bengali cooking

I've got three imminent coursework deadlines, too many dance routines to practise (don't ask), presentations to give, conferences to attend, and work to plan for a charity, and so obviously I decided to spend my entire Thursday night this week preparing and cooking a Bengali curry. Very smart. I can't even justify it as a de-stress activity because cooking instils an extraordinary amount of dread/fear/anxiety and raised blood pressure in me. I do however feel a sense of achievement: I've never cooked a curry from scratch before. The whole reason I went about this was because my pal Ella is half-Bengali, and her Grandma has a cool website full of amazing recipes here. I tried the Main Course-Chicken curry recipe and it wasn't difficult at all. Ella kindly gave me measures of the spices I needed for the recipe (me & the boys' spice rack extends to salt, pepper and ready-grated parmesan). Admittedly I was a bit heavy-handed with the extra-hot chilli powder but we survived, and if I do say so myself it was a pretty damn tasty curry. I took some action shots but gave up trying hard when I realised that this was probably the least photogenic dish I've ever made. Nevermind. Have a go at the curry though!! And peruse the website it's full of wonderful stories as well as recipes.

http://www.anita-pal.com/

Tip from Ella: make sure the onions are really brown and softened - this can alter the quality of the curry sauce.

And this was a lil thank you present from Jenny who came back to visit last weekend. (How sneaky is this bird). She kept saying she felt like she was on holiday here and to be honest I felt the same even though I still go here. KEEP COMING BACK JEN!