When planning to cook a dish of Indian cuisine according to the cookbook, you often find in recipes such an interesting ingredient as garam masala. What it is? Is it possible to make seasoning yourself in our conditions of the northern latitudes? Or cooking fragrant Indian dishes will remain an unattainable dream for us? Of course, zira, cardamom and coriander do not grow on Russian bows, and in our forests you will not find a clove. But in the markets you can easily find all the necessary ingredients.
So, we are going to the market. What do we need and in what quantity? The word “masala” from Hindi is translated as “mixture”. That is, it is a combination of herbs and spices. "Garam", by the way, means nothing more than "hot." Therefore, spices should warm. Garam masala is a mixture of spices that not only fragrant and give dishes a unique flavor. Seasoning is indispensable in the so-called “winter” dishes - chicken in carry, for example. And at home, in India, the mixture is added to a wide variety of dishes: salads, soups and even desserts.
So what are we going to the market for? Ask the merchant to send you two tablespoons of coriander, cardamom and zira grains. You also need to buy two sticks of cinnamon (about 5 cm long), a teaspoon of cloves (buds) and ground nutmeg. Well, at home you probably will find one bay leaf and two soup spoons of peppercorns. Now we start cooking gara masala. The recipe is extremely simple and resembles roasting seeds.
We take a heavy frying pan, preferably with a thick bottom, put it on a small fire. Without any fat! When it has warmed up well, pour a mixture of spices without nutmeg on it and stir it with a wooden spatula. After some time, the spices will begin to smell fragrant. After ten minutes of such calcination, the mixture will change color - it will become darker. This is a sign that it’s time to turn off the fire. Cool the gara masala completely, add a spoonful of grated nutmeg. Mix again and grind in a coffee grinder. We put the powder in a tightly closed container. The mixture stores the fullness of the aroma for about three months, and then begins to weather.
There is another, more complicated recipe for garam masala - “Karma”. According to him, we grind each spice separately. And the mixture is slightly different: 10 grains of cardamom, 5 cloves, 2 cinnamon sticks, 4 leaves of laurel, 2 dried pods of hot red chili, as well as two soup spoons of grains of mustard, cumin, coriander and pea. Then combine all the chopped spices in a bowl. We heat the dry pan until a light haze appears. Sprinkle the mixture and calcine it, constantly stirring with a wooden spatula, for two minutes. Cool, pour into a jar.
In what dishes does garam masala find use? In almost all meat, if you want to give them a touch of southern exoticism. This spice mixture can also eliminate unwanted odors from foods such as lamb. Fry the fillet in olive oil 5 minutes until crusted, put on a plate. In the remaining fat for 3 minutes we pass the chopped onion and 2 cloves of garlic. Add to them 2 teaspoons of garam masala and fry for half a minute. Put the fillet slices in the pan again, fill with broth or tomato sauce, bring to a boil. Then we cover the pan with foil or a lid and put in the oven preheated to 180 C for 4 hours.