Mahatma Gandhi

[Brownie]

An old friend of mine who was Indian (well, come to think of it, still is I suppose), said the only place he would buy Indian food was Southall.
More southerly and somewhat downmarket compared to Southall,  Plumstead is very good.
If you eat Indian food at a wedding or at someone's house, the food is much better than the average restaurant but similar to what you get at the above mentioned places.
We have takeaways from the 'Yak & Yeti', which serves Indian and Nepalese cuisine.  They have three restaurants in various places in London and the food is excellent.

[trippymonkey]

Great post so far - I can honestly say, as a visitor to India for 3 months of each year visits, I never seen any family eat a curry the way 'we' do in the UK.

Each item is set out separately so one may choose what one eats.
Indian Restaurants IN India do, however, serve like we do here.

Nick

[Sriram]

I had heard that what passed for Indian in the uk didn't resemble any similarity to real Indian crusine
In India.

I would love to try real Indian food.

Any chance you could post one of your own favorites, in the recipe section?

🌹

I have lots of favourites from different regions of India.

For that matter, I also love thin crust Italian pizza with jalapenos, olives, sun dried tomatoes and capsicum.  I also love spaghetti Aglio e  Olio with grilled veggies, pieces of toasted garlic and lots of EV olive oil.

Here is a site on various cuisine (veg only) including Indian food that may be useful to you.  You could surf through it and find lots of dishes of different kinds.

http://www.tarladalal.com/

[Sriram]

An old friend of mine who was Indian (well, come to think of it, still is I suppose), said the only place he would buy Indian food was Southall.
More southerly and somewhat downmarket compared to Southall,  Plumstead is very good.
If you eat Indian food at a wedding or at someone's house, the food is much better than the average restaurant but similar to what you get at the above mentioned places.
We have takeaways from the 'Yak & Yeti', which serves Indian and Nepalese cuisine.  They have three restaurants in various places in London and the food is excellent.

I have once eaten at an Indian restaurant in London (Regent street) called Veeraswamy's. It was an expensive place and said to be patronized by the rich and famous. It is one of the oldest Indian restaurants in the UK I think (1920's or so).

[Aruntraveller]

The people who lose out with globalization are the people, the masses. So if they vote in governments that work for them and not the big corporations and then these nations work together to stop this parasitical actions of those corporations then they win. The proto types of these governments have been seen in Greece etc. and Trump is feeding off this desire to stop the elites.

Except of course Trump is very much of the elite. And for it.

[Udayana]

This is an interesting read, casting some light of Gandhi's nature, positive or negative aspects.

Gandhi's experiments with food

The word "curry" may have originated with the British in Madras (Chennai), the first large settlement, based on dishes made with "curry leaves"- "Karuveppilai" in Tamil. (http://simpleindianrecipes.com/herbs.aspx)

We, in Punjabi or Hindi, call the resulting mixture of butter (or ghee), herbs or spices and water in which vegetables etc are cooked "thari" or "thurri" - Sriram you must know the word? I guess this is "sauce" or "gravy" in English.

[Sriram]

Yes...the word 'curry' probably originated in Madras and as I said the Tamil word curry means meat. 

Karuveppilai is usually used in making curry as a flavour enhancing herb. It also has many health  benefits. It is most commonly used in making sambar, rasam, chutnies, bhajis and in most other South Indian dishes.  It is the most common flavouring herb used in South India and rarely will any dish not contain karuveppilai.  (I am not sure what Karuvei means, illai means leaf).

It probably came to be called 'curry leaves' in english because it was used in making curry....and because the British could not pronounce Karuveppilai (as usually happened).     

[Sriram]

Yes...the word 'curry' probably originated in Madras and as I said the Tamil word curry means meat. 

Karuveppilai is usually used in making curry as a flavour enhancing herb. It also has many health  benefits. It is most commonly used in making sambar, rasam, chutnies, bhajis and in most other South Indian dishes.  It is the most common flavouring herb used in South India and rarely will any dish not contain karuveppilai.  (I am not sure what Karuvei means, illai means leaf).

It probably came to be called 'curry leaves' in english because it was used in making curry....and because the British could not pronounce Karuveppilai (as usually happened). 

I did a little bit of research on the Karuveppillai name.  I understand that it is actually Karu Veppailllai. Veppa illai is Neem leaf. Karu means dark. 

So Karuveppillai means 'dark neem leaf'.    Both Karuveppillai and neem leaf are said to have medicinal properties and are used extensively but neem leaf is lighter in colour, hence the 'dark' reference for Karuveppillai. 

In the north, Karuveppillai is called 'Meeta neem' or sweet neem because the neem leaf is bitter.  So the link of karuveppillai with neem leaf (veppa illai) is established.

The name 'curry leaf' is clearly a British legacy. 

 

[Udayana]

Yes indeed, it's a variety of neem used in cooking Tamil meat dishes as you indicated.

[Sriram]

Yes indeed, it's a variety of neem used in cooking Tamil meat dishes as you indicated.

Yes...it is used extensively in the south not just by non-vegetarians. No home will be without it.  We use it is sujbi, sambar, rasam etc. Every meal will have karuveppilai in some dish. 

[Bubbles]

I have lots of favourites from different regions of India.

For that matter, I also love thin crust Italian pizza with jalapenos, olives, sun dried tomatoes and capsicum.  I also love spaghetti Aglio e  Olio with grilled veggies, pieces of toasted garlic and lots of EV olive oil.

Here is a site on various cuisine (veg only) including Indian food that may be useful to you.  You could surf through it and find lots of dishes of different kinds.

http://www.tarladalal.com/

👍🏻🍷🍾

Thanks