The kabab season

'Come September' got there first, but I would have liked to pen an ode to November. This is really the month that ushers in all that is good. The weather is getting better, and you feel like eating all the rich and fatty food that you have been cold-shouldering all these months. And on top of my list of to-dos are kababs.

Kababs have also been figuring prominently in a friend’s plans for his golden jubilee to be held in November. One of Delhi’s kababchis has been contacted, and he will come and woo the guests with kababs and roomali rotis. The kababs will be grilled on a barbecue or a tandoor right there, and will be served all smoky and hot. When the evenings are cold, there is nothing like a kabab just off the skewer or a tawa.

What interests me is that bawarchis offer all kinds of kababs these days. Most of them have exotic names, but are variations of some of the old recipes. Quite a few, of course, are vegetarian — and have wonderful names all coined, no doubt, to hide the fact that what you are eating is actually a mix of potatoes and cauliflower florets.

But some are interesting recipes as well. For instance, the executive chef of Peerless Inn in Kolkata, Rupam Banik, has come up with quite an exciting fare of kababs. Apart from the seekhs and shammis, and the usual murg malai and kalmi kababs, you can get to eat something called a sultani kabab or a hosseini kabab.

He tells me that a sultani kabab is quite like the gilafi seekh kabab, except that the former has a sweet taste to it, for the minced meat is mixed with raisins, and is not, like the gilafi, covered with a layer of vegetables. The hosseini kabab, on the other hand, is a dish of cubed lamb skewered with cubes of green pepper and onions and grilled. The original recipe calls for beef, but Chef Banik is using lamb instead.

Often, the names give you an inkling of what the kabab is all about. The subj seekh kabab, clearly, is a green vegetable skewer. The kabab e chaman — or the garden of kababs — is a platter of kababs.

Or take something called palak moong kabab. As the name suggests, it’s a kabab cooked with spinach and moong dal. Or take something called Jannat e zamin. The name — which means heaven on earth — doesn’t tell you much, but this is a kabab made out of baby potatoes and curd. You have to take some baby potatoes and parboil them in salted water. Then drain them and mix the potatoes with curd, garam masala, ginger and garlic paste, salt, mustard oil and chilli paste. Refrigerate for two hours. Then fix each potato onto a thin skewer and grill it in a tandoor. Once it’s done, add lemon juice, chat masala and chopped green chillies and coriander leaves. That, truly, is heaven on earth.


Of course, while I like all these exotic sounding kababs, I still think the real test of a good kabab maker is the basic kabab. There are two kinds of bawarchis — those who make seekhs, and those who make shammis. If you can grill a perfect seekh kabab, or prepare a shammi cooked just right, you are a master. Once you have done that, you can cook all kinds of kababs.

We had a great teacher. My father had a friend called Bundu Khan, who used to come and stay with us for months on end, and then suddenly disappear. We wouldn’t hear from him for years, and then he’d suddenly drop by again. Bundu Khan was from Rampur and cooked the most delicious shammi kababs. My mother, a reluctant cook, inherited his shammi kabab recipe — and it was one of the two things (the other being a creamy payesh or kheer) that she cooked really well.

People have their own triggers. Some see colour and think of a paint company. But whenever I see kabab, I think of Bundu chacha.        

Gilafi Seekh Kabab

Ingredients (to serve 6-8)

• 1kg minced lamb • 50gm ginger paste • 300gm browned onion paste
• 6 finely chopped green chillies • 2tsp garam masala • 2tsp red chilli powder • Salt to taste • 50ml vegetable oil l90gm processed cheese • 120gm finely chopped onion • 100gm red, yellow and green capsicum • 100gm finely chopped and deseeded tomatoes • Butter for basting

Method

Mix the mince with ginger paste, browned onion paste, green chillies, garam masala, red chilli powder, salt, oil, and processed cheese. Squeeze out any excess water from the mince mixture. Mix the onions, capsicum and tomatoes. Keep aside for two hours. Shape the mince mixture along the length of a skewer and coat it with the vegetable mix. Roast in a tandoor for 10-15 minutes, basting with butter at regular intervals. Remove from skewers and serve hot.

Hara Tawa Kabab

Ingredients (to serve 6-8)

• 1kg channa dal • 150gm spinach paste • 5gm turmeric powder • 10gm red chilli powder • 30gm cumin seed • 5gm white pepper powder • 20gm garam masala powder • 10gm dried fenugreek powder • 30gm ginger paste • 30gm garlic paste • 50ml oil • 50gm cornflour • 50gm cashewnuts • Salt to taste

Method

Take channa dal, turmeric powder, red chilli powder, salt, ginger and garlic paste and water in a handi. Put the handi on the fire and cook the dal till it’s done. Now take out the mixture, cool it and grind it to fine paste. Heat oil in a saucepan, add whole cumin seeds. When they start to splutter, add the spinach paste. Cook well till the oil separates from the spinach. Add the channa dal paste to the cooked spinach and mix well. Cook on a slow fire. Add fenugreek powder and garam masala powder to the mixture. Check the seasoning. Divide the mixture into medallions of 50gm each. Shallow fry on a tawa till golden brown on both sides. Serve hot.

Courtesy: Chef Rupam Banik, Peerless Inn, Kolkata

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