It is one of the few books (and therefore chefs) that even comes close to Vineet Bhatia's Rasio, New Indian Kitchen cook book. Thanks again Tim and Sandra for giving me this gift of Rasio that keeps on giving and will do so forever in my life. It changed, singlehandedly my approach to cooking, whether Indian or classical French.
Back to this book and this recipe though. The Goan spice mix for Mr Singh's trout dish is heady. Coconut vinegar, cloves, black (i.e. smoked) cardamon pods, black peppercorns. chilli, star anise, coriander seeds. Toasted and ground with fresh ginger and garlic. Then you have the separate marinade of garlic and chilli pastes with Kashmiri chilli powder. As it is a Goan recipe which stands out in the high acidity levels to complement fish. Goa uses cloves and vinegar in careful, considered abundance. If the balance is right it's a knockout. A head scratcher as to how so many spices come together in unity. This is a recipe I do exactly as per the instruction. Any spice out of balance would throw the whole thing into disarray, it's so complex. It is imperative by the way, when using spices to dry roast them off first. It's not a step to be skipped and only takes a sec. Without this step there's a sort of harsh taste and feel in the back of the throat from raw spice. It might be a reason people find Indian dishes too harsh in flavour because there is a significant difference to the taste of a finished dish when spices have been dry roasted before grinding to those that have not.
The salad is a mix of raw lentils that are soaked for 6 hours, rinsed and drained. Not cooked. Finished with lemon juice, salt and tempered mustard seeds and curry leaf. (Tempering is heating and then cooling. You heat the mustard seeds in oil till they crackle, add the curry leaf and immediately mix it through the raw lentils. This forms the dressing and gives the whole dish a lovely toasty note from the curry leaf.)
Apart from the sheer delight of flavour which is uncompromisingly complex, the raw lentil salad gives the freshness and textural component. The lentils - I used red dal, (masoor dal) and red dal (moong dal) along with some dried and peeled broad beans. They peel easily once soaked.
I added pomegranate seeds, a fresh yoghurt coriander chutney, fresh coriander and a little pickled onion. Two versions are below. One with onion one without. One with broad beans, one without. Both entirely delicious. Light, fresh, incredibly complex in spice but sitting harmoniously. Not for those who are against complex spice. Definitely not a dish to fiddle around with regarding amounts of spice unless you seriously know what you're doing. I will be making this dish again and again over the years.
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