Mamta's Kitchen - A Family Cookbook





Banana Chicken Curry

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On 15/09/2010 09:09pm, Mattmatt wrote:

Hi everyone. I LOVE Indian food and ate at a restaurant once that served a dish they called "Kashmiri Chicken" which was a mild "buttery" curry that contained both chicken AND BANANAS! It was the most delicious dish I think i've ever had, though, I can't find any recipies for it. Does anyone know of such a dish? Is it a traditional one or something created specifically by and for this restaurant? Any help would be greatly appreciated! :)

On 15/09/2010 10:09pm, Kavey wrote:

I had something like this once.

If you can't find a specific recipe for it, I'd suggest looking for/ adapting a creamy korma style recipe and adding banana to that. If the sauce itself was sweet, you'd need to add sugar too, I guess.

On 15/09/2010 10:09pm, Andrew wrote:

That sounds delicious. Although I'm a veggie, one of the restaurants I worked at served a starter which was banana wrapped in smoky bacon and served with a curried mayonnaise. I was told that it was fantastic!!

On 16/09/2010 07:09am, Mamta wrote:

Did it have ripe bananas or green bananas? If they were ripe ones, I bet they were added right at the end, just like some people add ripe mangoes or pineapple. Make a chicken curry and try adding bananas to it for the last 5 minutes or so of cooking. Some curries have dry apricots added to it.

This reminded me of a dish I haven't thought of for at least 40 years?! My father's younger brother used to make plum/apricot kofta curry. Ripe plums/apricots were covered in a vegetarian kofta mixed, deep fried and added to a lovely. I think he used to slit the fruit to stop it from bursting, but left the stone in, so it will keep it's shape. I will ask his son if he remembers how to make it.

On 16/09/2010 10:09am, Rajneesh wrote:

I have heard of dry fruits in lamb curry but banana in chicken ? For me the taste is a mismatch.

On 16/09/2010 11:09am, Kavey wrote:

I love fruit with meat...

In Madeira banana is often paired with white fish, this is quite traditional.

So chicken, as a white meat, makes sense to me too.

I'm not a huge fan of sweet curries, though I think there is a region in India where this is not uncommon (ma?).

On 16/09/2010 02:09pm, Mamta wrote:

Yes, you are right Kav. Gujrati people add sugar to some of their curries/other things. Though I like fruit in some curries, I am not very fond of a 'sweetened' curry or dal etc.

On 16/09/2010 03:09pm, Lapis wrote:

AFAIK bananas don't grow in Kashmir, and even though I know Kashmiri cooking quite well, I don't know of any true Kashmiri dishes that have bananas in them.

IMHO most 'Indian restaurants' add virtually anything to their dishes, (which all use the same stock pot and therefore the same flavour), to provide some variety. Rogan josh is a Kashmiri dish (its a korma) but can (and does) have fruits, tomatoes, cream and nuts in, in so-called 'Indian restaurants'.

And I would guess that bananas in Indian savoury dishes are of the plantain kind, the ones that require cooking. Try frying ordinary bananas and you could end up with a mess!

My suggestion is to stick with Mamta's recipes, they will provide everything one wants, and more!

On 16/09/2010 07:09pm, Mamta wrote:

Thank you Lapis :-)

Mamta

On 17/09/2010 07:09am, Winton wrote:

I too would stick with Mamta's recipes. If you can get green bananas there are several banana curry recipes on site and of course many excellent chicken curries. I'd try making one of each and serving together (just not from the same pot!)

Reminds me when was a kid the excitement of the first 'curry house' opening in town. Whatever you ordered you were given bowls of chopped bananas to pile on top of everything!

On 17/09/2010 05:09pm, Mamta wrote:

"Whatever you ordered you were given bowls of chopped bananas to pile on top of everything".

Ugh! that must have been Vesta Curry days!!

I love green babana curry and kebabs/chops, delicious. You can get them from Indian grocers, sometimes even Sainsbyry's.

On 17/09/2010 07:09pm, Winton wrote:

Too true Mamta! Along with milk delivered in bottles, refundable deposits on soda bottles and 'fish in boil in the bag' (though perhaps they are coming back with chef's 'water baths.')

You are often asked about recreating dishes 'like in a restaurant' but I bet you have never been asked how to reconstitute a Vesta beef curry Mamta? LOL!

On 17/09/2010 08:09pm, AskCy wrote:

You can still buy vesta curries but they are nothing like they used to be (or at least nothing like I remember them being).

I'm guessing changes to regulations about what can and can't be added to food, reduced amounts of salt and such have changed the product.

What I do remember is the experience of having something spicy and exotic, which was a change from the normal. You have to remember that being brought up in the UK in an English family that many years ago, that you had meat and two veg for most meals, going out was a chippy tea, brown bread was rarely seen, you drank orange cordial until older when you switched to tea/coffee, pepper was considered spicy and spice racks were bought, put on the wall and rarely touched !... So a vesta curry on a friday evening was something so different and special that is still has a little place in my heart (probably clogging a blood vessel.. lol )

Steve

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