Palak Rice

Hello boys and girls!

Welcome to cooking with Varun! A few years ago when I was living in Northern Ireland, there was a girl in the office of the attractive variety. Very attractive. So my roommates and I did the usual walk past, sideways glance thing that boys do. Unfortunately, after a few days of this, we discovered that she was married, and to someone we knew from our limited conversions with to be a really nice guy. This brought the checking out to a screeching halt and we moved on from the 'checking out' stage to the 'friends' stage. What followed was several social gatherings and office events and the more we all hung out, the better friends we all became and soon she was no longer 'Hottie Hotterson', as she had been pegged (although I still call her that.. she knows!), but one of the gang.

Now, in all the time that I was in Northern Ireland, my roommates and I used to carry lunch to the office. What started off as a box of dal or curry and a box of rice, soon turned into a full-blown banquet with massive portions of food enough to feed an army (which we did, since a lot of our friends nicked food off us) and it became tradition to make lunch a pot luck with everyone contributing a dish. Some days it'd just be us 3 roommates and the Hottersons, on others we'd have a few of our Northern Irish friends braving the spicy food we'd set in front of them, and the pizza Fridays when we'd take the day off cooking and order in large pizzas and wolf them down as people sniffed the air in anticipation. Hottie was already a very good cook and I had been dabbling with cooking (thanks in no small amount to my roommates) so we would often discuss recipes and she would give me tips on how to make a perfect sambar. I remember in particular, she had this dish called 'methi chaman' that was absolutely gorgeous and like many of her dishes it was a something+rice dish.

Today's palak (spinach) rice dish is also a something+rice dish which I first made in an attempt to mirror Hottie's cooking style, and switched it around a little the more I made it.

For Palak Rice, you will need the following:

Spinach	300 gms
Rice	2 cups
Onion	1 large
Tomatoes	2 (tinned ones will work just fine)
Cinnamon	1" stick
Cloves	3-4
Jeera (cumin)	2 tsp
Peppercorns	small handful
Bayleaf	1
Green chillies	2
Ginger garlic paste	1 tsp
Dhaniya (coriander) powder	2 tsp
Jeera (cumin powder)	1 tsp
Garam masala	1/2 tsp
Red chilli powder	2 tsp
Biryani masala	2 tsp (optional.. but it does add flavour)
Salt	to taste
Oil

Prep:

1. Wash and roughly chop the spinach.
2. Pop the chopped spinach in a blender.
3. Whirl it around until it is coarsely chopped. (Do NOT puree it!)
4. Thinly slice the onion.
5. Chop the chillies.
6. Chop the tomatoes.
7. Rinse the rice out in cold water about 4 times.

Method:

1. Turn on the gas.
2. Bung a pan on.
3. Splash in some oil.
4. Count to 20.
5. Float in the bayleaf.
6. Drop in the cinnamon.
7. Pop in the cloves.
8. Bounce in the peppercorns.
9. Cook for a minute or so until you can smell the aroma from the cooking spices.
10. Add in the jeera.
11. Roll in the chillies.
12. Slide in the onions and listen to them sizzle and pop.
13. Cook until the onions go light brown.
14. Plop in the ginger garlic paste.
15. Mix well.
16. Cook until brown. (Not too dark.)
17. Sprinkle in the red chilli powder, dhaniya powder, jeera powder, biryani masala and the garam masala.
18. Mix well.
19. Pop in the tomatoes and move them around to help deglaze the pan.
20. Cook for a minute.
21. Chuck in the blitzed spinach.
22. Cook for a minute.
23. Tip in the washed rice.
24. Add 4 cups of water. (Twice as many cups as the rice. Same size cup!)
25. Add in salt to taste.
26. Mix well.
27. Drop the heat to little above low and pop the lid on.
28. Cook for about 15 minutes.
29. Take the lid off and mix to unstick any of the rice from the bottom of the pan.
30. Pop the lid back on and cook for 3 or 4 minutes until the water has dried and the rice has cooked.
31. Turn the gas off.
32. Serve with chilled boondi raita.
33. Stuff face.
34. Bask in the glory of your successfully executed dish.

Tip: If you're in a rush and couldn't be bothered making the whole masala, just toss everything in the pan higgledy-piggledy once you can smell the whole spices, mix well, stick the lid on and let it cook.

And remember, overeating is a myth. A full tummy is a happy tummy!