Curry Masterclass at Cafe India , Glasgow

Emily, Maria and I went to Cafe India (http://cafeindiaglasgow.com) in Merchant City of Glasgow the other day for curry demonstration class. It was my birthday gift from Emily, Craig, Maria and Dale. Thank you, guys!

Cafe India, Merchant City, Glasgow

I had no idea what to expect. In any case, it would be an authentic experience.  When we arrived, we sat at the waiting area and other participants also arrived. We all looked rather pensive, wondering what and how this would take place...

First, we washed our hands, yes food hygiene is paramount! We were then shown to the real working kitchen in the back where our Master Chef of the day was waiting for us. We were also given aprons and small chefs hat which is far too small for my big head that keeps sliding off my hair.

The menu for the day is pakora for starter, main dish of our choice and then nan bread. It turned out that I am the only one who does not eat meat so everyone had to settle with vegetarian pakora ... sorry....

Anyway, the chef (sorry again, I can't remember his name...) showed us how to make pakora, which turned out to be rather straight forward.  Internet search informs me that pakora is a generic term used for deep fried fritters.

First you 1 large chop and dice onions.

Chef has no tears when chopping onions!

You then chop and dice potato and a bunch of spinach. 

Add some water into the chopped vegetables.

Add selections of spices into the mix ....

To be honest, I can't remember what went into the mixture ... I think salt, garam masala, red chilli pepper, ginger and fenugreek went in .

Adding fenugreek seeds in ...

The chef asked us how hot we wanted and we all said medium so chillies must have gone into too.

Mix them all up well with your hand ....

Next, gram flour.  I assumed that cooked and mushed chickpea would go into the mixture but instead, gram flour is used to make pakora.  What I did not know at that time is that gram flour is a pulse flour made from ground chickpeas!!  Wikipedia informs me that when mixed with an equal proportion of water, it can be used as an egg replacer in vegan cooking. I must tell this to my colleague who is a vegan.

Fancy purchasing this from Indian spice shop now ....

Master Chef did not even need to measure it, he just put the gram flour into the mixture with his expert eyes as guidance.

Then mixing all in with hand....

Once the mixture is ready, scoop some in your hand to make a small ball and drop carefully into the fryer.

Emily having a shot at making pakora

Everyone was given an opportunity to try this under the chef's supervision ....

Maria having a shot at making pakora

and Voila! Vegetable Pakoras are ready to eat, yum!

These were the most delicious pakoras I have ever eaten .... really delicious.

Everyone tucked in trying our our vegetable pakora. Emily, Maria and I looked each other and agreed that we must try making this at home sometime definitely ... but we need a deep fryer which we do not have at home ....

The curry demonstration came with a glass of wine, beer or soft drink. I had a cold and was taking anti-biotic for my throat, I volunteered to be a designated driver as I could not drink alcohol.  I sticked to a glass of diet coke. Those pakora would have gone down really well with beer though ....

Next, participants were given an opportunity to choose their favourite curry with the chef. There were nine of us and all had their own preferences. I could not remember how made what but I think there are two different kinds of vegetable curries. And for others using chicken or lamb with sauces such as Korma, Dansac, Butter with lots of butter and cream, South Indian Garlic Chilli, and other flavours which I can't remember, sorry ....  however, here are some photographs ...

This is one of my two vegetable curries ...

Another type of vegetable curry (left) 

I think this is chicken korma with extra heat ...

Someone else was making lamb curry - sorry I can't remember what sort it was ....

Emily also had a shot at making chicken curry .... I think this might have been with butter sauce with literally lots of butter and cream ....

And the chef was about to add a block of butter ..... healthy, NOT but tasty YES!

Here it is ...

Now, Maria having a shot ....

Maria shaking the pan like a real chef ... I think she was making Chicken with South Indian Garlic Chilli.

In the meantime, the chef also let us try fenugreek seeds.  The internet informs me that its taste resembles with maple syrup. ..... I tried it but as I had a cold I could not taste properly other than vague recollection of tasting something like aniseeds.

Anyway, the internet also informs me that fenugreek seems to have many positive and medical properties such as used for digestive problems (loss of appetite, upset stomach, constipation, gastritis), heart health and kidney ailments and lots more .... It also includes properties for chronic coughs..  I should have had more of my vegetable curries to help with my throat then ...

Anyway, there were 9 of us and 10 different flavours of curries. As I don't eat meat, unfortunately I only tried a tiny bit of each sauce apart from my own vegetarian curries. Everyone else tucked in after each curry was made and by the time all 9 people had a shot, they were really full.  

After having fished making curries, the chef told us that he would show us how to make nan bread and took us to the back of the kitchen.

The chef was showing how to make nan breads.

Tandoori oven was so hot that it did not take long for the nan to be ready!

This is Peshwari nan. The internet informs me that 1/2 of the nan bread could be as high as 600 calories! However  I don't care, it was really delicious!

This was the end of the curry demonstration. We had expected that we could get to eat what we made after this however by the time we came our of the kitchen, all curries we made were gone, tidied up. It would have been good if we could do that as by the time the demonstration finished all participants started to get to know each other a little bit and it would have been nice to be able to converse with them more. Everyone was really nice and I would have enjoyed talking to them whilst eating up what we had made. Emily and Maria said that maybe due to food hygiene protocol we were not allowed to do that as earlier everyone tried everyone else's dishes although we used clean spoons to avoid cross contamination. Ok, I can understand that.  Besides, I think everyone was really full toward the end and were happy to go home without any more curries. I think I was the only one who kept going back to Peshwari nan!

To be honest, I was hoping that I could get to bring some pakora and curries home for my husband to try and I even bought my own tupperware for that ....  I was also started to get a bit peckish as I only had small portion of vegetable curries to try earlier as I was too polite. Emily kept saying earlier that I should eat more of my own vegetable curries whilst others are trying chicken and lamb curries. She was right. I should have listened to her advice.... it was my fault...

Overall however I really enjoyed the curry experience. I fancy trying to make pakora at home now. I have even asked my mother-in-law Mary if she could ask her Pakistani friend Azra's daughter Tashin to show us how to make curries and chapati's. Apparently Tashin makes a perfect chapatis!  My mother-in-law has now spoken to Tashin and it looks like this may happen in October ... I can't wait!!!!

That's all forks!