Gobi Manchurian

Health-0-meter: 2/5 (5 being healthiest)
Ease: 2/5 (5 being difficult)

I first tasted this dish in India, and found out that it was invented in India for Indians who wanted Chinese food, but with an Indian taste. Sounds weird, but really it's quite a delicious combination!

Last night, I was feeling lazy and not in the mood to cook so we went to an Indian restaurant for dinner. They're one of the few restaurants I know of that have dinner buffets and on a Friday no less! Lucky for us, they decided to feature gobi manchurian on their menu, and I got really excited! Too bad it tasted awful - the cauliflower tasted gummy and the sauce was too thin and had a strong tomato taste. Ugh.

This is the second gobi dish in the last two weeks, so you might be thinking I love this veggie. Well, yes and no. I do love a good cauli dish, for sure, but I had half a head of cauli sitting in the frig and I didn't want it to go bad. Plus, my sis-in-law makes *great* gobi manchu and I had to make good use of the recipe I begged for and got. :)

On to the recipe!

Sauce (traditional):

• Soy Sauce 1/4 cup
• Ketchup 1/4 cup

*We didn't have ketchup at home and the hubs was grossed out at the thought of ketchup in his main dish, so we got steak sauce instead. We used 1/2 cup of the steak sauce.


The steak sauce we used

Try it on chicken, steaks, burgers... and indochinese food!

For the rest:

• Cauliflower, split into florets*
• 6 green chillies, medium sized**
• 1 tbsp garlic, grated
• 1 tbsp ginger, grated
• 1 tbsp corn oil (or vegetable oil)

*Make sure florets are not too big as they will not cook all the way through when fried. The smaller the better, but that can get too time consuming if there are too many florets.

**Chillies can be added/subtracted according to taste. We found 6 chillies to be perfect. If you want it spicier, add more. If you're not too fond of spice, cut down on the number of chillies.

Garlic/ginger paste can be used, but fresh always tastes better.

Batter:

• All purpose flour, 1/4 cup
• Cornstarch, 2 tbsp
• Salt, to taste
• Water, 1/4 cup
• Oil for frying

The ratio of flour to cornstarch is 2:1, if the recipe needs to be scaled up.

1. To make the batter, mix the flour and cornstarch and salt with a whisk. When thoroughly mixed, add the water and use a fork to mix. Batter shouldn't be too thick, i.e. should be able to coat the cauliflower florets without too much of the cauliflower peeking through.

2. Wash the florets and dry them thoroughly. If even slightly wet, they will either not stick to the batter, or will splatter in the oil (bad, BAD situation).

My florets are ready to be dipped and fried!

3. Heat oil in a deep frying pan or wok. Make sure oil is at 350F (use a candy thermometer). If you don't have a thermometer (like me), place a drop of batter into the oil. The oil should bubble furiously around it - that's when it's ready to go. Use a metal slotted spoon with a long handle when frying. Placed fried florets on paper towels to drain while the sauce is made.

Yummy, delicious fried cauliflower

4. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a wok or deep frying pan. Placed the chopped chillies, grated ginger and garlic into the oil and cook until the ginger/garlic is almost brown, but not quite. When it looks like the picture below, it's ready.

5. Add the florets and stir on a low flame. Once the ginger/garlic/chilli mix has sufficiently coated the florets, add the sauce. Make sure the florets are thoroughly coated with the sauce. This is the "dry" version of this dish. More sauce can be added according to personal taste.

And voila! You are done and ready to eat! They came out absolutely perfect and delicious. Try it, you'll love it!

'Til the next dish...