Indian Home Cooking with Love and Light

It is our first Diwali and we are guests of our new friend, Pravina. Her invitation leads to a lesson in Indian home cooking delivered with love and light.

Rangoli design created by Pravina’s daughter in the courtyard entry

During Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, goodness is illuminated. Good will triumphs over evil, signified by the lighting of lamps and exchanging gifts. Windows and doors are opened for Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, to find her way into the homes of the people. Bright rangoli designs are created in patterns of colored rice as a sacred welcome to the gods and a decorative beacon for luck. Central to the holiday is Indian home cooking; the traditional curries and sweets are lovingly prepared for family and friends who come to celebrate.

Betsy and Pravina at her roadside cart

We’re guests of our new friend, Pravina, who has invited us to her home in Korotogo Village for lunch. Pravina is hard to miss if you’re traveling the Queen’s Highway from either Nadi or Suva. Every day, she’s at the Sunset Strip roundabout with her brightly painted wooden cart. For nine years, Pravina has pulled it on foot from her home to sit between roadside and shore. From there, she waves and smiles at passersby, hoping to sell them a necklace or bracelet, some Indian sweets, a piece of fresh fruit, and perhaps a lesson in Indian home cooking.

I am always amazed, although I shouldn’t be, when the smallest things turn out to be most auspicious. Pete had come home one day from a walk down to the reef with the news that Pravina had a red coral necklace I might like. I’d seen one that was very beautiful in a high-priced tourist store in Nadi, but the decision to purchase from Pravina was easy at about 1/3 the price. What happened next, though, birthed a friendship.

Pressing a variety of freshly made colorful sweets upon us – “you try!” – and peppering the conversation with rapid, heavily accented exclamations – “you’re so wonderful” and “darlings” – Pravina charmingly demanded we come to her house for real Indian home cooking.

Pravina’s sweets and savory treats

Indians are the second largest demographic in Fiji’s total population of around 900,000. Since arriving, we’d sampled a variety of Indian food, including a memorable meal at the Krishna temple which dominates the Sigatoka skyline. “Oh no,” insists Pravina, “the Krishna food is not as good to eat! There is no garlic and onion. Real Indian home cooking must have it.” Well, we think, avowed garlic and onion lovers as we are, that’s that. Pete looks this up later and it is true: garlic and onions are thought to be detrimental to meditation in that they root the consciousness more firmly in the body. I guess we won’t be real Hare Krishnas anytime soon.

Pravina’s Diwali lunch is spectacular, laced not only with plenty of onion and garlic, but punctuated by staccato bursts of spicy goodness. Her culinary orchestrations meld flavors in crescendo, glissando-ing between individual notes. We greedily play with sections of the composition, scooping jackfruit curry up with roti, stabbing lentil balls out of their sauce, and surreptitiously emulating the etiquette of eating with fingers instead of forks. “I’ve got to learn how to cook like this,” says Pete.

Diwali lunch at Pravina’s

A few days later, we make our way back to Pravina’s for the lesson in Indian home cooking. This day, as it turns out, will be more than about food.

Invited for the first time into the kitchen, I am struck by its humble simplicity. It is small, perhaps 8 feet by 10 feet. There is a table with open shelving, a glass case of spices and small staples, and large covered trash-can sized containers of flour and rice. The countertop two-burner is fueled by a propane tank in front of what once was a connecting door to an adjacent apartment. Further down the tiny hallway toward the back of the house are the family bedrooms.

Pete stirs at the two-burner

Ingredients at the ready on the counter

Here Pravina cooks, beginning daily at 5 a.m., sending her husband off to his work at the hotel with a midday meal, feeding the children breakfast and then packing their lunches for school, and after that, stocking her cart for the day’s business. She has a fairly new, but small, refrigerator, and her deep freeze is in a corner of the living room by necessity.

Indian spices, clockwise from top: Methi (fenugreek), Jeera (cumin), Shah Jeera (caraway or black cumin seeds), Masala (spice mix), Haldi (turmeric)

Pete in his Full of Passion apron with Pravina

I think to myself, this is not a kitchen I, nor any of my American friends and family, would deem adequate by any stretch of the imagination. And then I am ashamed.

Emotion floods my brain: remorse over my thoughts, admiration for a woman who began cooking for her brothers and sisters at the age of 7, who now sells from a roadside cart to fund her children’s education.

I sit dumbly in the only kitchen chair which has been given to me as an honored visitor, and remember that Nietszche famously believed “in large kitchens the cooking is usually bad.” I’m a mess! Trying to clear my thoughts while Pete dons an apron that says “Full of Passion,” I listen to Pravina chattering happily about, showing the ingredients she has prepped for the lesson. We begin.

There are no written recipes here, so I flit between roles: photography and transcription. The names of some ingredients are unknown to us, so we write them phonetically. Pravina is a whirlwind, chopping, rolling, adding, explaining. “Oh, he uses his left hand to write!” she exclaims. “This means very smart, he is!” Yes, he is. “You are lucky!” she trills. Yes, I am.

Pete follows orders, estimates measurements, kneads and rolls, picks and swirls, peeks and stirs. A neighbor walks in with an infant and we ooh and aah, Pravina’s mother-in-law from next door arrives to greet us with bright eyes and a kiss, her daughter studies in the courtyard for an important exam. We taste, tease each other, bang pans and utensils, dig through unmarked bags for just the right ingredient, stain our fingers with turmeric and curry. There is life in this kitchen as it happens and love in the light of Diwali. Lakshmi has delivered us great wealth.

And the food is exquisite.

Indian Home Cooking Recipes:

Rolling out roti

Roti and Puri

Recipe By: Pravina Dutt, Pravina’s Indian Home Cooking

Ingredients:

• 2 cups flour
• 2 pinch salt
• 4 teaspoon canola oil
• water, boiling

Directions:

1. Mix together flour salt and 1 tsp of the oil.

2. Add some hot water. Stir and mash with fork to make small balls of dough that form in the dry flour. Add water as needed. Let cool briefly.

3. Begin kneading the dough into a single ball. Add remaining oil and knead into the dough. Dough will not be sticky.

4. After several minutes, roll into a log and cut into pieces. Small for Puri and larger for Roti.

5. Form each pieces into a ball and flatten (If no one helps you, skip the rolling into a ball part and simply squish). Roll with rolling pin to make tortilla-like. Roti is large, Puri is small.

6. For Roti, heat in a lightly oiled pan, flipping until well browned on each side. For Puri, add 1/2 inch oil to pan and fry, flipping occasionally.

Chick Pea & Potato Curry

Chick peas and chopped potato

Recipe By: Pravina Dutt, Pravina’s Indian Home Cooking

Serving Size: 4

Ingredients:

• 1 medium potato, Chopped
• 1 cup chickpea
• 1/2 medium onion, chopped
• 1 pinch methi
• 1 teaspoon turmeric
• 2 teaspoons masala
• 3 tablespoons garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon chile, minced
• 3 small tomato, chopped
• 2 sprigs cilantro, chopped
• 2 cups water
• oil
• 1 pinch chili powder

Directions:

1. Add some oil to frying pot over medium heat. Add onion and methi, turmeric, masala, garlic and chili frying until onion has color.
2. Add potatoes and chickpeas plus pinch of chili powder. Stir and cover.
3. Once the chickpeas and potatoes have some color, add 1 cup water and cover. Add more water as needed to prevent dryness.
4. When potatoes are tender, add tomatoes and cilantro. Stir and cover briefly.

Notes: The chile in this and related recipes are fresh hot chiles run through a food processor until finely chopped. The chickpeas are not canned but rather dried. Soaked for several hours. When water is added near the final step, the chickpeas will absorb more water.

For Jackfruit Curry substitute chopped jackfruit for the potatoes and chickpeas above.

Jackfruit curry

Lentil Balls

Lentil Balls in Sauce

Recipe By: Pravina Dutt, Pravina’s Indian Home Cooking

Serving Size: 4

Ingredients:

• 2 cups dried yellow split peas, soaked 4 hours, mashed
• 4 tablespoons garlic, minced
• 2 teaspoons chilies, minced
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 2 pinches tumeric
• 2 pinches masala
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ginger, minced
• 1/2 medium onion, sliced length wise
• 3 cups water
• 1 pinch methi
• 1 pinch shah jeera
• 1 pinch jeera
• 2 teaspoons cilantro fresh, chopped

Lentil balls in sauce

Directions:

1. Set 1/2 cup of the mashed yellow peas aside. To the remaining, add 1 T garlic, 1 t chili, 1/2 t salt, pinch turmeric and pinch of masala. Mix well.
2. Make small balls out of the peas mixture, about a T or so by rolling in your hand.
3. Heat 1/2 inch of oil in frying pan and fry balls several at a time until golden. Drain and set aside.
4. In a deep frying pan, add a little hot oil from frying the balls. Then add the sliced onion, plus pinches of methi, jeera, shah jeera, masala, turmeric, and salt. Stir then add 2 T minced garlic, 1 t minced chili and 1 t minced ginger. Swoosh around until onion develops some color. Add 1 cup water to remaining mashed peas and add to onion mixture. Stir. Add 2 cups more water to get soupy looking. Bring to boil on high heat, then reduce to simmer until thickened.
5. Add the balls. Flavor with a touch of tamarind, lime juice or lemon juice. Add chopped cilantro. Simmer a bit longer.

Notes: Add minced chile to your desired heat level.

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