Curries, Mathematically Speaking

Curried Chickpeas

A much lighter post today. I thought moving away from the weighty issues of the last two posts was in order.

The idea for this post came from a question I noticed on one of the Facebook food groups I belong to: How many spice blends do you have in your kitchen? Well lots.

And in many of the responses, I saw curry powder occurring frequently.

Which sent me right down a rabbit hole: What is a curry powder? How many spice blends do I have in my kitchen? How many would I consider curry powders? What are the spices I use most commonly? How are my spice combinations different from my mum’s? Where do spices live in my mum’s kitchen? And in mine?

Well the answer to the last two questions is the same, and easy: An anjarai potti (/aɲd͡ʒaɾaɪ poʈʈɪ/). Which seems a lovely way to take you down my rabbit hole.

Every Indian household has an anjarai potti – a spice box. Anjarai, in Tamil, translates to anje, five, and arai, room - so  “five-roomed” – why five? I have no idea because at least today, they typically have at least 7 little containers in them. I choose to give you the Tamil word for this spice box because it is infinitely more interesting, linguistically, than the versions in other Indian languages – which usually just translate to “spice box” or “masala box”.

So why do we have an anjarai potti? Because an anjarai potti is a spice box with frequently-used spices. And every south Indian household has at least one, usually with the following spices in them: black mustard seeds, cumin seeds, fenugreek seeds, urad dhal, channa dhal, red chilli powder, and turmeric. Some anjarai pottis come with a plate on top of the little containers, which sits just below the lid. And on this plate are dried red chillies. Because these 8 are usually the most common spices in simple south Indian food. And anjarai pottis are absolutely genius – open one container instead of 8!  

But coming back to the first part of my trip down my rabbit hole: What is a curry powder? Now of course you’re thinking the yellow stuff that is largely responsible for making all Indian food outside India… well, a curry – yellow, saucy, somewhat spicy. Often has tomatoes in it. Sure.

But.  A curry (outside India, of course, you know me by now!) seems to be typically defined as a saucy preparation seasoned with spices that are, today, associated with India. Well, by that definition alone, there have to be loads and loads of curry powders, right? And because of this, what the world calls curry powder simply doesn’t exist in India.  Curry powder, the yellow, somewhat spicy stuff is ubiquitous only outside india. In India, it doesn’t exist. Don’t get me wrong…nothing at all wrong with it. But in India, a single curry powder simply doesn’t exist.

Because it can’t.

Why? Because which spices would we choose from? And why would we restrict ourselves to a certain few? In India, curry powder lives as numerous other spice blends – different combinations, regionally, markedly different.

So just for fun, let’s make a small list of spices (irrespective of where they originated – that’s another discussion altogether): green cardamon, black cardamon, cloves, cinnamon, chillies (loads of different kinds), tamarind, curry leaves, star anise, cumin, coriander, peppercorn, fenugreek, asafoetida, tulsi, bayleaf, caram seeds, unripe dried mango powder, kalonji or black onion seeds, caraway seeds, camphor (yes, edible camphor does exist and is exquisite in small quantities), fennel seed, mustard seed, nutmeg, mace, pomegranate seed, poppy seed, saffron, sesame seed, turmeric. And these are just the ones I use. Without even listing the different lentils I use as spices. And without differentiating between the numerous different kinds of chillies. There are more I constantly come across in my virtual travels through various sources  – Black stone flower, for example, which is apparently used in the cuisines of certain parts of Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Had never heard of it till very recently. And these are all spices used in South Indian food. Cuisines from other parts of India are full of spices I am not at all familiar with. Yet.

By now you’re probably wondering what this has to do with Math. Three simple words (she says with glee, still a little incredulous, even as she writes this, that she is actually using something from her high school math lessons): Permutations and Combinations.

I was terrible at math in school, dropped it as one of my subjects before grade 12. But I vaguely remember studying permutations and combinations in math class at some point. And I remember Mr. Ananda, my Math teacher (I wasn’t his favorite student) trying to patiently get me to understand the use of the ! (called a factorial or something) in the formula for permutations and combinations – if one has 5 spices, the total number of combinations those 5 spices could yield would be 5! – which translates to 5x4x3x2x1=120. So 5 spices could yield a whopping 120 different permutations (I actually haven’t the foggiest what a permutation is – I just like saying it) and combinations (assuming each spice can exist all by its lonesome).

So the number of possible combinations of my 30 spices is…not a clue, don’t have a fancy calculator.  Boatloads? Of curry powders.

And hey! Math!!

So why would we restrict ourselves to the one curry powder that is familiar to the rest of the world?

The other part of my rabbit hole entailed pondering the difference between some of my mum’s and my spice blends, our curry powders. Two that I always have in my kitchen, and that come directly from hers, are sambaar powder and rasam powder. And the latter comes straight from my ajji’s kitchen. No changes. No need. These are combinations of various lentils, chillies, coconut, coriander seed…all appropriately toasted and ground. More on them later.

And another I have today that started off as my mum’s, and that I have altered is garam masala, which translates literally to “hot” spice; usually some combination of cardamon, cloves, cinnamon, black pepper. You are probably familiar with this – but hadn’t considered it a curry powder before, had you? Garam masala in the West is probably almost as ubiquitous as the yellow stuff, but again, there are as many recipes for it as there are households (or at least, households that cook) in India. My mum taught me hers, and I have altered it over the years. For me, a good garam masala contains the following, all finely ground together in a spice mill or mortar and pestle:

1 part cinnamon

1 part green cardamon

½ part cloves

2 parts coriander seed

1 part black peppercorn

½ part star anise

I sometimes toast the spices prior to grinding them, and sometimes don’t. Either is great, but toasting the spices does enhance their flavors.

And another curry powder I always have around is a mixture of cumin, coriander, and fennel seed; let’s call this Chandri’s curry powder. 1 part each of cumin and coriander seed, and ½ part of fennel seed, again, toasted or untoasted, ground as fine as you can get them in a spice mill or a mortar and pestle. This combination, my mum never has. While she always has ground cumin and coriander (usually separate), she rarely uses fennel.

Again, it’s a Brahmin thing.

So for today’s recipe, I give you a channa masala – curried chickpeas. One of numerous channa masala recipes. One of you asked for a bean recipe, so Catherine, this one’s for you. And in this recipe, I use both curry powders I just described.

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Channa Masala

Ingredients (easily serves 6, and freezes great; vegan; vegetarian; gluten-free)

1.     4 cups dry chickpeas, either white or brown, soaked for 4-6 hours – this yields about 5-6 cups of soaked chickpeas.

2.     1 ½ cups pureed onions

3.     3 Tbsp neutral oil

4.     1 Tbsp cumin seeds

5.     1 tsp turmeric

6.     2 Tbsp garlic paste/finely chopped garlic

7.     1 Tbsp ginger paste/finely chopped ginger

8.     1½ cups crushed/finely diced ripe tomatoes

9.     1½ tsp cumin-coriander-fennel powder (Chandri’s curry powder)

10.  1 ½ tsp Chandri’s garam masala

11.  1½ tsp Kashmiri chilli powder OR 1 tsp cayenne (or to taste, of course)

12.  2½ tsp salt

13.  ½ cup chopped cilantro

Method

1.     Heat oil in a heavy-bottomed pan or a pressure cooker. When the oil is hot, add the cumin seeds; they splutter

2.     Now add the pureed onion, and cook on medium till the paste dries out. It should  take about 15 minutes. You don’t want the onion puree to brown too much, just start to brown.

3.     Now add the ginger, garlic, and crushed tomatoes. Add 1 tsp of the salt and cook this all together on medium till again, the mixture dries out. Stir occasionally. Pureed tomatoes have the tendency to splutter like crazy, so cook this with a lid partially on to avoid your entire stove from being bathed in this mixture. And take care when stirring the mixture. This, again, should take about 15 minutes, at end of which you should see the oil separating from the pureed mixture. Waiting till this happens allows the flavors to really develop.

4.     Now put in the two spice blends, stir and cook together for a couple of minutes.

5.     Now add in the chickpeas, and the remaining 1 ½ tsp of salt.

6.     Add 1½ tsp of Kashmiri chilli powder or 1 tsp cayenne (more if you like it hotter). Add 3 cups of water and pressure cook. How long it takes depends entirely on your pressure cooker.

7.     If you are not using a pressure cooker, cook on low for a couple of hours, till the chickpeas are done. How long that takes depends on many factors, not the least of which is the age of the chickpeas. Old beans are not great. So unfortunately, it is impossible for me to give you an estimate of time. Also, how long you cook it for depends on how done you like your chickpeas. I like some consistency, but I do like them cooked enough to begin to thicken the curry. If during the cooking, you feel like the curry is too dry, add more water. With a pressure cooker, you won’t need to.

8.     Garnish with fresh cilantro and serve hot. You can eat this plain – or serve it with rice or a bread of your choice. I served this with my kids’ favorite Indian bread - a type of poori called a bhatura.

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