Listening to: You Belong with Me – Taylor Swift
Mood: Wired, thanks to some extra strong coffee today
My name is Becky, and I’m a foodie. Not in the pretentious
New York Hipster way, but someone who truly loves food and the creation of it.
No seriously. I love me some food.
Since I started dating Daddy G almost 13 years ago (my marriage
anniversary is in April – fun useless fact), I have been having an extended
love affair with everything and anything spicy. My married-into folks (the
inlaws) are from Andhra Pradesh India. For those geographically challenged,
that is smack dab in the lower center of the country. Now Andhra – ites (not
the technical term at all, but I like it anyhow) love themselves some spicy
food. Being an honorary Andhra-ite, I have completely lost count of how many
taste buds I have voluntarily sacrificed in the name of spicy yummy-ness. Yes,
that is the technical foodie term. Yummy-ness. Anywho, no one does byriani like Hyderabad
does byriani. Guess where my
married-into folks are from? You got it. Hyderabad. It is one of my favorite foods of all time. For those who are Indian food challenged, byriani consists of basmati rice (the nice yummy smelling one), meat (or not, if you're a veg head, then it's vegetables) and a metric ton of spices.
The magical thing about byriani is that I’ve never
encountered a really bad one. I’ve had uninspiring “meh” ones, but never bad.
The ones that are amazing (the ones that come from the tiny, dirty, you’ll-get-typhoid-there-son
are the best way to die, but what a way to go!!!) are enough to make me
consider giving my first born for. I didn’t say I’d actually do it, but damn,
it’s worth the consideration. The only
thing I can think of that would really ruin a byriani is if they try to Americanize
it and lose the spiciness. This would be an abomination. Byriani should be
spicy. It has to be. It’s like a law of food physics (not the technical term –
but I totally claim this term) or something.
My favorite is goat or lamb. Something about the gamey,
spicy meaty goodness that makes me insanely happy.
(Hear that? That's my taste buds Sqee-ing.)
Next comes chicken, which I’m going to skip a picture of because
it looks just like the one above.
After that comes Vegetable byriani. Now I have some serious
concerns about whether vegetable byriani should actually be classified as
byriani. This is because meat is a flavor here that belongs in the dish. It’s
essential.
More Squee-ing.
My maid cooks for us 2 – 3 times a week. As I mentioned in a
previous post about her, she is also an Andhra-ite. The woman knows how to cook
some Andhra food and I love her for it. A few weeks back, she made some vegetable
byriani for us. It was gone in 2 days and I have to fight the urge everyday to
beg her to make it every day. It’s that amazing.
I don’t eat much rice. I’ve been trying to cut back in order
to lose some weight. (Yes, I needed to. I’ve lost 35 lbs so far, and am far
from done). Having the amazing yummy-ness around the house is making it
challenging to say the least. With any other curry or vegetable fry, I am
totally cool with eating whole grains (Cracked wheat and brown rice the only
ones I can actually find in India. I miss Quinoa! And Barley! And Bulger! And
we’re done here.) in place of rice. Some people (ahem husband) have what I call
a “rice gene”. This gene makes them crave white rice in a crazy way and become
unwilling to substitute anything with the connotation of being “healthy” and or
“Wholesome” for those beloved empty white carbs. I don’t have this gene. I love
whole grains. Unfortunately, you cannot just
make byriani with whole grains. Or anything else for that matter. White basmati
rice is the only acceptable carbohydrate in byriani. If you try a substitute,
it is not technically byriani. In fact, you may spontaneously combust for your presumptuousness.
Seriously. Just wrong.
One of the best byriani’s I can recall came from a Pakistani
restaurant on Chicago’s Devon Street – the Indian destination for everyone up
to 3 states away. The place was Gareeb
Nawaz. It has the most amazing, balls out spicy, tasty byriani. It’s best to
take it to go (unless you like dirty, loud, crazy cafeteria situations – more power
to you!) because it’s not a fancy place. You better make sure they give you
yogurt too – you’re gonna need it. If you are anywhere near Chicago and love spicy - you simply have to try it. It's really not even optional.
I can’t even begin to rhapsodize about India’s byriani
restaurants. There’s nothing quite like the real deal.
Sigh.
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