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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am a 1st gen Indian who loves to cook.  I am an omnivore and come from a family where we all have found our life-partners from different regions and states of India. Also, we moved around a lot in India and abroad thanks to my parents profession and so was exposed to all kinds of cuisines.

My first pet peeve is that Indian cuisine is not one cuisine.  It is many cuisines, just like its a land of many languages.  There are all kinds of geographical terrains, all kinds of climates, all kinds of races in India. So, calling garlic naan and chicken tikka masala as Indian cuisine  really bothers me.

I remain absolutely shocked that Indian food in US has not progressed beyond the usual boring restaurant offerings.   Everyone talks about the same old butter chicken, butter paneer, saag paneer, gobi-aloo, cholley and garlic naans etc.  A smattering of kebabs, some biryani and that's it.     The south indian fare is also stuck at idli, dosa, sambhar, bonda, vada, bissibele bhat, lemon rice, curd rice etc. No judgement. They have to sell what sells.

I love the regional home foods from all the states that is cooked at homes.  I was a pampered DIL who was fed the authentic regional cuisine of their state made by my MIL.  It was eye-opening.  And unfortunately these recipes have not been recorded in ways that they can be passed on easily.   To date, I have not been able to replicate the deliciousness of her recipes in the same way that she cooked.

What Americans have eaten is less than 1% of types of foods that is available in India.  And this is true for most Indians too.  We have not been able to eat dishes from all regions because it is immense.   Unfortunately, the commercial business of running a restaurant often means that chefs will continue to offer the same kind of recipes all the time regardless of which country you end up in.

What I do not like?  I abhor the vegetarian North Indian food that is offered in the restaurants.  Most of the times my friends come to me to tell me how they love the saag-paneer and aloo-gobi of xyz restaurant and that they can make it at home.  I can assure you that to most Indian home cooks these offerings are hideous.  The hardest thing to cook is a good vegetable curry.  And the sheer volume that it is cooked in at a restaurant removes any delicacy from the vegetable.  So, all of my people who will complain that they can make it better at home...I hear you!

Rasika is not bad. I can work with it if I stick to ordering more appetizers and stick to one curry only.  The different curries in the entree section tastes the same to me.  I also cannot have a korma and a biryani and a daal makhani at the same sitting. Most people do not have the discernment to know how to order the entrees and they will order similar dishes and things that don't go with each other and it does not even make any sense.  That is the sure shot way to overwhelm your tastebuds. You have to understand spices and eat like a gourmet and not a gourmand.

Which is my favorite Indian restaurant?  By far, it is Royal Taj in Columbia.  I can actually choose a great tasting dinner by making good and intelligent choices from their menu and I have a fair idea how the different curries will taste.  So, from drinks to desserts - I can figure out what I will truly enjoy.

What I like when I go to India is how they have taken American fast food and made it 100x better.  So, nothing taste better than the McAloo Tikki in Indian McDonalds or even their chicken burgers.  They have even improved the bean burritos in the Indian Taco Bell.  I have not eaten in Bunglow in NYC yet (Chef Vikas Khanna's restaurant) but I remain curious to see how he has used his experience and training, as well as the ideas he got as the judge in Master Chef India to create fusion food.

Another thing - over 30 years, having mastered most of my Indian cooking - I am super capable about following recipes across different non-Indian cuisines and I am a fairly decent menu maker and cook.

Finally - I wish I had an old-fashioned kitchen away from the house where I could cook while sitting down.  I want an old fashioned oven, an old fashioned tandoor...and a huge cold-storage for my veggies and meat.  I want a few sous-chefs and bawarchis who would chop everything for me to my specification.   I immensely dislike how annoying it is to keep standing and cooking, and how annoying the counter height is, and how annoying it is to cook in the modern kitchen with all the tadka smell all over the house, even with the exhaust going on all the time.  I want to cook in an open courtyard.   The proper rural Indian way.  I want to fry the jumbo prawns with impunity in the  huge ass bada bawarchi-khana (kitchen) of the old British Raaj bunglows in India that I grew up in.

[/quote]

This sounds so amazing!

I am the poster who raved about her gas station Indian restaurant in the Midwest…I have found the best thing to do is ask the proprietors to select the food for me.  I don’t really know the names of the different dishes and they change it up, but it balances well together.  It sounds like that strategy is a sound one! [/quote]

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