I wanted to recreate some of the amazing traditional recipes that we tasted in Bhutan. And when I say traditional, I don't mean the set menu that you get in the traditional restaurants in Thimpu. For me traditional means, the meal you are served in a farmhouse, following a farm-to-table concept. So if you are planning for a Bhutan trip and a farmhouse meal is not yet considered in your itinerary, then you better do because otherwise you will miss out on experiencing the charm of having food with the locals in their house with the ingredients they source directly form their farms. 

• Chili Potato Stir Fry
• Chicken with Bhutanese Chili Powder - Stir fry
• Asparagus Stir fry
• Brinjal stir fry
• Chili Onion Salad with Cheese
• Rice

All of these dishes take maximum 15-20 minutes to prepare and are super easy. I will have a separate series of blogs on the vegetarian and non-vegetarian Datshis that I made at home.

Chili Potato Stir Fry

Preparation Time : 5 minutes 

Cooking Time : 15 minutes 

Serves - 1 adult

Ingredients :

• Potato - 1 medium
• Bhutanese Chili powder / Red Chili Powder - 1/2 tsp * ( can be adjusted)
• Butter - 2.5 tsp
• Oil - 1 tsp
• Salt as per taste

Procedure :

1. Cut potatoes into thin flat shapes ( Refer to image) and wash them well
2. Now boil some water and blanch these potatoes for 2 minutes
3. Discard the water and separate out the blanched potatoes
4. Now in a pan heat 2 tsp of butter. Keep the flame on medium so as to not burn the butter. Once the butter melts, add 1/2 tsp of Bhutanese red chilli powder or any chilli powder.
5. Add the blanched potatoes and coat them in the butter chilli sauce. Add salt. Add Sichuan pepper powder ( optional). Cook this for 5 minutes till potatoes are done. You can add a little water if you feel the potatoes are sticking to the pan. And that's it, a super simple potato side to go with rice.
   
   
   

Chicken with Bhutanese Chili Powder - Stir fry

Preparation Time : 10 minutes 

Cooking Time : 20 minutes 

Serves - 1 adult

Ingredients :

• Chicken - 300 gm
• Bhutanese Chili powder / Red Chili Powder - 1/2 tsp * ( can be adjusted)
• Dry Red Chili ( whole) - 2
• Onion - 1 medium, sliced
• Butter - 2 tsp
• Oil - 1 tsp
• Salt as per taste

Procedure :

1. Cut chicken on the bone into bite sized pieces. You can use boneless chicken too. Wash and keep the chicken aside.
2. Now heat some water in a vessel and add a spoon of salt. When the water comes to a rolling boil, drop in the chicken pieces. Let the chicken pieces be in the water for 2 minutes. Turn off the heat and strain the water and chicken in two different bowls and keep the water aside, we will use it later.
3. Now heat a pan and add 3 tsp of butter and 1 tsp of refined oil. When the oil is hot, temper it with dry red chili. Once fragrant add the sliced onions and let it fry till pinkish.
4. Now add the boiled chicken pieces and 1 tsp of Bhutanese chili powder or any chili powder. Toss everything well and let the chicken fry for about a minute.
5. Now add about 1/2 cup of the reserved water and cover and cook. You can repeat adding a little water until the chicken is soft and cooked.
6. Now remove the cover and dry out any excel water till the oil releases.
7. Serve it hot with steamed rice. Best served with Bhutanese red rice.

Asparagus Stir fry

This asparagus stir-fry with garlic and butter is one of my favorite side dishes. Please note the Bhutanese version uses very tender spears of Asparagus which are in season in summer and tastes amazing.

Procedure :

Preparation Time : 5 minutes 

Cooking Time : 15 minutes 

Serves - 1 adult

Ingredients :

• Asparagus - 250 gm
• Garlic - 4 cloves, minced
• Butter - 2 tsp
• Oil - 1 tsp
• Salt as per taste

Prepping

• You need to separate the tough ends of the Asparagus before you cook them. The easiest trick for this is to remove the white or pale green/pink part of each spear, then rinse the spears under water and pat them dry.  
• Asparagus cooks very quickly in the pan, so be sure to get your sauces ready before you start cooking the Asparagus. 
• Mince the garlic finely.

Cooking

1. Add refined oil to the pan and when the oil is hot, add the minced garlic and cook for a minute or two until it is fragrant. Add 1/2 tsp of chili flakes and toss in the oil. 
2. Next add the asparagus and salt as per taste. Stir every 30-40 seconds to ensure each side of the Asparagus gets enough time to be in direct contact with the hot pan. Cover and cook, the Asparagus will get cooked in its own moisture, but if you feel they are sticking, sprinkle a few drops of water in between. The Asparagus usually gets cooked in 4-5 minutes. 
3. When you are stir frying, you need to keep a close watch on the spears. Keep testing the spears during the cooking process, so you wont pull them out too early or you don't overcook them turning it into a mush.
4. Add 1 tsp of butter before finishing the dish, let the butter melt in the pan and coat the fried Asparagus evenly.

Transfer to a plate and enjoy immediately while they are still hot for the best taste.

Brinjal stir fry

Tender brinjals which have no/ very less mature seeds are best for this preparation. We saw these long and tender brinjals everywhere in their vegetable markets which were completely seedless. The local name for Eggplant/ brinjal is "Dolom".

Procedure :

Preparation Time : 5 minutes 

Cooking Time : 10 minutes 

Serves - 1 adult

Ingredients :

• Brinjal/ Eggplant ( preferably tender and thin) - 100 gm
• Rice Flour - 2 tsp
• Corn flour - 4 tsp
• Sichuan Pepper - 1/2 tsp, finely crushed ( Optional)
• Black Pepper powder - 1/4 tsp
• Salt as per taste

Procedure :

1. Wash and clean the brinjals.
2. Cut the eggplants into thin long slices.
3. Now make a slurry of corn flour, rice flour, salt and Sichuan pepper powder ( optional) or black pepper powder. The slurry will be slightly runny in texture.
4. Heat oil in a wok enough for deep frying the brinjals.
5. Now dip each of the brinjal slices in the slurry so as to coat them properly and slowly slower them into the hot oil. Fry till the outer layer is crispy

Serve immediately with steamed rice.

Chili Onion Salad with Cheese

Procedure :

Preparation Time : 5 minutes 

Serves - 1 adult

Ingredients :

• Onion - 1/2 medium
• Green Chili - 1, chopped
• Tomato - 1/2 , medium
• Cheese - 20 gm or 1 slice
• Salt as per taste

Procedure :

1. Chop onions, green chilli and tomato
2. In a mixing bowl add the chopped onions, green chilli, tomato and add salt as per taste
3. Now crumble some cheese and give it a nice mix

Serve it with your Bhutanese meal.

19 October

This year the autumn in Maharashtra doesn't feel like autumn at all. It feels like we are stuck forever in the monsoon season itself. Rain , rain and more rain is enough to drive us crazy. Thus to cheer myself up I checkout the vibrant fall pictures my friends are sharing on their social accounts from across the world. As much as I love Indian festivals around this time, I love the feeling of colorful autumn, thanksgiving and a white Christmas of the states. It takes me back to the time I was staying in Atlanta and how vibrant the entire place used to become during the fall season - the prettiest of all seasons! I remember the road trips along the Blue ridge parkway and the stunning visuals it presented. I couldn't peel off my eyes even for a second from the vista on both side of the road. I think I will create a separate blog post to revive the memories of a log cabin stay during the autumn in Chattanooga, Georgia.

So you get the drift. I am very much transported back to those red, yellow and magenta days whenever I hear the word fall or autumn.  And it has been my longest standing desire to prepare fall recipes. So this year I have been experimenting a few recipes with the fall theme on mind. I tried incorporating pumpkin in many of the recipes. And I found an interesting thing when I was doing research on the fall recipes. I liked all the pumpkin recipes which were more south east Asian interpretation of the American fall staples. I felt they are more zesty and flavorful. I might be totally wrong in this case, but going by the recipe ingredients this is what I felt. I never knew before this that even in Thai cuisine there is a pumpkin soup or a fall harvest salad. The ingredients they had used to make their versions aligned more to my Asian taste buds.

I am not at all a salad person. At least I was not at all a salad person before the lockdown. The only reason is that its too much of a work and the phycological thought process is that when it doesn't have a bread or rice in it, it is not going to be filling enough. But that notion changed during the lockdown when we started to focus more on healthy eating habits. Thus I started experimenting with different kinds of salad bowls. This particular salad was thought of as part of an Instagram contest (yes Instagram is kind of taking over my life, which I feel I need to restrict for good!) We wanted to create something fresh and feisty and different form the usual salads. It had to define our personality. That's very cheeky I know but yeah that's how the food should be. Its a reflection of myself I feel. And the Thai versions of both the harvest recipes - pumpkin soup and Autumnal salad felt like what would perfectly suite my palate.

When we think fall ingredients a few things instantly come to the mind - butternut squash, sweet winter pumpkins, crisp apples, pears, sweet potato and so on. They are so lovely ones that you can not just go wrong with any combination you choose.

This can be passed off as a both a fall and a summer salad. Its a feisty salad which will tease your taste buds with the spiciness of the bird's eye chilli, sweetness from the honey dressing, citrusy burst from the tropical fruits, buttery tropical vibes from saffron coconut prawns and to balance it all off the earthiness from the toasted nuts. It basically is a warm fall salad that will keep you cozy on a chilly fall night.

Marination Time : 30 minutes

Ingredients for Salad:

• Fresh Prawns with tails - 20 
• Peanuts - 1/4th cup
• Walnuts - 1/4th cup
• Pumpkin Seeds - 1/4th cup
• Onion - 1/2
• Cherry Tomato - 6
• Lettuce - 1/2
• Apple - 1
• Pineapple - 2/4th cup diced
• Mosambi/Sweet Lime - 1
• Salt

Ingredients for Prawn Marination:

• Saffron Strands 
• Sesame oil - 1 tsp
• Red Chilli powder - 1/2 tsp
• Bird's eye chilli - 1 chopped
• Coconut paste (Optional) - 1 tsp
• Lime juice - 1/2 tsp
• Salt as per taste
• Shredded Coconut - 1/2 cup

Ingredients for Dressing:

• Honey - 2 tsp
• Lemon Juice - 1/2
• Fish Sauce - 1/2 tsp
• Sesame oil - 1 tsp

Ingredients for garnish:

• Roasted Pumpkin Seeds -  2 tsp
• Bird's eye chilli - 2 chopped

Equipment:

• Thick bottom skillet/ non stick skillet

Method:

1. Start by cleaning the prawns. Devein it, take the head off and leave the tail. It preserves the shape of the prawn.

2. Now marinate the prawn for 30 minute with marination ingredients mentioned above expect the shredded coconut.

3. While the prawns are marinating, dice the apples. In a bowl take 1 tsp lemon juice and 1 tsp honey and add the apples. Toss everything well and let it rest.

4. Now prepare the nuts. Take a skillet and heat it on medium. Once hot toss the walnuts first until they are fragrant and toasted. Same way toast the peanuts and the pumpkin seeds. Now keep both of them aside to cook down.

Note: If you are using toasted pumpkin seeds no need to toast it again.

5. Slice the onions. In the same skillet on medium, dry roast the onions for about 2-3 minutes, tossing them around with a spatula. Take them off heat and let it cool down.

6. Dice the sweet lime and the pineapples. 

Tip: If either of them are sour, then just add a bit of sugar and let it sit till the sugar melts.

7. Time to prepare the prawns. Heat the skillet, add a teaspoon of oil. Spread the shredded coconut on a plate or any flat surface. Now take one prawn at a time and coat it with the shredded coconut on both sides. Tip them in the oil and keep the flame on medium so that the coconut doesn't get burnt. Turn both sides and fry them nicely till it gets a light golden brown hue. Patiently fry all the prawns for not more than 30 seconds each side. Keep them on a paper towel to soak the excess oil.

Note: Adding saffron is optional. But it gives a very nice flavour to the fried prawns.

8. Now prepare the dressing. In a bowl take everything mentioned under dressing and give it a good mix. 

9. Now its time to plate everything. Start by laying down a layer of lettuce in the platter. On top of it arrange all the fruits, onion, halved cherry tomato, prawns and the toasted nuts. Drizzle the dressing on top generously. Toss everything in.

10. Finish off by garnishing it with pumpkin seeds, chopped bird's eye chilli and sesame.

Pro tip: You can even add some cheese on top to make it more luscious.

You can pair this feisty autumn salad with any autumn soup of your choice. I had served it with the Thai Spicy Coconut Soup. Check out the recipe here.