A Kokni Muslim thali festival hopes to uphold the spirit of eating balanced complete meals
Shabana Salauddin (right) with her ammi
As Shabana Salauddin’s delivery kitchen in Marol turns five, she does what Kokni Muslims are known to do best — cook up a feast. The platform, Ammeez Kitchen, was born of Salauddin’s zeal for presenting the flavours she was brought up on. But why celebrate an important milestone with a thali? “The cuisine has so much to offer that often it’s not viable for a customer to taste our food at its fullest scope. So I thought of curating a food festival where Kokni Muslim food can be introduced through a starter, bread, fish curry, meat gravy, a rice preparation and desserts. And what better way to combine that diversity if not in a thali?” the home chef explains.
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The menu features a vegetarian thali that comprises dishes such as hara bhara kebab, yakhni pulao, khatti dal and paneer masala. The fish and meat platters have prawns halduni, tandul bhakri, pomfret tawa fry, goshh chaap, chicken qeema methi, among other dishes. Salauddin picks kokum as the community’s star ingredient. In their sixth year, she looks back and takes immense joy in having created a big food family that eats and stays together.
From: November 14 to 20
Log on to: @ammeez.kitchen
Call: 9820009857 (pre-orders only)
Crab halduni
Prep time: 30 minutes
Cooking time: 15 minutes
Serves: 10 people
Ingredients
>> 5 medium pieces of crab >> 250 gm refined oil >> 6 to 7 chopped green chillies >> 100 gm crushed garlic >> 50 gm kokum >> 4 tbsp Kokni tikhat masala >> 1 tsp turmeric powder >> 500/750 ml water
>> 2 tbsp Kokni pheeka masala >> 1 tsp cumin
>> 1 tsp mustard seeds
>> 10 to 15 curry leaves
>> 4 tbsp rice flour >> salt as per taste >> chopped coriander leaves and slit green chillies for garnishing
Method
Clean the crab well. Rub some salt on the crab pieces and keep them aside. This will take care of the seawater smell. Add all the ingredients in a cooking pot except oil and water. Mix everything well by crushing the ingredients with your fingertips. This process is called kalasina in Kokni. Now, pour in water and oil, and mix everything with a spoon. Place the pot on the stove on medium heat and let the halduni or gravy cook for some 10 minutes. Cook until the raw masala smell is gone. Now, slowly add the crabs to the simmering gravy and cook for a few more minutes. Once done, turn off the gas. Garnish the crab gravy with chopped coriander and green chillies. The dish tastes best with steamed plain rice.
Double ka meetha
Prep time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 10 minutes
Serves: 6 people
Ingredients
>> 4 stale pav roughly torn into bite-sized pieces
>> 3 cups milk >> 1/2 cup malai
>> 1/4 cup sugar >> 1 pinch cardamom powder >> Toasted pistachios and black raisins for garnishing
Method
Toast the pav pieces in a pan until they turn crisp. While the pav pieces are crisping up, add milk, malai, sugar, and cardamom powder to another pan. Bring the mixture to a boil and then, remove it from the heat. Place the fried bread pieces on a dish and pour the hot milk mixture over them. Cover the dish with an aluminium foil and let it cool down. Uncover the dish to top the dessert with slivered pistachios and raisins. Refrigerate for a couple of hours before enjoying a generous chilled helping.
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