Hi there!  How has your day been so far?  The little guy had his shots yesterday so we are just taking it easy over here.  I was amazed how quickly he bounced back after getting the shots.  He cried but was fine like two minutes later.  Totally happy as can be.

It’s strange for me being a SAHM and not heading into the office everyday (side note–I totally started to write SATC instead of SAHM.  Oh Freud.)  I have so much more time on my hands and yet, sometimes I blink and the day is over.  One of the great things about having a bit more time on my hands is I can occasionally sneak off to an event in the middle of the day.  Like last week when I headed out to a Let’s Cook cooking class featuring an Indian menu.  

Indian is one of my most favorite cuisines.  I love love love a good curry with hot, garlicky naan bread.  Unfortunately there are zero good Indian restaurants around here so I’ve had to learn to improvise at home.  I was excited to learn how others make Indian recipes, including what spices they use, their techniques and the brand of yogurt they find best.  I’m such a cooking nerd, I love discussing the art of cooking with other people!

On the menu were Vegetable Samosas.  I always consider samosas so difficult to make but the filling is so easy.  The hardest part is filling the pastry and then frying them.

We also made Chicken Tikka Masala–my personal favorite!

Normally a chicken tikka masala recipe requires marinating in yogurt before cooking the chicken, but we didn’t do that for this recipe.  Instead we spiced the chicken with homemade garam masala (you can buy it here but it is difficult to find–I brought some with me) and some canola oil.  

Then you pan sear it until it is browned just on the outside using clarified butter (butter that is heated and the white foam is skimmed off and discarded).  Once the chicken is browned you remove the chicken and add the ginger, garlic and onions to the pan.  You then add the tomatoes.  I like to use an immersion blender to soften up the tomatoes and make a sauce.  The chicken goes back in, along with coconut milk (secret ingredient!) and you allow it to simmer.  It was completely delicious!

We also made some nice pan fried okra and cauliflower to round out our healthy meal (there is almost nothing healthy about Indian!).

Our finished product not only looked amazing, it tasted unbelievable!  Plus I was starving after smelling all these delicious smells in the kitchen for hours!

And of course, no meal is complete without dessert.  We made the traditional mango lassi for dessert, which is kind of like a smoothie pudding.  I learned the coolest way to quickly skin a mango.  You just use the side of a glass to scoop the flesh out into the glass.

The mango lassi was perfect because it isn’t too sweet after such a rich meal.

Readers, did you know you could peel a mango with a glass?  What’s your best Indian cooking tip?  Have you ever made your own spices?