Top 10 Receipes on BongCook

First of thanks dear readers for making BongCook.com so successfull. I first started BongCook as a personal log of all the food I make and all the recipes I wanted to pass on to my daughter. In my wildest dream I did not expect it to become my primary identity. I have had countless emails, facebook messages encouraging me to go on or asking me frantically for help when guests are due in an hour and something is not turning out right. This has been a tremendous journey and I have you my readers to thank.

Here I present to you the most read posts of bongcook.com. Some I always expected to be a hit like the Kolkata Biriyani, some like Jinge Post and mete chorchori is a surprise. Please leave your comments in my blog if you have something in your mind.

Kolkata Mutton Biriyani
Tadka Dal Dhaba Style
Bengali Aloo Phulkopir Singara (Samosa)
Bengali Style Malpua
Radhaballavi (Radhaballabhi)
Jhinge Aloo Posto (Ridgegourd and Potato in Poppy seed Paste)
Mughlai Paratha with Spicy Potato Curry
Nolen Gurer Sondesh/Sandesh With Ricotta Cheese
Mete Chorchori (Liver Curry)
Labanga Latika (Lavang Latika)

Hello Readers

It has been over 4 years since I started this blog. The story of why I started the blog is a story for another day. I never imagined that I will get to know so many of you through your emails, messages and comments. Even though I expected a bunch of you to visit my web-site from India, US and other countries with large expat Indian community, I never thought so many of you would come from Ukraine. Вітаю to all of you! And to you my Israeli friends שלום

The top visitors by countries

1. India
2. United States
3. United Kingdom
4. Ukraine
5. Canada
6. Australia
7. Israel
8. United Arab Emirates
9. Germany
10. Singapore

In the past most of you would visit this web-site from your Windows laptops and computers. In the recent past this has hugely changed. You are mostly coming from your Android phones and tablets. I hope my website is mobile friendly and even on the smaller screen you enjoy the pictures. Be careful and don’t drop your device into your pan. Fried phone doesn’t taste that good.

I also always try to ensure that my blog looks good on the varied browser you use

Going by my blog analytics, most of you are reading this page on their Android device.

The most popular posts seem to be the traditional Bengali food. The top 5 are

Singara
Chelo Kebab
Kheer Kadam
Jinge Posto
Tadka Daal

If you would like me to post something or need some clarifications, its always faster to get to me over my facebook page

Or you can always leave your comments here.

Prawn Butter Masala

In our last Kolkata visit my venerable Buria Pishi asked my daughter, what she’d like to have. My daughter asked for some butter masala without eluding to butter masals of what. Pishi cooked up this amazing prawn butter masala. I asked her for her recipe and she sent me this beautiful hand written note.

I followed her recipe and made some fantastic prawn butter masals (if I may say so myself ). Hope you get equal success.

Ingredients

• 1kg tiger prawn cleaned and deveined
• 2 medium onions chopped finely
• 2 medium onions ground to paste
• 2 tsp. ginger paste
• 1 tsp. garlic paste
• 100gms. cashew
• 50gms. golden raisins
• 50gms. chaar magaz
• 1tsp. coriander powder
• 1 tbsp. Kashmiri chili powder
• 1 tbsp. turmeric powder
• 1 lit whole milk
• 1 tsp. Bengali garam masala powder
• 3 tbsp. ghee (clarified Butter)
• 1/2 cup refined oil
• 1 tsp. sugar
• Salt to taste
• Tempering
  • 4 whole dry red chilies
  • 2 large bay leaves
  • 4 green cardamom
  • 1" cinnamon
  • 4 cloves
  • 1/2 tsp. shahi jeera

Procedure

In a grinder make a fine .paste of cashew, raisin and chaarmagaz with minimum water and keep it aside for later use.

In a mixing bowl take the cleaned prawns and smear them with turmeric powder and salt. Keep aside for about 15 minutes.
In a pan take 2 tbsp. oil and heat it. Add the marinated prawns and sauté. Lower the heat and keep it covered for a minute. You will find water releasing from the prawns. Turn off the heat and reserve the sautéed prawns along with its water.
Take another big clean pan and add rest of the oil along with 2 tbsp. ghee to it. Heat it up and temper it with whole red chili, broken whole garam masala, bay leaves and shahi jeera. When the spices stop buzzing lower the heat and add 1tsp. sugar to it. Soon you will see the sugar frothing. Immediately add chopped onions to it and fry on low heat till the onions turn golden brown.
Add onion paste along with the ginger garlic paste to it. Sauté till you see oil seeping out of the spices. In a bowl mix coriander and chili powder with little water to make a paste.
Next to go in are the reserved sautéed prawns along with coriander and chilii powder paste. Mix everything well on low heat for about 2 minutes. Add cashew, raisin and chaar magaz paste. Mix well. Now add about a liter of whole milk and give it a nice stir. Check the seasoning and adjust accordingly. Remember don't boil too long after you add milk. So adjust the quantity of milk depending on how much gravy you want.
Let the entire mixture simmer for about a minute or two.
In a small pan heat 1 tbsp. ghee and temper it with Bengali garam masala powder. Pour it over the gravy and turn off the heat. Keep it covered till you serve.

Mutton Tikia or Balls

The same recipe works for both tikia and balls based on the final shape you choose. If you have ample time, shape them as discs (tikia) and shallow fry them, if you are in a hurry and your guests arrive in the next hour, make them into balls like I have done and deep fry them. The taste and texture remains very similar.
Tikia goes very well both with a glass of scotch that you share with your guests before dinner, or with a steaming cup of coffee.

Ingredients

• 1lb. minced mutton
• 1 tbsp. raw papaya (Instead you can use 1/2tsp. meat tenderizer)
• 2 medium onions minced
• 10 large garlic cloves minced
• 5 green chilies minced
• 1 tsp. red chili powder
• 1 tbsp. clarified butter (Ghee)
• 1 tbsp. freshly ground Bengali garam masala
• 2 tbsp. roasted gram flour (Besan)
• 1 tbsp. sugar 
• Salt to taste
• Refined oil for frying

Procedure

Wash the minced meat and drain it on a colander or strainer to drain out most of the water from it.
Now take the meat in a mixing bowl and add chopped, onion, garlic, green chilies, raw papaya paste red chili powder, garam masala powder, salt, sugar along with a tablespoon of ghee to it.
Knead the minced meat well with all the spices and keep the mixture marinated in the refrigerator for half an hour.
After thirty minutes take out the mixture and bring it back to the room temperature.
Add roasted gram flour to it and mix well. This will help in binding the tikias. Take a lemon sized meat mixture and give it a flat round cutlet shape. that is the traditional shape of tikia. I have made them round as I was in a hurry.
Heat oil in a tawa (Skillet) and fry them on medium heat till the meat meat is cooked. Drain them on a paper towel and serve hot with paratha and your favorite chutney..