And so from Kerala, onwards and upwards. First through Karnataka where I stopped briefly for some beach action and a taste of the famous gadbad ice cream and then onto my final destination in India, Goa. Gadbad is India’s answer to the Knickerbocker glory – layers of flavoured ice cream (pistachio, rose and cardamom) with grapes, dried fruit and nuts nestling in between each layer. I tried to recreate the frozen dessert when back in the Spicery kitchen by making a few of our spices into syrups, combining with yogurt and freezing but as you can see from the photo to no great success so far!
Unfortunately, to an even greater extent than Kerala, Goa is pretty overrun with tourists. The first town I visited had a slightly disappointing Costa del Sol vibe with lots of sunburnt Brits around (fine if you’re after sun, beer and chicken & chips but not the best place for a spice mission). Further beach towns were equally disappointing, catering for tourism so much that it was really hard to get any decent, authentic Goan food. The menus are all the same, consisting of Tibetan momos, a bit of north Indian fare, Russian salad and various bad imitations of European food. The best meal I ate at one of the beach towns was in a French restaurant ran by some French expats! Fortunately there was cooking school and Panjim to relieve the disappointment of the rest of Goa.
For 450 years, until 1961 Goa was actually a province of Portugal. The food, architecture, culture and religion all reflect this (once you get into the real Goa!). Walking through the streets in Panjim old town (Goa’s largest city), you’d be forgiven for thinking you were smack bang in the middle of a Portuguese town. The streets are littered with colonial style houses, street signs are made from Portuguese tiles and you’re never far from a pristine white church.
The cooking school I went to was in a small town called Siolim Bardez and the lessons run by a Goan lady called Netty. The school itself was based in the home of the former government of Macau (another Portuguese colony), an impressive and beautiful building that has been tastefully restored to its former grandeur by a couple of Delhi bankers.
Goan food is strongly influenced by the Portuguese, in the type of dishes cooked and also in the ingredients used. In fact, the Portuguese in a roundabout way are pretty influential in all Indian cooking since it was them that introduced chillies, tomatoes and potatoes to the country. Try making aloo matar, Bombay aloo or pau bhaji without any of those ingredients!
The distinctive ingredients of Goan cooking are Goan red rice, Goan chillies, dried fish (like lots of hot and humid countries fish are sundried to preserve them and added in small amount to dishes to give a real umami hit), toddy vinegar to introduce sourness (dried mango and tamarind are also frequently used), coconuts (like the rest of Southern India) and pork. In particular, roasted suckling pig and a Goan version of chorizo(not quite as good as the European version, probably due to the humidity) are popular throughout the region.
At the cooking school we were taught a few of the most popular dishes of Goa. To name a few:
- Chicken cafreal – chicken cooked in a green sauce made from coriander, ginger, tamarind and poppy seeds
- Fish rechado – translated as ‘stuffed fish’, fish stuffed with a hot and tangy paste made from chilli and vinegar
- Goan sorpatel – another hot and tangy dish made from quite finely diced pork and pork liver cooked in a chilli, garlic and vinegar sauce which can then be used to preserve the meat for a few days
- Prawn and okra caldine – a mildly spiced coconut curry
- Chicken Xaccuti– another coconut based curry but this time with lots of interesting spices such as star anise and poppy seeds added for a completely unique flavour
The key to Goan cooking is the freshness of the ingredients - fish is straight out of the sea, coconuts plucked from the trees and ground up as required (see Maria using her special coconut grater below) and spice pastes are all freshly prepared. Food is not served as it is in the rest of India with an array of different dishes and condiments to accompany. It tends to be a couple of main dishes with rice on the side but not as many chutneys, raitas or different dahls.
