I know there's an international food section in Newcomb Dining Hall, and I know some restaurants on the Corner are not American, but my culinary sphere of influence truly expanded last Saturday when I entered "Snacks of Mumbai"at the Lorna Sundberg International Center at 21 University Circle - a destination I never previously knew existed.
Earlier this month a friend of mine e-mailed me a link to activities at the International Center, and I jumped at the chance to cook something for my column. After introducing ourselves to other class participants, we realized how diverse the other people in the room were. There were participants from Nigeria, Iran, Algeria, India, Argentina and at least three other nations.
After my friend happily admitted that she was born in Switzerland, I came to the conclusion I was the only person born in America. Never have I felt so uncultured. Luckily, my name is semi-unusual so I casually threw out the "Irish last name" explanation to diffuse my role as total tourist.
Entering the kitchen, I was visually assaulted with bowls of bright vegetables and boxes of spices. We cooked three dishes, all of which our teacher explained were commonly sold by street vendors in Mumbai.
Our teacher, Eusibio Pires - EZ according to his name tag - is a Mumbai native. His attention to detail when it came to preparing the food amazed me. To compare, I pictured the kind of preparation that goes into making food on the streets of an American city - hotdogs and hot nuts require about two ingredients each. I knew Indian food had a lot of spice in it, but I had no idea that the spice-combination variations and the subtlety of the flavors could be so intricately created.
I watched open-mouthed as EZ and others added spice after spice to our dishes. Each box of spices generally has the same ingredients in India; varying the amount of each ingredient is actually what changes dishes' flavors. Before my cooking adventure, I'd always thought I was being eccentric when I added red pepper flakes to my roasted broccoli. Try green chilis in curried vegetables. My seasoning skills never seemed so tame.
Our first dish was Bombay pav bhaji, or curried vegetables with bread. Featuring a ground mixture of spices, pav bhaji masala was perhaps too strong for my uncultured taste buds, and so I don't think I enjoyed it nearly as much as some of the Indian natives. As a girl informed me that her dish wasn't spicy enough, I wiped tears from my eyes and nodded in unconvincing agreement. The pav bread, however, was delicious. It may be because it was essentially bread soaked in butter, or perhaps my taste buds were finally adjusting.
The kanda bhajia, meanwhile, was my favorite dish because you could eat it with ketchup. What else would one eat with onion fritters?
These deep-fried onion clusters were similar to a blooming onion at Outback Steakhouse - except better. Slice four large onions as thin as possible. According to the recipe, these should be "done fresh to make the bhajias crisp." Add salt to the onions to remove excess water. Thoroughly coat the onions in a cup of gram flour, a teaspoon of red chili powder, a pinch of cumin seeds and sliced ginger. Add water to this mixture if lumps of batter don't form. Drop lumps of onion mixture into a pot of hot oil, and once they've turned golden, remove and drain.
Participants stood around the food preparation and shared stories of recipes from their native homes. I stood in the corner sipping my masala chai - spiced tea - wondering if my basic pasta-and-tomato recipes would appeal to this world of gourmands who smelled fresh ginger root and thought of home. I found, though, that I did have some food culture to add to the global m
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