I Don’t Always Do This (But Sometimes I Do)

An Indian Dinner Story

It all started with a text.“Tell me something different to make for dinner, if you want me to cook. I’m bored with what we’ve been eating.”

My husband replied, “I do miss some of the Middle Eastern dinners you made. Those were really good.”

“Like Indian? Or what?”

“Yes. Or some of the lentil dishes.”

Funny, because I was already thinking about that. I didn’t even go grocery shopping until 2:30, which, in hindsight, should have been my first clue.

Never too much cilantro

This is how I ended up making two fairly involved dishes, plus a third side, at the same time, starting at 4:30. Each one, on its own, was completely manageable. It was just that they were all happening at once.

To be clear, I cook most nights without incident. I can make dinner, carry on a conversation, maybe have music playing, and everything comes together just fine. But that’s when I’m cooking things I know. This was not that kind of night.

Every once in a while, I do this. I decide to make something like jambalaya, without a recipe, of course, and then think black-eyed peas would go well with that. And then fried green tomatoes would be really good too. And then what are fried green tomatoes without a remoulade sauce?

That’s when it turns into a long night. This was one of those nights. Just with Indian food.

On a major holiday, I know better. I make a schedule. I ask my husband, “When do you want to eat?” and, “What are you making?” (we usually split things up because there are so many moving parts). Then I get out a notebook and work backwards: what goes in the oven when, what temperature everything needs to be, and how long it takes to prep.

I stagger dishes. I do anything that can be done early, very early. It turns into a full day of cooking, but we actually enjoy it. The funny part is, my husband will give me a hard time for “worrying” about the schedule, usually while rolling his eyes.

“Why do you overthink everything so much?”

And I say, “Do you want to eat before 9:00?”

This is where things were still under control

This was not a scheduled night. This was a “I’ll just make a complicated dinner for no good reason” kind of night. I decided on chicken tikka masala, dal makhani, and roasted cauliflower. Good thing I didn’t try to make the keto naan I had planned.

Dal is a lentil dish (the word “dal” actually refers to lentils themselves). This one uses small black lentils, called urad dal, which are a little different from the larger lentils most people are used to.

This is where it started to get out of hand

The chicken got a little out of hand. I had over three pounds total (it was on sale), which was more than I planned, so everything started scaling up from there.

I also forgot to remove the skin from the chicken thighs before putting them in the marinade, which I corrected mid-process. I am not a fan of raw chicken juice mixed with yogurt and spices under my fingernails.

If only everything went as smoothly as the onions.

Then I realized I didn’t have enough crushed tomatoes, so I opened a large can of whole San Marzano tomatoes and crushed them by hand. That worked well, but it also meant I needed more spice than I originally thought, and I ended up adjusting as I went.

The broiler and I did not come to an agreement. The recipe called for a quick broil before the chicken went in the sauce, to create more depth of flavor. I have a strong broiler, apparently not strong enough to brown cold chicken on a cold pan in a cold oven.

I kept giving it “just a few more minutes,” and nothing happened until I started to worry that it was cooking, just not browning. So I pulled it and moved on.

I ran out of ground cumin. Of course I did.

At one point, I ran out of ground cumin, which turned into a brief spice-grinding session. I also ground coriander and found a jar to store the extra in.

The chicken went into the oven, and I left it there a little too long, or so it would seem.

While the chicken and dal were cooking, I had to run outside to finish chores my husband had started. One of the hens was having trouble laying an egg (which was a whole drama in itself), which slowed things down a bit.

Later, I went back out to the garden to cut cilantro. I use a lot of cilantro—no need to measure.

Back inside, I was finishing the dal. The last step is a mixture of cumin seeds bloomed in ghee, stirred into tomato paste and cooked together. It always looks like it’s not going to come together. It usually does.

This is dal. Trust the process.

Just not the first time I made it that night.

That may have been because I didn’t measure the ghee or the tomato paste. I was just throwing things together at that point, and in the process of trying to get the paste to incorporate the ghee, while also mashing the dal, I overheated it and burned the whole mixture.

Burned cumin seeds and tomato paste are not the goal. The second attempt was much better.

The thighs were great. The chicken breast… required some commitment. It didn’t survive the evening as well as the thighs, and I had to shred it and drown it in sauce.

Fortunately, the sauce was really good. My husband said so. And I did manage to sneak a piece of the tender thigh meat, which helped my bruised ego somewhat.

Right before we ate, I threw the cauliflower in the oven. In an effort to save time, I used the same pan I had used earlier to broil the yogurt-marinated chicken. That was not my best decision.

The cauliflower, however, was a clear win. It cooked in about 15 minutes and had great flavor on its own: slightly spicy, a little charred, and worth making again.

In the end, we did what we have been doing for fifteen years. We sat on the couch and ate dinner in front of the TV.

The dal went into a small bowl with cilantro on top. The chicken went into a large bowl, with more cilantro. The cauliflower stayed on the side, because it had earned the right to stand on its own.

It all came together. Eventually.

There was a brief discussion about the lack of rice, which ended when I mentioned the carbohydrate content of the dal. My husband approved of the thighs, even while explaining that they are “not calorie efficient.”

I ate the chicken breast anyway, mostly because I needed the protein, and I don’t like to waste food.

The sauce was very good, and the dal was even better. I may have had more than I planned. I could have eaten an entire pot of dal if I weren’t trying to be responsible.

It was a good meal—definitely worth making again, with a few adjustments next time. We are used to having Indian food with rice or naan, so this was a bit of an adjustment. I was disciplined… and slightly resentful about it.

I don’t always do this. But sometimes I do.