Indigo Roth came over today and I didn’t have much fresh food in the house, so decided to cook an Indian vegetarian meal.  I had a hankering to make naan bread and – well, I had some vegetables.  So I devised a meal and then talked to Roses and things took off  a bit.  Fortunately, she had ginger, because I’d used the last of mine yesterday.  She also had dried mango powder, which I’d never heard of, and she happened to have a chicken that somehow had proved surplus to requirements.  The result was that – well, I cooked an absurd amount of food for the four of us.  There was a potato dish, a chickpea dish, a beetroot dish, a mixed vegetable dish, a chicken dish and the naan bread.  I’m happy to say that nearly all the leftovers have been taken and I’m left with barely enough to feed myself for two days.

The naan was delicious.  Really wonderful.  It was not complicated at all – flour, yeast, sugar, salt, baking powder, milk and yoghurt, all kneaded together and left to rise, then divided into portions and kneaded again before being shaped and rolled into the traditional flat, tear-shaped breads.  I couldn’t cook them in the traditional way of course, so baked them for a few minutes in the Aga and finished them under the grill.  Indigo and I couldn’t resist tearing pieces off a freshly-cooked one and they were nearly as good reheated later.

I really want to try making pooris.  I love them.  Actually, my next trip to India, I need to have a few lessons.  Or maybe it would make more sense to ask an Indian friend for lessons, using ingredients one can get in England.  The mango powder recipe also wanted pomegranate seed powder.  I didn’t have any, but I did have a pomegranate, so I MADE MY OWN.

I also discovered that Indigo and I work really well together in the kitchen.  He is good cook and just gets on with things.