Food Talk
Festival special

Our own murg musallam can substitute for the alien Turkey and steal the show, says
Pushpesh Pant

MURG MUSSALLAM

Ingredients Chicken (whole) 1 kg Raw papaya paste 1 tbsp Salt to taste Onions (medium sized and sliced finely) four Garlic cloves (ground to paste) four Ginger (ground to paste) 2 inch piece Cinnamon stick (1 inch) one Cloves eight to 10 Black pepper 1tsp Green cardamom 8-10 gm Poppy seeds 1 tsp Coconut (desiccated) 3 tbsp Chironji 2 tbsp Cumin seeds 1-1/2 tbsp Coriander seeds 1-1/2 tbsp Chilli powder 1 tsp Curd 250 ml Eggs (boiled) four Almond slivers 2 tbsp Silver leaves 2 A pinch of saffron soaked in 1 tbsp kewra jal (optional)

Method: Prick the chicken all over with a fork. Rub it well with the raw papaya paste, garlic and ginger pastes and salt. Keep aside for two to three hours. Heat ghee in a pan and fry the onions till golden brown. Remove and grind half the onions to a paste and keep aside. Reserve the rest for the gravy. Dry roast the whole spices on a griddle and grind to a paste. Blend the spice paste with the curd. Then put the chicken in this marinade for about 30 minutes. Place half of the fried onions with boiled eggs inside the body cavity of the chicken. Truss the chicken by bringing the wing and leg close to the body and tie with a thread. Heat the oil used earlier for frying onions in a shallow pan, place the trussed chicken with the marinade and the reserved onions and let it simmer for about 30 minutes. Sprinkle the kewra soaked saffron strands and garnish with silver leaf and almond slivers.

Of the many festive feasts that we have in our great land, nothing quite compares with the Christmas repast.

True, there are glorious kebab and biryani topped off with peerless sevian at the time of Eid, and the splurging on gujiya and almond-enriched thandai (spiked with the right kind of grass!) during Holi has great seductive appeal but the week preceding X-mas and the one following it seem to be totally devoted to food.

As a kid one had a gala time collecting edible rewards for singing Christmas carols on cold winter evenings.

Then followed the night with the sleep punctuated with dreams of gifts that Santa would surely bring. The excitement of unwrapping the goodies only whetted the appetite for the Christmas lunch.

With adulthood much of the magic is lost along with the innocence of childhood. What remains is the allure of fabulous feasts. Different nations have a traditional delicacy earmarked for the occasion.

France has the roasted turkey with chestnut, Russia is proud of its koutia — wheat grain cooked with dried fruits, in Germany specially fattened carp is the favourite and in Italy eels are enjoyed with stuffed capon.

The regional variations in all these countries are mind-boggling. There was a time when bare din ka khana meant a selection from the Anglo-Indian Raj repertoire.

Not any longer. Good friend Satish Jacob of BBC fame hosts in Delhi every year a wonderful Christmas lunch and his dastarkhwan dazzles with rarely encountered kebab and its Indian kin.

John Dayal, another journalist friend with a penchant for good food, has convinced us that the signature cake and pudding can be combined brilliantly with culinary classics of our own.

We are very happy to share with our readers the recipe for murgh musallam — that can very easily substitute for the alien Turkey and steal the show.

The dish is exceptionally rich but don’t be bothered by pangs of guilt. We promise to balance this over indulgence with sustained vegetarian discipline as soon as the party season is over and the New Year dawns.

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