Pappadums & A Curry

This month’s challenge as a Patak’s Ambassador was to hit up our local Indian cuisine restaurant and then try to recreate something from the menu at home. Those of you who are familiar with me know that I don’t tackle Indian cooking often, if ever, because the lists of spices overwhelm me. Thus why I am such a good fit with Pataks this year, because I’ve used their sauces all my life and will continue to do so!

We went out to Zaika here in Edmonton, a restaurant that is only 3 minutes away from where we live and our absolute favorite. It also happened to be my son’s choice for his 10th birthday dinner and he’s so predictable. It’s Indian cuisine every year for us on his birthday, no matter how many times we may have eaten it before.

While eating the buffet, I kept looking at everything and thinking, what on earth am I going to recreate at home?

Mr K eats almost everything there. Our one secret to getting him to eat meat when he was a meat-refusing child was to cover it in a curry sauce, no word of a lie. It’s the only way he would eat chicken at home when he was younger. To this day, the kid still isn’t fond of chicken if it’s not a nugget or in butter chicken.

My daughter’s plate.Oh so plain and then BAM! Butter chicken.

We don’t understand it. Everything is always “too spicy”…except for butter chicken.

We don’t actually talk about it because we don’t want to jinx it since it took her until she was seven to get to this point – and we’ve eaten Indian as a family since Mr K was a toddler.

I soon figured out what I was going to attempt at home.

Now yes, as you can see I made the absolutely fantastic Coconut and Peanut Sauce from Patak’s using beef as the meat. If you are looking for a mild, delicious sauce, this is the one for you!

This is a new family favorite!

However, it’s those beauties on the side that I was the most keen to make.

I’ve never, ever made a pappadum before.

Heck, I didn’t even know what those delightful crispy bites were at the Indian buffets.

Patak’s has boxes of delicious ready-to-make pappadums.

Who knew?

While I did overcook a few – they literally take only about 2 seconds in oil! – the majority came out sooo amazing! Crispy, crunchy and exactly like the buffet ones!

Sadly, now the children are never going to let me get away with not having these whenever I make Indian cuisine at home. The kids are in awe that I can make them. They loved watching them puff up from these little disks into large crunchy circles for them!

If you make Indian at home, I can’t recommend these enough!

Happy Cooking everyone!

Love,

Karlynn