Happy 2009!

Here's wishing all of us a most wonderful 2009! The holidays have sort of swallowed me up a bit recently, so please forgive the infrequent postings.

At our house, the Christmas feast was a five course Indian meal that we spent two days preparing - that's my idea of a good time! In fact, we've been refining and combining different recipes to come up with the perfect palak paneer, and we think we've finally hit the jackpot! So hopefully I'll post that recipe in the near future. If you are not familiar with palak paneer, it is a spinach and cheese curry that uses homemade cheese, and it's a total comfort food, yet bursting with flavor and texture. I'm telling you, our house STILL smells amazing from all the food we cooked, days later!

But what's a person to do when they don't actually have two days to spend in the kitchen? Thankfully, my obsession with Indian cuisine recently led me to yet another cookbook that I am very excited to enjoy: 5 Spices, 50 Dishes: Simple Indian Recipes Using Five Common Spices by Ruta Kahate. The recipes in this book feature coriander seeds, cumin seeds, turmeric, cayenne, and mustard seeds. I'm very excited to start trying some of the recipes, particularly because the recipes are simple, in that you can whip them up any night of the week in an hour or less. But simple doesn't have to mean simplistic, and I'm sure this is true, because I actually had the good fortune to take one of Ruta's cooking classes in Berkeley several years ago, and I have tasted the results. I'm sure you'll be hearing more about my adventures with this cookbook before too long.

For now, I'm off to get ready to ring in the new year, and wishing everyone a safe and happy and prosperous - and well fed - journey into 2009!