Craft Club with an Indian Flair

Oh how wonderful is the month of May.  The leaves are full and lush, the fragrance of hundreds of flowers hangs thickly in the air, the birds wake you up every morning with such happy twittering, and the monthly Craft Club meeting was all about cooking Indian food.  Our normal compliment of five had shrunk to three for this months' get together so instead of paper art like we had planned we decided on cooking.  Not to fret paper lovers, we will tackle that craft soon so stay tuned. I am not quite sure how we got to Indian, but once we were there we rejoiced in the tastiness of it all.  Before we move into the food porn that was that Saturday night let me preface this with the fact that we did a 5K walk/run early that morning in preparation for the bounty to come.

Anita, Mr Biscuit, and Sadie all dominated on the running while Katy, Abby, and I walked the 5K with pride. In all honesty we walked at a pretty good clip but we still got passed by a very determined bull dog that I swear was a trained speed walker.  He was too cute to stay mad at and his daddy looked so proud.  This is the second year we have done the Lilac Mutt Strut it is such a nice way to welcome Spring and get dogs out for some well deserved social time. Way to go pups!

 Ha, look at those dog hineys go! See this is why we needed to go home and have some killer Indian food to fill us up after all that outdoor dog time.  Let us not take into account that after the 5K they give you pancakes and sausage, but that is not important here. What is important is this very valuable piece of information that I am about to give you right here right now. Get your Pintrest pins ready as you will want this link available always: Show Me The Curry.  I cannot express in words the epicness of this web page.  These two wonderful women have put together terrific videos showing you the hows and whys of delicious Indian cooking.  With lots of yummy tabs to choose from both vegetarian and meat eaters alike will find lots to tug at their culinary heart strings. Hetal and Anuja add comfort and ease to cooking an ethnic cuisine I though was beyond my skills.  Their humor and warm approach to the videos make me want to experiment with everything they offer.  They have so many recipes and how-to videos to watch one should never go hungry!

Our yummy offerings for the evening:

1) Vegetable Pakora
2) Saag Paneer
3) Saffron Mango Mousse
4) Jalebi

All of these items were made from scratch with love and hungry tummies.  Those pakora were nibbled on almost right out of the fryer.  I learned recently in a cooking class that frying can be part of your diet if it is kept to high quality foods that are at room temperature to keep the oil absorption to a minimum.  These pakora were not greasy at all and had lots of veggies inside.  The Saag had my homemade paneer, Indian compressed cheese, and rich coconut milk.  The mousse was so rich and the Saffron really did make the difference in this dish.  It went from comfort food to classy dessert with that simple addition.  The julebis right out of the oil were sticky and crunchy, so very good.  We finished off the night with some Bravo TV and a happy warm fullness that I think back on very fondly.  I can't wait to have another cooking Craft Club, it is both tasty and informative.

I hope you are all cooking up a storm with the spring vegetable showing up in the farmers markets right now.  Head on over to Show Me The Curry and try a new Indian recipe with your favorite veggie, I am sure they will have one you will adore!

Keeping it tasty,
Kelly, the origami ninja 

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