morsels & sauces

When we first moved to the Bay Area about 13 years ago, the husband and I lived with the in-laws. There, I learned how to cook for more than just myself and the occasional impromptu party. Certainly, I was well versed in how to make all the things I liked--eggplant Parmesan, veggie burgers, salsa--and I knew how to get excited, make three lasagnas, realize I couldn't possibly eat that much, and invite a dozen friends over. What I didn't know how to do was cook on a daily basis for someone other than myself. Further, a recent conversion back to the eating of meat left me with no idea how to cook anything that was once clucked, bleated, or mooed. Thus, the nightly dinner with the in-laws spurred me into learning how to cook. With rotating dinner-making duties, we all gathered in the kitchen, talking, sipping wine, and tossing together a simple salad. Somewhere in that time, the mother-in-law began cooking from Julie Sahni's  Classic Indian Cooking , a cookbook I ...

Adapted from Cookbook #24:  Classic Indian Cooking Recipe:  Chicken in Onion Tomato Gravy (Murgh Masala) I have already waxed poetic on the Indian food in the Bay Area.  However, this cookbook ensures that I have perfect Indian cooking at home anytime I want it--or am willing to devote the three hours of cooking time to make it.  Deciding that cooking was a fine way to spend a weekend afternoon, instead I made this during a weeknight last week (which would indicate why I didn't have the time to post it.  However, then with all the hullabaloo surrounding the end of the school year and a fantastic visit from a friend from out of town, I really never got around to posting.  I promise, I am not shirking my cooking duties, but I sure have been shirking the posting duties). Anyway, The New York Times loved this classic cookbook, comparing it to Marcella Hazan's Classic Italian Cooking (to be featured here later). And it is a pretty grand cookboo...