THE RECIPE LARDER

Garlic Mashed Potatoes

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Our trip to Japan was largely about Japanese food. Tofu meals, Zen meals and meals in the temple. We all developed a love and respect for Tofu and all its variations. This one restaurant that we went to and which was purely fusion was Rigoletto, in the Roppongi area of Tokyo. They had very few choices for vegetarians, but all of them were sumptuous.

I made the garlic mashed potatoes for my husband’s birthday. It was a smashing hit.

Garlic Mashed Potatoes

Garlic Mashed Potatoes

Yeah yeah, it has a lot of calories and all that. But hey! it is really tasty. And you gotta cheat once in a while right? How else will you enjoy life?

The potatoes have to be boiled and later mashed along with all the other ingredients. The entire mixture can be a heavy load for most blenders. Even mine protested mightily but held its own. By no means am I proclaiming Technora blenders to be the best, but where I am concerned it has stood the test of time and use. I love their inbuilt stirrer. I don’t have to open the lid and stir the food, I can do it while the blending is on. Pure genius.

garlic potatoes

This is a copycat recipe, so my imagination can take no credit for it. But I added a twist to its story, by cooking it in an earthen bowl. It wasn’t coated inside with any kind of ceramic polish. Just pure earthenware. So when the garlic mashed potatoes cooked, the flavour and fragrance of the natural clay seeped into the potato, giving it that extra kick and twist.

Wash the earthenware once and dry it in the sun if you can. Fill the mashed goodness, add dollops of butter, garnish and bake. It’s a quick and easy recipe, and I shall become famous – because everyone is going to ask you for this recipe.

😉

Have fun guys – I promise you a piece of heaven!

Ciao!

garlic mashed potatoes 2

Garlic Mashed Potatoes
Print Recipe
Served in earthen ware, so the smells and flavours infuse into one good yummy dish!
Servings Prep Time
12 pieces 20 minutes
Cook Time Passive Time
20 minutes 10 minutes
Servings Prep Time
12 pieces 20 minutes
Cook Time Passive Time
20 minutes 10 minutes
Garlic Mashed Potatoes
Print Recipe
Served in earthen ware, so the smells and flavours infuse into one good yummy dish!
Servings Prep Time
12 pieces 20 minutes
Cook Time Passive Time
20 minutes 10 minutes
Servings Prep Time
12 pieces 20 minutes
Cook Time Passive Time
20 minutes 10 minutes
Ingredients
For the potatoe
To Garnish before cooking.
Accessories
Servings: pieces
Instructions
  1. Boil the potatoes.
  2. Once the potatoes are boiled, peel and run it through the ricer.
  3. Add all the ingredients for the potatoes and load it into the blender.
  4. Blend well. You might have to do it in parts. It should have no lumps.
Garnish
  1. While the potato is boiling, peel the garlic meant for the garnish. Slice the garlic into thin slivers.
  2. Rub the olive oil and salt on it and pop into the oven. Bake for appx 10 minutes, till it is dehydrated and a wee bit brown. You don't want to make it crisp and completely baked
    Rub the olive oil and salt on it and pop into the oven. Bake for appx 10 minutes, till it is dehydrated and a wee bit brown. You don't want to make it crisp and completely baked
Final Dish
  1. Ladle the mixture in the earthen ware / baking dish, garnish with parsley, chilli flakes and the par baked garlic.
  2. Add dollops of butter (the one kept aside for the garnish) on all sides and slide into the oven.
  3. Bake for 10 minutes. First the butter will melt and then cook and infuse into the potato. When the butter sizzles, and the garlic on top looks browned, take out and serve hot.
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Mango Salsa

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mango salsa

mango salsa

Mom’s house has this huge mango tree. It’s not ours. It belongs to the next compound, but every single leaf and mango grow into our side. Those poor dudes watered the tree and looked after it, but we reap all the benefits.

As kids, we would make this huge stick, one tied to the other to make it as long as possible. On the edge, a blade was jammed in and using a sawing motion many a raw mangoes have been cut and taken down. Of course, we had to do it as unobtrusively and slyly as possible. But even then the gardener would hear his beloved tree rustle and run after us with a stick. He was not allowed to cross over to our side, so obviously we dangled our stolen goods under his nose and felt thoroughly pleased with ourselves. This was summer holiday time and a very seriously planned agenda in our schedules.

We would then proceed to cut open the raw mango (we never washed it!) and spread salt and chilly and lick it for hours. Then spread some more salt and chilly and bite into the tart fruit. Our palate would go pop, and eyes would tingle, but the taste is embedded somewhere deep in my soul. Now when I eat a raw mango, I am transported back to that spot under the tree, where I either helped to hold that huge stick and saw off the mango bunches, or I stood under the falling mango, to try and grab it so that it did fall and get damaged.

As I grew up, the love for raw mango became a love for mangoes. I still love raw mangoes, but I cannot go at it with wild abandon like I used to.

 

mango salsa

mango salsa

mango salsa with nachos

mango salsa with nachos

I saw my friend Rekha, (the one who has to lead me to this wonderful thing called food!) make a mango salsa. She whips up the most delicious of dishes, with the most absurd of combinations. When I first saw her make the mango salsa, I was stunned. I mean, she was adding olive oil and herbs and spices to a fruit. A fruit which is so revered in India, for its taste and limited availability? Weren’t fruits supposed to be eaten as is???

mango salsa

mango salsa

Very reluctantly I tasted the mango salsa and immediately landed myself under the tree, where we caught falling mangoes. I tweaked the recipe, but I cannot call it mine. It still belongs to Rekha – my mentor.

The sweet and mildly sour, and extremely wholesome flavour of the fruit will pop open your eyes. You might then pick up the spoon and wolf it down! That’s what my friend does, whenever I make it.

mango salsa

Serve it with nachos, or chips.

Its not an Indian recipe.The closest is Mexican Fusion.

I love it with my all time favourite – Whisky.

mango salsa nachos

 

Mango Salsa
Print Recipe
Quick and easy to make. A sure fire hit in a party.
Servings Prep Time
4 people 15 minutes
Servings Prep Time
4 people 15 minutes
Mango Salsa
Print Recipe
Quick and easy to make. A sure fire hit in a party.
Servings Prep Time
4 people 15 minutes
Servings Prep Time
4 people 15 minutes
Ingredients
Servings: people
Instructions
  1. Peel and chop the mango. Cut the fruit into small squares. Don't cut so small that the fruit gets mashed up while mixing.
  2. Chop the onions into thin rounds. Chop some of the green as well. So basically it should be more that 3/4th whites and rest the greens, finely chopped.
  3. Add the onions to the mango.
  4. To the olive oil, mix all the other ingredients,( except the spring onions) and mix.
  5. Add the olive oil mixture to the mango and onions, and very gently toss it all together.
  6. Voila - its ready! Simple?? Serve Chilled!
Recipe Notes

Serve with nachos, chips, on a salted biscuit, with toast, toss it with croutons and serve as a salad!

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