My Kitchen Café #4: Arfi Binstead Does Some Bollywood Cooking ~ Baghare!

This post was due to have been published here last month but that didn't happen. So this month, my guest at my My Kitchen Café is Arfi who regularly features gorgeous food and photography on her blog HomemadeS by Arfi.
Arfi describes herself as an Indonesian-born Kiwi who cooks for her family with a passion and bakes with joy. I have long admired her photography and if you are new to her blog, then you are in for a visual treat.
So I was more than happy when she agreed to grace My Kitchen Café with her presence. She brings with her the glamour of Bollywood cooking!



Bollywood Cooking: Baghare (Inspired by Bulbul Mankani)


I am so honoured that Aparna sent me an email one day and requested if I would love to write a guest post for her blog.
I had received “The Bollywood Cookbook” written by Bulbul Mankani as a prize for Bollywood cooking competition that Meeta of What's For Lunch, Honey? organized long way back. My entry was Bombay Beef Curry and Rice Kheer and since then, I have promised myself to try out recipes that Bulbul had written. I did manage to try out some of the recipes, but I keep coming back to Baghare.

I love aubergines and love to cook them this way. There is a chili hot and spice combination that is lovely when mixed together. I love eating it with warm jasmine rice and heaps of salad on the side.

I have had to adapt the recipe to suit my personal taste. I am in my first trimester of pregnancy and the smell of frying oil makes me sick, so I have to grill the aubergine rather than fry it.

Ingredients:

1 big aubergine (egg plant), halves

1 red chili

1 tsp coriander seeds, toasted

1 tsp cumin seeds, toasted

2 bay leaves

¼ tsp chili powder

1 tsp sesame seed

1 tbsp cashew nuts

1 tbsp desiccated coconut

1 tsp tamarind paste
salt

sugar

freshly cracked black peppercorns

a little oil

Method:

Soak the halved aubergine in a bowl of warm water to prevent it become brown.
Make a paste of roasted coriander seeds, cumin seeds, and garlic. Mix the paste with the other ingredients.

Pat the aubergine halves with paper towel. Rub the spice paste on the cut-side of the aubergine halves. Transfer on a baking dish and grill until the aubergine halves cooked. Enjoy.

The copyright for this post and photographs rests with Arfi Binstead of HomemadeS by Arfi, and are reproduced here with her permission.