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Category: Food

Azerbaijani Cheese & Herb Gutab

Azerbaijani Cheese & Herb Gutab

Azerbaijani Cheese & Herb stuffed flatbread Located geographically at the intersection of Europe to the west and Asia to the east, Azerbaijan has a colorful and delicious cuisine with mediterranean and Persian (Iranian) influences. Although it is considered a landlocked country, with no border with a sea or ocean, it does border the Caspian Sea (actually a lake with saline water) and access to the sea is possible from the Volga River and the Don River via the Volga-Don canal….

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Sri Lankan Cabbage Mallung

Sri Lankan Cabbage Mallung

(Gova Mallung) Growing up in Sri Lanka in the 1960’s & 1970’s we rarely ate raw greens. Lettuce was uncommon – at least partly because (at the time) uncooked greens were considered a health risk for food-borne diseases such as salmonella, listeria and cyclospora. When lettuce was served my mom would first get it soaked and washed in an anti-bacterial dip! Food-borne pathogens can still be a problem, even in the US, as evidenced by several recent food poisoning outbreaks….

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Potato Curry (not spicy)

Potato Curry (not spicy)

Ala Kiri Hodhi Sri Lankan cuisine has a reputation for being spicy and chilie-hot. The reality is that there are spicy/hot dishes and there are also many dishes that are not spicy and with little or no chilie-heat. When eating Lankan food we mix bits of spicy and non-spicy with the carbohydrate (usually rice, string hoppers, etc.) and pop it in our mouth. By serving individual dishes with their own unique flavors, for example potatoes in one dish, lentils in…

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Lentil & Bacon Mulligatawny

Lentil & Bacon Mulligatawny

The mulligatawny I remember from childhood was a watery but heavily pepper-spiced broth that was used to moisten the main starch component of dinner – rice or string hoppers (indiappa). It had the effect of wetting the rice and whetting the appetite. It also made me cough and sputter when the black pepper seared the back of my throat as the first spoonful went down. Later, as a grad student in England, I discovered a recipe for a mulligatawny that…

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Not my Mama’s Lasagna

Not my Mama’s Lasagna

The first dish I learned to make was, strangely enough, Lasagna. Sri Lanka (or Ceylon as it was known then) in the late 1960’s early 70’s was under the yoke of the near-communist regime of Sirimavo Bandaranaike (the first elected female leader of a nation worldwide). Imports were banned, and food was rationed so we Ceylonese had to be creative in how we used the resources available. When we could get cheese it was the canned variety, tomato sauces and…

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Festive Yellow Rice

Festive Yellow Rice

Rice, Oryza sativa, is the second most widely grown and eaten grain worldwide. Over 3.5 billion people consider rice a staple. Basmati, Jasmine, Arborio, Carnaroli, are just some of the rice varieties but are there lots more varieties that most people don’t know of. Worldwide there are over 40,000 varieties – each with its distinctive flavor and properties. Some rice varieties are associated with specific techniques. Examples include Carnaroli rice used for Italian risotto and the Sushi rice used for…

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Sri Lankan Dry Beef Curry

Sri Lankan Dry Beef Curry

While Chicken and Fish are widely eaten, Beef & Pork are less widely eaten in Sri Lanka largely due to religious sensibilities. Many Buddhists are vegetarian or eat fish but abstaining from beef is not universal. This fragrant and tasty curry made with beef and served “dry” (no sauce) has long been a favorite at my table. It also tastes good with pork. I was attempting to make a traditional Sri Lankan beef curry with lots of gravy but forgot…

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Sri Lankan Red Chicken Curry

Sri Lankan Red Chicken Curry

The spice blend used for this recipe is called “Badapu thuna paha” in Sinhalese, which translates to “roasted three five”. Presumably the original spice blends had either three or five spices but my blend has eight ingredients. Thuna-paha is a generic name for spice blends and each cook may have a different blend for each type of meat . Feel free to modify the blend to your taste! In the ingredients I specify Ceylon Cinnamon. Ceylon was the colonial name…

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South Asian Cuisine

South Asian Cuisine

In our future blogs we will delve into foods from a variety of countries. For me, having being given the honor to write the first food-related blog, it is appropriate that I begin with some recipes from the country of my birth. Sri Lanka. Although I have lived outside Sri Lanka for most of my life I still yearn for the flavors of Lankan cuisine. Other cuisine from mainland South Asia (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh) is similar, but also quite different. …

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