feel in these modern times
42:04in India to be a Rajput what what does it mean now that yeah loud nowadays they're like a tamed tiger
42:10really because they don't have any powers anymore there are no more powers so they are like a tamed
42:18tiger in a circus it was a lovely lunch and it remind me of something I'd read about British Raj one
42:38thing that really put the British nose out of joint was that the Indians do posh rather better than we
42:45do so they're and as luck would have it my next stop on my curry quest is the state of Himachal Pradesh
42:55the perfect antidote to all that cream yogurt and meat lovely
43:08this is Kangara fort a castle belonging to one of the oldest families in the world
43:15the Katoch family the name Katoch means best in swordsmanship and apparently these people can
43:23trace their lineage right back to the days of Alexander the Great this place reminds me of
43:31scenes from old movies about Dering Do and the Northwest Frontier starring Errol Flynn and usually an
43:38English actor blacked up wearing a turban and playing somebody deeply untrustworthy
43:44the Katoches own pretty much all the land around here and today is an auspicious one because it
43:55heralds a visit by the family matriarch Mrs Katoch
43:58the son ash that's him in the pattern shirt his greeting guests arriving for a special feast because
44:10his mother is seriously into Indian politics this is the day for thanking all supporters and retainers on
44:23the family estates so it's a curry picnic for about 2,000 the men cooking this feast of Brahmins the highest
44:34cast in India and they're strictly vegetarian they take their role here seriously all the spices herbs
44:42and various condiments are measured out on leaves saves on washing up and tipped into these big copper
44:49cooking pots I have to content myself that I'm at the hub of where it's all that because to formulate
44:56a recipe is utterly impossible however it's given me a really good idea on how to go about cooking an
45:03authentic dish from Himachal Pradesh right well I'm just gonna run through five of the eight dishes first
45:11of all here we have madra and there's lots and lots of ghee in there and I noticed lots of asvatita
45:18and lots of that dried milk which really richens it up it's almost like milk powder in there called
45:24Koya over here chaps before they move it off it's cutter and now this is a black lentil a dull I'm
45:33particularly fond of this one I've cooked it already for myself and it's flavored with Amcha which is
45:39some dried green mango which gives it a very very tart taste now I'm not going to tell you what those
45:46yellow things are on the top because they're over there too next here we have just a very simple
45:51yellow dull I lost count of the different spices that are gone in there and it's finished which what
45:58I think is celery seed but Dave the director doesn't agree but I know I'm right because I've tasted it
46:06before in Bloody Mary's over here this is a chickpea curry and this is finished with those little yellow
46:16things which are actually puffed chickpeas so like puff wheat and over here it's sweet rice sweetened with
46:24sugar with lots of coconuts and raisins in it a real banquet dish and the thing is about all this food
46:32is there's no garlic and onion in it the gods don't like garlic and onion because it encourages it heats
46:39the blood and it encourages intemperance lust wantonness that sort of thing
46:52this is the first sitting and they'll probably be about 10 more of them before the afternoon's over
46:58it's very easy and comfortable for those used to sitting cross-legged for hours at a time but I
47:05haven't done this since I was at the village school about 60 years ago you want a green chili yes please
47:14it's very nice food take it in your three fingers okay and with your thumb just push it in your mouth okay
47:25now if you can try that it's three fingers and then okay flick it into your mouth it's not flicking it
47:31just pushing it in but in him I tell when you sit like this there's no difference between the rich the
47:43poor the cast or anything everybody's equal and the food is only served by Brahmins it is cooked by the
47:49Brahmins and only served by the so there's a sense of equality here was something very convivial about it
47:57and I mean would they feel nervous in with you around or are they um well with my mother around
48:02yes definitely they'd be nervous but uh not you uh but not with me no they've seen me you know most of
48:09them have seen me grow as a little kid yeah uh from here so half of my boys are the ones I used to
48:14play cricket with so you're saying that you think you might be the oldest family in the world well
48:19historical records um date us back to Alexander's war records a war hero known as King Porus from
48:27whom we descend uh we fought every invader who came into the country from the Mughals to the British
48:33and um you are you're being welcomed here so people always want to know whether the caste system is
48:42continuing is it dying out in many states it's very very prevalent yeah especially in Haryana or that
48:50inter-caste marriages are not accepted in the villages
48:57and so it makes a lot of problems for young people who fall in love but
49:04bigger cities like Delhi Calcutta Bombay Lucknow and all these areas biggest cities it has become it's dying
49:12of course it's a lot of people who come out
49:15god i found that a bit hard getting up i'm not used to sitting cross-legged for so long
49:19i must say it was um quite in a way quite moving because there is a great sort of leveling
49:26sense when people sit down to eat together and i think ash is right it's a tradition that he should
49:32maintain because you're all you're all as one in a situation like this eating together
49:38one of the meals cooked that afternoon was a lovely dish rather like a chunky bean curry
49:48and it's one of the most popular vegetarian dishes in the whole of india
49:53and once the beans have cooked it takes no time at all
49:56oh they seem to be about ready i'm about to finish cooking a rajma which is a red kidney bean curry from
50:08himachal pradesh right up in northern india i've been cooking these beans just with a bit of turmeric
50:15for about an hour and a half they really do take i soak them overnight and i've been cooking them
50:20and they're still well they're soft now but it's certainly taken a long time i actually when we
50:25came over right at the beginning of filming some months ago on the plane they served rajma and i
50:30was thinking at the time it's a bit like sort of comfort food like cazalet without the meat
50:36so to those frying onions i put in a garlic and ginger paste very common here it's very easy to make
50:42back home in a food processor then chili powder now you can tell that's just freshly ground because
50:49it's all fluffy and now to reinforce those curry flavors garam masala
50:57and now i'm going to add quite a lot of yogurt because yogurt is incredibly important in northern
51:03india it's a lot sharper in india but if you use an ordinary yogurt not a sort of low fat one my gosh
51:09no because there's certainly plenty of fat and indian yogurt but you'll get approximately the same
51:15thing although not quite so sour and now i'm going to add my beans there we go
51:23to help thicken it crush a few of the beans against the side of the saucepan
51:27with the back of a spoon and that's it
51:29the last thing is to squeeze a bit of lime over the top and there we go just serve that with some
51:39fluffy basmati rice brilliant
51:53this is the town of macleod ganj in the foothills of the himalayas the indians refer to this area as
52:07the abode of the gods and actually this is where talking of gods the dalai lama lives
52:14consequently there are many of his followers living here and so naturally the restaurants serve many
52:19varieties of tibetan food
52:24i'd never heard of these before i came here but i've been told that their popularity is spreading
52:30all over india they're little steamed dumplings called momos
52:37gosh these are good they really are good what i love about them is
52:42they're um steamed so they're very moist you've got lots of nice tasting
52:47minced lamb in there and lots of onion only slightly cooked so almost a bit sharp
52:53they're so lovely no wonder i mean it's just such a relief to me after so many curries just to come
53:00and have some um tibetan food which is so different but as i was saying no wonder they're catching on
53:05through the whole of india because they are truly truly lovely
53:14i wanted to come here to meet the dalai lama i know it sounds a bit lame or stupid but i wanted to
53:21talk to him about food what it means to him it's as simple as that i sensed his aids were a trifle
53:29bemused at my request food just food they'd say yes i'd really like to know his holiness's thoughts about food
53:37hello hello very nice to meet you your holiness i must say i'm a bit nervous no no no no don't you know
53:52this is david richard the director great honor to meet you your holiness ready ready yes moving oh yes
54:03um just obviously as a monk that food doesn't feature now in your life but as when you were young
54:12when you were little did it matter to you food is it traditionally as a young sort of student
54:19including monk student so not feeding eggs box and fish
54:25then my own parent my father very much fun book so occasionally when i visit my own sort of family's house
54:45when my father is enjoy books and then i just sit beside him like dog
54:53waiting waiting some peace from that
54:59so that anyway quite illegal young dalai lama should not allow you that also egg my mother quietly cooked
55:13egg egg and then give me so so one day i enjoy uh pork and eggs which supposed to see uh not ella
55:28eating dalama then one official monk official you see come while i enjoy these things so then i burst
55:37go away go away so that that shows you see young boy very much so fond these food which not allowed in my
55:51official kitchen like that this is one thing one thing then then of course you see i'm buddhist fully
56:03audience for a monk so afternoon no dinner right only breakfast and lunch after after that is in no solid meal
56:17but occasionally when i feel very hungry then with salutation to buddha it's a few biscuits
56:23i think my healthy body is more important than just just you see that's the uh smart one small root
56:41so really you have to teach yourself to think of other people to be compassionate to other people
56:46and and i mean and and sharing of food to me as part as part of that compassion really as a chef i think
56:56actually the most pleasure i get from it is cooking for other people and making them and seeing the
57:04happiness in their faces i think we should uh promote awareness oneness of humanity
57:13i think that's what i'm saying once you see that sort of concept and become strong then a lot of world
57:19problem can reduce now we too much sort of stress different religious faith different nationality
57:28different nations own sort of interest don't care about other so therefore i think your program about
57:38food i think through that way you can teach people basically we are same king queen also loves food
57:47beggar eight patients oh these also you see loves food on that level we are same
57:57you're so right i mean that's what it's all about to me really and um i just like to thank you so much
58:04for being so open with me because um as i said i was really nervous before and now i'm overwhelmed okay
58:12thank you thank you thank you much okay now you satisfied our boss satisfied now i'm very satisfied oh
58:23that's good that's good that's good that's good
58:36you
58:38you
58:42you
58:44you
58:46you
58:48you
58:50you
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