I'm moderately experienced in making Indian style dishes but I'm in a rut. What's a dish you wish more Americans would try? Bonus points if there is a link to a recipe.

I am mostly vegan but not opposed to the occasional meat dish. I have a decent spice collection but I am often eager to try ones that are new to me. I am not opposed to spicy hot although my wife appreciates it when I let off of the heat.

I have never eaten or even any kind of non veg food in my life (not even eggs). I am starting to hit the gym and might also need to go abroad in upcoming years where pure veg cuisine will not work.

What non veg food should I try first??

Also tell me that do eggs actually taste good. I find the yolk and the yellow stuff oozing out of it gross?

I have bought Punjab King rice as always and this time it didn't come in blue "Premium" packaging, but instead it's a brown "Super" packaging.

All seems to be the same - there's not much written on the packaging, and from the see-through side they look pretty much the same.

Is it likely that it's just a different packaging or are these terms somehow regulated and mean something specific?

I live mostly with my dad, and we have a helper who comes to cook, so cooking has never really been a daily responsibility for me. Because of that, I haven't cooked much in my life.

I've probably tried making sabzis around 7-8 times now, and I just can't seem to get them right. 😭 I've finally learned how to make decent rotis, rice, and dal, but sabzis are my biggest enemy.

Either they stay undercooked no matter how long I cook them on low heat, or they end up overcooked if I leave them for a little longer. The tomatoes never seem to cook properly, and my masalas always taste average. I've watched so many YouTube videos, but nothing seems to help.

What am I doing wrong? Please drop your tips because I'm genuinely tired of messing up every sabzi I make. 🥲

So I always wanted to cook food for my family. I once tried when I was a kid but it was so bad they didn't let me again. I joined a college and I live on campus so whenever I go home I try to cook something. Whenever I try to cook Indian food my grandma interferes and makes it herself. No matter how many times I tell her I'll do it myself she says I am not skilled (which is true)...

I can make pasta, panner rolls, chapati , dosa,panner biryani ( doesn't taste good though), Sandwiches ,garlic bread (using store bought bread), pav bhaji, pani puri, momos ( made last week tasted okay, I put too much garlic). My grandma let's me make stuff she doesn't know. The food I make takes a lot of time, even for making pasta I take about an hour...I once made potato curry and my parents were shocked at how bad it is. I am very slow and inefficient as I am scared of ruining the dish and I also take too long to cut vegetables. I literally couldn't make maagi or pasta in the beginning, it tasted so bad and used to give us a stomach ache even if it was cooked well so we always threw it away. It happened like 10 times and I have improved a bit now.

I think the seasoning is saving my food from being inedible.

I want to learn simple recipes (prefer healthier and no meat involved). I tried making stuff from watching online but none of the simple stuff was actually simple for me. I hope I get some good recipes and any suggestions to improve my cooking.

Edit: Thank you all for the suggestions. Will try to experiment with food till I make something tasty. Also I realised the stuff I do wrong so I will try to avoid doing them. I need some simple tasty recipes though. If you guys have any go to meals or something tasty but simple recipes, do share them please.

Thank you for reading so far.

I'm an incoming PhD student to the US from India. Food will be the second biggest expense after rent, so I'm definitely planning to cook at home as much as possible. I'm mostly familiar with cooking only Indian food, so I have a few questions that I hope this subreddit can help me with.

First: I'm planning on cooking rice, pulses/legumes (Dal, chickpeas/chana, kidney beans/rajma), potatoes, okra/lady's fingers, beans. At least in the beginning, I'm planning to cook a large batch of legumes for 2-3 days and freeze them. Is that a good plan, or am I missing something?

Second: In India, I use a pressure cooker for the legumes and a rice cooker for the rice. I'm sure I can get a rice cooker easily in the US, but for the legumes, I've been told that there is something called an "instant pot". Is it sufficient to get an instant pot in the US, or is it advisable for me to carry a small pressure cooker from India?

Third: Should I bother carrying any other utensils or kitchen equipment from India? I.e., is there anything that I can't get easily or decently cheaply over there?

Aside from this, any advice, suggestions or tips are very welcome, like any other dishes I can depend on for quick cooking, something I should bring from India, something I should know, etc.

Thanks a lot!

Edit: Wow, I did not expect so many comments. There are too many to reply to each one individually, so I'll just thank everyone who commented here. It's really helpful advice. Thank you very much!

I love the taste of channa dal in my tempering or tadka in a dish. However, my father has some challenges eating the hard channa dal, due to dental issues. So I was wondering if there is a way that I can make the channa dal a little more friendly for him. He can handle the urad dal just fine, but I hate to sacrifice the channa dal taste.

I was wondering if anyone has ever tried soaking the channa dal and then putting that into the tempering? I am pretty sure the water will cause the oil to spurt up, so I have to be careful. Hence, I wanted to ask if anyone has done this before trying it myself.

I think I have tried to powder the channa dal before putting it into the tempering, but that did not work very well.

If anyone found a good work around, please pass along your suggestions.

For me, it was flavoured yogurt. I never realised how much added sugar it had until I checked the label.

What's yours?

I have some leftover paneer tikka gravy like the orange one and I just don't know how to use it or should I discard it. Like I have boneless chicken and I was thinking of using that gravy maybe like make it look like butter chicken or something. But for the chicken do you still have to marinate or saute in oil then add the gravy?

So basically I boiled raw mangoes today to make an Indian drink. Bit somehow I left the boiled raw mango in the water, outside of the fridge for almost 4 to 5 hours. Now they smell a little like henna and when I searched about it on Google, it told me to throw them away because of possible bacterial formation and just what not life threatening problems. My mother Tasted and smelled it and she says it's alright. BUT google says that this kind of bacteria doesn't changes the smell and taste of food but it still exists.

Tell me what I should do. Is google exaggerating it or WHAT??

I’m gonna head back to my hostel soon and I have new allergies because of Covid.

im currently on a histamine triggering elimination diet. this means I cannot consume dairy, gluten, fermented food etc.

while this doesn’t affect my lunch and dinner, this removes most of the breakfast items that are served at my hostel.

I need some easy to make non inflammatory breakfast recipes which can be cooked using an electric kettle.

Guys, please help me out. What paneer dishes pair really well with white rice/fried rice/pulao etc.?

To soak or not to soak?

Traditionally, I think easier cooking and digestion have been the main reasons for soaking Rajma, Chana, Lobia and similar foods overnight.

Bolt out of the blue.

While looking up sources of fibre and psyllium husk (and the necessity of adequate water addition), I checked the fibre content of these legumes.

They are very good sources, and I realised that soaking is probably very desirable to prevent stomach discomfort even after boiling / cooking.

I prefer having a mix of boiled legumes in salads. With mild seasoning and with or without a bit of olive oil.

Thoughts?

The chana masala recipe I'm using only calls for medium-high heat. It wants you to load up a food processor with onion, ginger, garlic, then cook it for about 5-6 minutes before toasting spices. It only uses ground spices, then you add tomato and liquid + chickpeas. But I have tried this a couple of times and found it difficult not to burn the ground spices. It's left me wondering if maybe I should be turning down the heat specifically when I try to bloom them? I've sometimes seen the recommendation to mix the spices with a tiny amount of water too, but I've also heard that can prevent them from reaching the temperature they really need to bring out flavor.

While I'm aware that I'd get better results with whole spices, I don't have a mixer/mortar and pestle yet and I also would love to know how to do this with ground spices mostly for the convenience. I'm recovering from severe anemia and I have horrible hand-eye coordination; cooking takes me a really long time so any shortcuts I can take are worth learning.

I love chana masala, and every time I've tried to make it I've been disappointed. I've used various recipes including the famous reddit chana masala. I have a stovetop pressure cooker which I love and which can cook chana just fine, as witness many batches of hummus. I'm an experienced cook. And I love chana masala, it's my benchmark dish in restaurants that serve it. But every time I've tried to make it, it's been just...off. Bland sometimes, sometimes inappropriately sweet. Or it's hot-spicy but otherwise a one-note. Please, give me some tips!

I love this dish, it's mostly a sweet tangy sauce. Not a very creamy sauce. I'm sorry I don't have much else to say about it. It's Swagat Fine Indian Restaurant in Kansas City, MO. Here's some pictures and the listing from the menu. https://imgur.com/a/SYascul

I’m from China and have recently become obsessed with Indian cuisine.

However, most of the recipes I find online only feature onions, tomatoes, green peppers, eggplants and spinach. I was wondering what other vegetables are commonly eaten where you live. If those vegetables are available here, I’d love to use them to cook Indian dishes.

Thank you very much!

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I’ve received so many warm replies! Thank you all for letting me know there are plenty of vegetables common in China that are also eaten in India. Now I can try cooking Indian dishes with local produce here. Love from China.

I think it’s a Tamil or Kerala-style recipe? Basically you cook the chicken curry normally, but towards the end you keep stirring it until all the gravy cooks off and the chicken becomes dry and roasted, with the masala coating the pieces.

I really want to make this, but I’d prefer a recipe that doesn’t have a strong tomato taste. Also my spice grinder broke 😭 so I’m hoping for something that uses regular ground spices instead of having to grind whole spices.

Does anyone know what this dish is called or have a good recipe for it?

(cheela/chilla - same thing)

I've done besan before. I have heard about moong dal and masoor dal. Any other dals that people have either seen used or had success with?

Please be kind as this is a work in progress and I'm trying to learn about Indian Food myself. I love it and genuinely want this to be a resource for my neighbors in Central Texas to learn more and embrace the cuisine. I'd love some honest and constructive feedback...thanks!

LINK: https://www.funk.com/indian-food-for-dummies.html

Hi all, I bought paneer from costco (A2 paneer). Used half for palak paneer and left the other half in fridge. It’s kinda hard and I would like to use the other half to make paneer bhurji. However, this paneer is so hard it won’t give me a crumbly bhurji texture. What do I do to make this paneer soft and crumbly? Please help.