Feeding the Masses

I finally got around to cooking a full, multi-course vegetarian meal for my friends. Here's what finally came out...
  1. Kumro bhate - Steamed pumpkin mash with coconut and raw mustard oil, and rice
  2. Posto bhate - poppyseed paste with raw mustard oil, and rice. This was actually the surplus poppyseed paste from the aloo posto, but it tastes great nevertheless
  3. Methi shaag - Fenugreek leaves stir fried with roasted peanuts
  4. Aloo posto - Potatoes in a poppyseed and nigella sauce
  5. Boti Chocchori - Cauliflower, peas and snow peas steamed with mustard. Snow peas, of course, are not traditional but substitute nicely for broad beans (sheem) which are.
  6. Mushur dal - Masoor dal with panch phoron and chopped cilantro
  7. Chhanar Dalna - Paneer in a ginger-cumin sauce with whole garam masala
  8. Shujir Payesh - Rawa milk pudding with saffron and cardamom.
(Its actually five courses, because 4,5 and 6 are meant to be had together) All this, of course, with steamed rice. I ran out of Gobindobhog, but there was the local Ambe Mohur. Nothing wrong with Basmati, but that's not what you would usually have it with at a Bengali home. Of course, we don't normally have rice at all for dinner - usually rotis or parathas or pooris, but that's outside my capabilities so rice it was.

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