Easy malai recipe?

February 26, 2006 12:39 PM

I'm looking for an incredibly easy recipe for malai kofta. Does this exist?

I have several Indian cookbooks but little time in my life right now to spend on food preparation. How can I approximate the wonderful malai sauce for fast, everyday meals? I'm willing to do without the koftas themselves and I am not averse to Patak-style shortcuts.

posted by Morrigan to Food & Drink (4 answers total)

Does this exist?

I think you're going to be disappointed. Without the koftas, it's basically just cream, tomato sauce, garlic, cashews and spices. That's not so hard. You could put the ingredients in a slow cooker over night, refrigerate it in the morning and have a really well-mixed, settled gravy by the time you get home from work. But you're not going to enjoy it as much if you omit the dumplings and just eat it over rice. (Somebody's going to provide a recipe they like shortly or google "malai kofta recipe" and pretend that they'v been using the particular recipe for years for whatever reason people pull that shit.)

Look, it's not a dish that you should eat frequently. It's my favorite, too. And I also hate paying for it. But it's better for my pants and my overall enjoyment of the malai kofta experience to eat it once every six weeks or so.

Ever have a dish that you loved so much that you ate it really frequently and then you suddenly didn't love it so much any more? That's going to happen here (even eating an inferior version) and you'll be heavier as well.
posted by Mayor Curley at 12:59 PM on February 26, 2006

Somebody's going to provide a recipe they like shortly or google "malai kofta recipe" and pretend that they'v been using the particular recipe for years for whatever reason people pull that shit.

I was going to ask my mother for her delicious malai kofta recipe that she's been making for years (I'm Indian) but now I'm not going to bother since Mayor Curley already shut down the thread.
posted by EiderDuck at 4:23 AM on February 27, 2006

Response by poster: Oh, please do, EiderDuck. The Mayor's concern is well-meaning but not entirely relevant to my situation.
posted by Morrigan at 6:15 AM on February 27, 2006

Best answer: My mother just emailed me a recipe, but she used a lost of Indian ingredient names and has never written down a recipe in her life so I tried to make it understandable.

Kofta ingredients

• 1/2 lb potatoes
• 2 heaping tablespoons crumbled paneer
• 1 lb ricotta cheese
• 1/4 cup each: milk powder, bisquick, white flour
• 3-4 chopped green chilles
• 1/4 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp red chile powder
• oil for deep frying
• salt to taste

Kofta technique

1. Boil the potatoes until tender.
2. Peel, mash and mix with all other ingredients for Kofta
3. Knead well
4. Make into small round balls
5. Deep fry each kofta until golden brown.
6. Keep the burner simmering while frying the koftas
7. Drain and keep aside.

Gravy ingredients

• 2 medium onions chopped coarse
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed (optional)
• 1 inch ginger crushed
• 1 small bunch fresh coriander
• 3-4 green chiles
• 5-6 almonds and 3-4 cashews
• 2 tsp coriander powder
• 2 tsp cumin powder
• 2 large black cardamom and 2-3 small green cardamom
• 2 tsp red chile powder
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 tsp garam masala powder
• 2 tsp dried methi (fenugreek) leaves
• 1 large can of crushed tomatoes
• 1 Small carton of heavy cream

Gravy technique

1. Blend in food processor all ingredients from onions to cumin powder.
2. Fry paste in 4 tbsp of oil along with whole black cardamom, whole green cardamom, bay leaves, chile powder, dried methi leaves, until oil begins to separate.
3. Add tomatoes and another 2 cans of water and simmer for 20 minutes.
4. When gravy begins to thicken add cream and allow to simmer for another 10 minutes.
5. Mix in some water if necessary.
6. Remove whole spices and bay leaves before serving.
7. The koftas should be added to the gravy just before serving.

posted by EiderDuck at 1:43 PM on February 27, 2006 [2 favorites]