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There is a lot of mumbo jumbo spoken about the Indian restaurant menu. We are led to believe that each dish is lovingly prepared to some secret recipe, known only to that particular chef. Read the menu and it will describe the virtues of any particular dish in a most evocative style.
But there is one thing you can be sure of, most dishes in the typical Indian restaurant don’t vary much at all, other than in heat and the most prominent ingredients, such as the type of meat, fish or vegetable and possibly whether the sauce is lentil or cream based. This is not to say that the dishes are not enjoyable, but to cater in almost the ‘fast food’ market, that is the way they have.
So, every Indian restaurant will have its basic ‘curry gravy’ and every dish served will be a derivative of that sauce. The Indian restaurant chef is the master of exploiting that base to give us what we know as our favourite dish.
We have tried to demystify the Indian restaurant menu by explaining what individual items are and how they vary from each other. It is worth bearing in mind that spellings are not definitive as all the translations into the English language and alphabet have been done phonetically. So we might see Dhansak or Dansak, for instance.
| Balti is a style of cooking that developed in Birmingham twenty or thirty years ago. There are a number of theories on the origin of the term Balti, some say Balti describes the cooking pot and others say it refers to a style of cooking that evolved in Baltistan, somewhere on the North West frontier no doubt. I can’t actually say, but I’m willing to bet that what is served in a restaurant today, described as Balti, would be unrecognisable on the Indian sub-continent. |
 So in a ‘traditional’ Balti restaurant, everything is a Balti, and probably reasonably priced. In a normal Indian restaurant, anything described a Balti is usually on a separate section of the menu and a couple of quid more expensive. And that’s the main difference. In a ‘traditional’ balti restaurant, the dish is served in a large balti pot and eaten with Indian breads, such as Nans, Chappatis and Parathas. In some Indian restaurants, the term Karahi or Korai is encountered. This refers to the serving dish, which is made of cast iron on a wooden base and pre-heated, so that the curry sizzles in the serving dish when it is brought to the table. Don’t touch the Karahi or you will get your fingers char grilled.
A Bhuna is a fairly dry fried curry containing onions and spices. It tends to be medium hot and fairly palatable to the uninitiated. Like Dopiaza, but less onions. Biryani is a rice dish, cooked together with whatever meat or vegetable it is ordered with. The meat and vegetables are pre-cooked and then mixed with the pillau rice. It is usually served with a separate bowl of curry sauce. I suspect the origins of this dish lie in using up leftovers, although it may have evolved into a more splendid affair for banquets and feast in times gone by. So, where should you go to try out some decent Indian food in Sofia? |
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