by Currylicious | Mar 20, 2013 | BLOG
Hello everyone,
As promised, I am posting some pics from my cooking demonstration at Williams Sonoma in Short Hills Mall, NJ on March 23rd. It was a lot of fun and
like always I had a wonderful audience. This time, I must confess that I had this one lady who came up to me and asked me how I could stay vegetarian for so long? and
if I missed eating meat? I said to her ” Not really since I love to cook with veggies and put a ton of flavor in it and share my secrets with everyone:)”
She was so thrilled she sat in a chair and watched me as I cooked away my dish. She had a pen and a book and was making a note of whatever I said.
So the dish I made was an Eggplant Tapanade with cilantro chutney served on a cracker. Lot of people walked in tried my dish and appreciated the flavors!
It was a truly memorable experience since the manager of the store at Williams Sonoma, Short Hills walked up to me, ate my dish and said to me” There was this lady who walked up to me and said that you did a great job answering all her questions, she loved your dish and thought it was great. That must mean a lot to you”.
And yes it did, I was so happy to merely listen to something like that and would consider myself lucky and all my efforts seemed to have paid off. This is the most rewarding job that I ever had – not in terms of money but in terms of happiness and appreciation! Nothing can beat this:)
Thanks again to all who walked in and tasted my dish- for all your kind words and time.
by Currylicious | Mar 20, 2013 | BLOG
Hello everyone,
As promised, I am posting some pics from my cooking demonstration at Williams Sonoma in Short Hills Mall, NJ on March 23rd. It was a lot of fun and
like always I had a wonderful audience. This time, I must confess that I had this one lady who came up to me and asked me how I could stay vegetarian for so long? and
if I missed eating meat? I said to her ” Not really since I love to cook with veggies and put a ton of flavor in it and share my secrets with everyone:)”
She was so thrilled she sat in a chair and watched me as I cooked away my dish. She had a pen and a book and was making a note of whatever I said.
So the dish I made was an Eggplant Tapanade with cilantro chutney served on a cracker. Lot of people walked in tried my dish and appreciated the flavors!
It was a truly memorable experience since the manager of the store at Williams Sonoma, Short Hills walked up to me, ate my dish and said to me” There was this lady who walked up to me and said that you did a great job answering all her questions, she loved your dish and thought it was great. That must mean a lot to you”.
And yes it did, I was so happy to merely listen to something like that and would consider myself lucky and all my efforts seemed to have paid off. This is the most rewarding job that I ever had – not in terms of money but in terms of happiness and appreciation! Nothing can beat this:)
Thanks again to all who walked in and tasted my dish- for all your kind words and time.
by Currylicious | Feb 4, 2013 | BLOG
I know that everyone was excited about the Superbowl yesterday and today is of course the discussion day about last evening ‘s game!
Well, I had an interesting time yesterday evening not watching the Superbowl but cooking for a group of wonderful people who got together to watch the game.
Debbie had called me a few days back and left me a message saying it was last minute and that she was planning on having me cook some delicious appetizers for game night. She wanted to see if I was available to cook for a bunch of her friends who were gathering at her place to watch the Superbowl yesterday evening. When I called Debbie, I was so thrilled to know that she and her girl friends were going on a trip to India and so she wanted me to make some Indian Appetizers so they can enjoy them while watching the game. So we came up with a Menu Plan and I promised to get her place at 5:30 pm with all the ingredients and grocery.
I shopped all morning yesterday, getting prepared for the evening’s cook off. I was very excited and reached Debbie’s place at 5:30pm. Words simply cannot describe how nice she and her husband are, and the beautiful house they have. They were such wonderful hosts and made me feel so welcome and at home. The kitchen was spectacular and Debbie was so kind to get me whatever I needed- like pots and pans and bowls and spoons. One by one, the guests started arriving. I started organizing and prepping. There were about 14 people altogether and a bunch of 7 beautiful girls who hung out with me in the kitchen chatting and asking me about India and the food.
The menu that we planned was:
Chickpea Salad with grated coconut, cumin and cilantro
Cocktail Papads with Onion tomato cilantro and chat masala
Crostini topped with baked eggplant
Bite sized Quesadillas with an Indian twist
I must say that as I put forth every single dish- everyone was so appreciative and gave me feedback on each dish. When you work with such a group of people, who tell you exactly what they liked about the dish and want to know about what goes in their food, there is nothing more rewarding than that.
My guess is they liked the Crostini with the baked eggplant the most:) I leave it to them to comment:) if I am right.
The evening was perfect and I enjoyed cooking for such a warm, welcoming beautiful group of people. I look forward to going back there like Debbie mentioned to cook some dinner parties for her in future.
I wish them a WONDERFUL, SAFE, ENJOYABLE TRIP TO INDIA!
With much love….
![Savory Phyllo shells with Onion Tomato Chutney, Goat Cheese and Cilantro!]()
by Currylicious | Oct 28, 2012 | Nandini's Food Court, Recipes
Serving Size (4)
Ingredients:
Athens Mini Phyllo/ Fillo Shells(Frozen)- 1pack
Onions 2
Tomatoes 2
Olive Oil 2 1 tbsp
1 tsp Cumin Seeds
1 tsp Lemon Pepper
1/2 tsp Turmeric
1 tsp cumin powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp cayenne powder
1 tablespoon goat cheese
Bunch of Cilantro leaves for garnish
Preparation:
Chop onions, tomatoes very fine. Place a pan over medium heat and drizzle some olive oil. Now add salt, lemon pepper, cumin seeds, cayenne powder, turmeric and cumin powder. Mix well with a spatula. Transfer the finely chopped onions immediately and mix well. Let it cook till onions start to sweat a little bit. At this point add your tomatoes and cook covered for about 3-4 minutes stirring in between.
Meanwhile open the frozen package of Athens Mini Phyllo/ Fillo Shells. Remove the shells from outer carton and inner tray. Place it on a baking pan. Place it in the oven at 350 degrees F and bake for 3-4 minutes.
Now cook until you reduce the onion- tomato to a chutney consistency( water from tomatoes help us gain the required pasty consistency along with all the spices). Switch off the gas.
Take out the shells from the oven and let it cool. Spoon in the onion tomato chutney into the cooled shells and crumble some goat cheese. Finally to give it some color, add chopped cilantro leaves as garnish. Trust me these are pure quick simple healthy pockets of HEAVEN!
Enjoy making this quick recipe this holiday season !
Tip: You can save some time by adding the filling to the frozen shells and baking it together till the filling is hot for about 5-8 minutes but I have just noticed that when I do it separately, I get a crispier lighter effect with the shells.
by Currylicious | Oct 24, 2012 | BLOG
Hello everyone,
I wanted to invite everyone to my cooking demo @ Williams Sonoma at the Short Hills Mall, NJ on 10/28 from 2 to 5 pm. I am going to be showing you how to cook up some quick and healthy horderves in no time ! Also, I am going to be using the ATHENS MINI PHYLLO SHELLS! With the holiday season around the corner- you will be amazed as to how quickly you can come up with fancy horderves using Athens Mini Phyllo shells in no time and impress your guests!!!
http://www.athensfoods.com/
I wanted to thank everyone for making it to the event! I had a fantastic time cooking as always and I hope that all of you who came in had a great time tasting my food as well. I also promised a lot of people that I would post my recipe so please look up Savory Phyllo Shells with Onion Tomato Chutney, Goat Cheese and Cilantro under the Recipes section.
Initially Chef Laura Edwards had requested that I come early and start my demo at 12 pm and wrap up by 2pm due to the impending hurricane warning. But thanks to all of you who came by today- I was at the store cooking up my chutney and filling my fillo cups with chutney and goat cheese up until 4.00pm. I was forced to stop since I ran out of my most ingredients then:))) else would have loved to stay till store closing lol!
I am sure a lot of you were amazed to see how quickly you can come up with a tasty healthy yet delicious horderves using the ATHENS MINI PHYLLO SHELLS.
It took me less that 15 minutes to make the Savory Phyllo Shells with Onion Tomato Chutney, Goat Cheese and Cilantro and to be honest I had both kids and adults come back to pick more than one from my tray!!!!which I was very glad about.
What I noticed was that not many were aware that the ATHENS MINI PHYLLO SHELLS bake within 3 minutes into crispy light pockets of heaven. I guess all the kids that walked in today became huge fans of the phyllo shells and I had a lot of moms asking me where they can purchase them. I had an availability list printed out so everyone knows where to get them from and its available in the freezer aisle of most supermarkets.
Please email me @ curryliciousme@gmail.com if you cannot find it and I shall email you the availability list.
So here are some pictures from the event today. Hope you enjoy.
A lot of people were interested in taking some cooking lessons from me, some were interested in catering for parties , some in kids cooking classes and a lot of them were up for Girls Night Out Parties! So please email me @ curryliciousme@gmail.com and I can definitely work with you to organize any of these classes or parties at very reasonable costs!
Thanks much again to all !
Please tune in to my blog for future events and more recipes!
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