Warm winter menus to make your heart sing
Summary
Taste the freshest flavours of December in dishes like ‘bhaang’ chicken, ‘shaak’ risotto and hay ice cream with a cherry blanketCitrus fruits, leafy greens and chefs’ creativity pack a punch in winter menus. Add Christmas dishes to the mix and they make for meals of pure happiness. With each season, restaurants aim to push the limits of imagination, expand their quest for hyper regional produce and the experimenting never stops.
“We have tried to dive deeper into different states of India this winter," says chef Sarvesh Moudgill, brand head and culinary director of Mool Kitchen and Bar in Mumbai. Their philosophy is rooted in regional fare. For the winter menu, they introduced Darjeeling-style momos, as their existing menu has Kolkata-style kosha mangsho but they hadn’t gone further afield in West Bengal. The momos are served with a unique chutney spiced with timur, a Sichuan pepper from the foothills of the Himalaya. This spice, Moudgill says, has a warming quality which makes it ideal for winter. Another spice with a similar characteristic, bhaang or hemp seeds go into a saucy chicken main, bhaang kukkad.
A curiosity-inducing non-vegetarian item is the bateir rassa, quail meat cooked in a velvety onion-based gravy from Lucknow. These can be paired with flaky chur-chur naan or the winter essential, makke ki roti.
Also read: The perfect beer and snack pairings for your next party
While Mool casts a wide net across different states of India, Bengaluru’s Malgudi Mylari Mane unearths delicacies from the heartland of Karnataka. They have a limited winter menu with new combinations and fresh produce like avarekalu or hyacinth beans. “We have a seasonal breakfast combination with avarekalu gojju (semi-thick gravy) and puri served on weekends. It’s rustic and high on spices like green chillies and pepper; diners love such flavours during this time of the year," says co-founder Steven Thirumalai.
They also serve a collagen-rich paya, or lamb trotters soup, paired with thatte idli. Thirumalai explains, “In Kannada, thatte means a plate, and this is a slightly bigger idli. In our cuisine, the recipe for paya is slightly different from the one in north India. We add a little bit of coconut milk to balance the fiery peppers. This pairing of thatte idli with paya makes for a soulful winter meal." A special dish is the dosa stuffed with mutton brain mince for a nourishing high-protein option.
Wholesome and nutrient-rich are key to winter menus. These are reflected in the use of saags or leafy greens. The Bombay Canteen has makke ki roti generously topped with jaggery-infused butter that is best accompanied with saag murgh. It has chicken tikka pieces coated in garlic in a green gravy that combines three different leafy greens—bathua (lamb’s quarters), mustard and spinach. There’s an interesting reinterpretation of leafy greens in pastas as well.
The Kolkata restaurant Sienna has a shaak risotto, modelled on palak khichdi. It integrates leafy greens like kolmi (water spinach) and amaranth leaves, prevalent in Bengali kitchens during this season.
Gurugram’s vegetarian café Omo has handmade pasta in a creamy ricotta sauce topped with mustard greens that are cooked with a bit of garlic for a familiar taste. “The idea is to use them for flavour as well as texture," notes chef Vanshika Bhatia of Omo. Her team has a thumb-rule for seasonal ingredients: They don’t create new dishes, but build on existing ones by adding or substituting with fresh produce. While the mustard leaf pasta is an example of the former, replacing basil in pesto with winter carrot greens is a creative take on the latter. Blanched winter carrots are used as toppings on pizzas too. Apart from carrots, strawberries announce the arrival of winter for gastronomes. Bhatia is looking forward to introducing a mille feuille-style dessert with strawberries and Brie.
This month’s dining experience is incomplete without Christmas specials and there are festive menus galore. Restaurants and cafés try to outdo each other with the ultimate winter and festive favourite drink—hot chocolate. For instance, Mool has a hot cuppa made with Puducherry chocolate, Delhi’s Fig at Malcha offers one with 61% dark chocolate and Bengaluru’s Lupa has gone all out and placed a hot chocolate cart on its premises.
While on this sweet trail, there are desserts to savour too. Perhaps one of the most creative takes is an ice cream made with hay in the experimental kitchen of chef Johnson Ebenezer of Bengaluru’s Farmlore. He drew inspiration from childhood memories of collecting hay for the Christmas crib. But, is hay edible (for humans)? “Of course, it is," comes the reply from the chef who goes on to break down the technique of making the ice cream.
He roasts the hay at the scalding temperature of 300 degrees centigrade. Then he begins the long drawn, four-hour process of infusing the milk at a temperature of 120 degree centigrade. The milk imbibes the aromas and flavours of hay which is then churned into ice cream.
To serve, it is garnished with a cherry leather to represent a blanket, and a star made with a crispy croquant. It is the last course of their new menu, Carolonomy 3.0, inspired by carols from different corners of the world. The ice cream is named after the carol Away in a Manger.
It’s December, and foods like these are bound to make your heart sing.
Also read: Dive into Sindhi cuisine with a recipe for fried fish
topics
