March 27, 2007
Special Delivery: Come Give it to me (The Remix)Food
A few years ago, erstwhile mutineer Manish posted here about an enterprising Tiffinwalla in New York who would deliver healthy, vegetarian lunches (“2 chapatis, rice, dal, one vegetable, appetizer, dessert and pickle/chutney”) for all of $5.
I was living in California at the time and lazy ingrate that I am, I was green with longing, even as I was eating fresh Mallu food daily at home.
It just seemed like such a fantastic concept; New Yorkers got EVERYTHING, I wistfully thought. Couldn’t the left coast have had similar, especially during that arid, empty time that my Mother was abroad for two months? ;) I mean, protein shakes get old, y’all.
Apparently, my whining has been answered, according to a story in the grey lady which many of you were blowing up our tipline/news tab with (Thanks, Derick):
In Mumbai, formerly Bombay, the tiffin, or lunch, is prepared by the wife, mother or servant of the intended. In the United States, because of little time (and a lack of a domestic staff), many of these lunches are prepared by outsiders, but the underlying principle is the same…
Annadaata, which began as a homespun operation in 2002, has morphed into a business with several delivery people distributing meals each weekday across San Francisco. Kavita Srivathsan, 29, the chief executive of Annadaata, got her start by cooking meals for her new husband and his friends.
Srivathsan stumbled in to a market which was just waiting for someone like her to hook them up with comfort food:
She did not have a job at the time, so she spent her time learning how to cook Indian foods. Using recipes from her mother in south India, she experimented in the kitchen for a few hours each day. On a whim, she advertised $5 box meals on justindia.com, a Web site based in the San Francisco area that no longer exists. “That was the only time I ever did any advertising,” she said. “The very next day I got a few phone calls from people ordering the boxes, and from then on the word spread like wildfire.”
Mrs. Srivathsan’s business grew so fast that a few months later she decided she could no longer run it from her home. “It began as me cooking out of my kitchen, but since there was such a demand for it, I had to make it a legitimate business with a tax ID number and a rented kitchen,” she said.
Because she wanted to reach a wider market and knew that Indians generally favored cuisine from their region, she hired cooks from various areas in India, including Gujarat, south India and Punjab. Today, customers can click on her Web site, annadaata.com, to view a menu for the coming week. After choosing from among a vegetarian ($7), a nonvegetarian ($8) or a south Indian meal ($8), they place orders over the Internet and pay with credit cards.
Uh, anyone want to start this up in D.C.? Pleeease? There’s only so many times that I can stomach Chipotle/Potbelly/Subway/Raisin Bran for lunch and like the people quoted in the NYT article, it’s just not possible for me to cook. Proper South Indian food requires time, discipline and a devotion to process that I can’t muster right now and I’m not a fan of shortcuts (my mother told me this weekend at our family reunion that if she ever caught me availing myself of something like this, she’d pinch my thigh so viciously I’d need a skin graft). Owww.
Srivathsan sums it up perfectly:
At the end of the day I just wanted the basic Indian food I had grown up with.
Werd.
anna on March 27, 2007 09:15 AM in Food, Humor · T·r·a·c·k·b·a·c·k address · Direct link · Email post
Anna, what are your favorite Indian places in DC? I am partial to Delhi Dhaba in Van Ness and Arlington (not the Bethesda branch, it's worse), plus Indique in Cleveland Park.
My mommy was in India for an ENTIRE month of February. Worst month of my life. So I feel your pain sister.
Someone needs to start this up in the LA metro...
I am so hungry now, and after going back to read Manish's post, have gathered that the NYC option seems to have gone. Is there another one available?
Otherwise, I'll have to settle for Chipotle.
Please please someone let me know if you ever hear of something like this in the DC metro area! Veg, non-veg, I don't care.
For thayir sadham/dosa/rasam/kappi: Amma's in Georgetown
For buttery, heart-stopping ma ki dal/adorable aloo tikki/pani puri: Heritage, either location.
For excellent food (palaak chaat/broccoli poriyal/flawless bhindi) and atmosphere: Rasika, since they have apologized/made it up to me. ;)
Just a quick note, you shouldn't have though NY had everything. The Bay Area has has such a service for 5+ years now.
true...somehow, my peanut butter and jelly just doesn't seem to hack it today
:( ...I want me mommy's food
Reads other people's plight. Looks at his awesome lunch, daily surprises and all.
Reminds self to send a dozen tulips to Mrs. S. For starters.
Boston-area tiffin services, anybody?
Are you specifically looking for tiffin delivery services?
I live in Virginia, and finding someone to cook for you is not terribly hard. Maybe, they won;t deliver it to you, but you can pick it up. Every other desi housewife with a smidgen of cooking talent is giving dabbas. When my wife was pregnant, she couldn't stand the kitchen. So, she found 2 within 5 miles of our house who cook good food. Give me a day, I'll find the website that she used to find those women.
Hell, if you live in Reston area and want North Indian instead of South Indian, my mom will be ready to cook, and all you need to do is pick the food up in the morning.
Anna, not sure if you've explored Columbia, MD - but there's a somewhat upscale chain of restaurants headquartered there called Bombay Grill. I've never been disappointed by anything I've eaten at any of their restaurants - and they have good South Indian stuff. But more to the point, they currently seem to be exploring new business directions, and are actually looking for a Business Development Director. Why not talk to the contact person listed at the bottom of the page - and tell her where the real business opportunity is - lunch/tiffin to-go for busy 1-gen, 1.5-gen, and 2-gen South Asian professionals - esp. SI food - not necessarily all-you-can-eat buffets! With this blog, (and its phenomenal stats) you're uniquely well-placed to influence market dynamics, and hundreds if not thousands of DC area folks will thank you if you are successful!
A while back I saw another article that pointed out that most of these services don't last very long - it's exhausting, the margins are small, and working at scale risks discovery of what is essentially a grey operation. I'll see if I can dig it up tonight.
I found this
in the Washington DC area. Has anyone tried any of these?
And I found this for the Los Angeles area. I am sure if you look, you can find Indian food catered in many cities with a sizable Indian population.
Quite true. I think they touch upon this in the NYT article, too.
Also, part of the issue is what defines "D.C." South Dupont is far from Reston, for example. People in cities who don't have cars won't find it easy to pick something up in the morning like our friend here is willing to do. Tiffin deliveries in Arlington won't help those in downtown, etc.
Catered isn't quite as convenient as "delivered". ;)
I've long considered starting a tiffin service in Philadelphia. There is a sizable desi population in Philly, and the options for khanna (Karma, and Cafe Spice), while good, can be hard to get, especially over lunch.
I do love to cook, and I make some dishes fairly well, but I wasn't sure if people would trust a gora-run dabbawallah service.
Still, I think about the idea often, especially when I get fed up with the IT industry.
I've tried Annadaata's once and it was good - low oil, reasonable sodium without compromising on taste. My grouse is the tons of rice and relatively less amount of vegetable they dole out in their packages. Hardly a way for us sedentary engineers to eat. Still, it does approximate to home cooked food.
gg
There are catering services(yellow pages) for people on health diets which will cook food based on the doctors recommendation. One more thing they do is, they will cook based on recipes that you give. This is present in almost all major cities. The only question would be are they willing to cook curry for you.
Reason 546 why I love y'all -- you know exactly what's on my mind! I'm a Southie here in DC too, crazy jonsing for some Indian food that I can either pick up or have made at home. I mean, Amma is great and all, but sometimes, a girl's just got to have some rasam, beans poriyal and thayir sadam. Know what I mean?
ps -- I called one of the numbers listed on Sulekha like a week ago and no one has responded...
Anna woman up and learn how to cook it stop being a wimp.
SM Intern: Troll Alert!
That's true, but if South Dupont (or wherever you live in DC) has a sizable Indian population, then it is not hard to find a housewife who is ready to cook for you and make money on the side. Making tiffins is the oldest idea in the world. I would be surprised to find a housewife who hasn't toyed with the idea, and there is no dearth of housewives among desis
Sure thing sweetheart-- right after YOU sack up, shut up and
a) get a job where you work my 60-hour weeks
b) stop being an anonymous coward.
Then I'll be HAPPY to stay home and grind rice for my own arripodi. Idiot.
Dear Commenter #23 (aka Doug),
It's come to our attention that you have a severe case of idiocy. Unfortunately, we don't know of a cure for this condition, but as it can be contagious we please ask that you take your attitude and leave.
Thanks,
The Rest Of Us
I get the first and last at Amma all the time, actually. In fact, I just order the thali and mix the chor and thayir with sambar and lemon pickle in that iconic steel pathram...it's bliss. My problem is that Amma isn't near my job and they don't deliver. I work at Gallery Place/Chinablock and would love delivery in THAT 'hood.
This post reminded me of the "Cook and See" (Samaithu Paar) series written by S. Meenakshi Ammal back in the day. These cookbooks have become huge over time.
From what I understand, the books gained popularity among newlywed South Indian women who were going abroad with their husbands (so 60s, 70s). They were expected to cook, etc., but didn't have any easy way to reach relatives for culinary questions. That's where S. Meenakshi Ammal stepped in...
I'm actually intrigued to know if anyone's done any sort of study of Samaithu Paar and where it was most popular, who used it, who still recalls it, etc. Has anyone else heard of this book? Do you remember it in your kitchen?
Here's a link to the website of whoever now has the rights to S. Meenakshi Ammal's name: http://www.meenakshiammal.com
there actually is a tiffin service in philly: https://tiffin.com/
haven't used it myself though. i think it's by the same guy who did Karma...
For those in the DC area: I love Tiffin, in Langley Park (just a mile from the University of Maryland on University Blvd (193)). It's nothing fancy but the service is excellent and the food's pretty good...they have a lunch buffet that really hits the spot. They have a sister restaurant on the next block, Udupi.
http://www.tiffinrestaurant.com/
It's not Rasika (which is sooo yummy) but it's a great weekend lunch and a friendly staff. Mostly North Indian food.
since we're talking about food...are there any good places in philly to get south indian food? or chaat?
Restaurant recs are always good but just to clarify for anyone who might be interested, we're discussing THIS tiffin. Not that one. ;)
what's the other tiffin?
There's a restaurant called "Tiffin", which Melissa was referring to...just trying to keep things clarified like ghee.
Yes, let's stay focused here. Lots of hungry desis in the DC area waiting for that list of lunch or dinner pick-ups or deliveries. Hell, I'll even include Reston in my definition of DC if it means that I can finally have some avial.
Wow, so there is a tiffin service in Philadelphia! Color me happy! And yeah, it looks like the same guys who run Karma. Good deal.
I think there are a couple. But as someone mentioned, they are often fly-by-night operations. I guess it's a stressful job. I'll ask my friend about the one she uses and post back here if it's still around.
Maurice Reeves, I would trust a gora-run tiffin service. Unfortunately I don't live in Philly.
Anna, I know you don't want to use pre-made dosa mix but one of the stores in NoVa has a really good homemade one that my mom uses. It's actually better than her's (and my mom is an amazing cook) so we don't feel guilty about it. And for vellappams, there is a mix called "double horse", you just add water, and they actually are really good. Idlis--the rava kind--MTR mix--just add yogurt. The plain idlis don't taste as good. Sambar I make from scratch. I'm a food purist too but if this is the only way I can get it, I'll take what I can get.
The problem with restaurants in the DC area is that their quality is never guaranteed. One month they will have great food, next month really bad, and mediocre in the one after that. I visit Woodlands in the Langley Park area about once a month, and one month they had kheer made with somewhere around 17 ingredients, and the next month, kheer was day old rice mixed with sweetened milk flavored with pista flavoring. I don't know what happens to them. It's like going to new place every time. Maybe they up their ante when the clients drop, and use cheap materials when there are too many people. Maybe they keep losing cooks. And the funny thing is that if quality of one place drops, the competitor's quality will rise. Similar tthing happenned with Woodlands and Shravana palace in Fairfax. Woodlands had what I would term, passable quality of food, up until Shravana Palace opened up. Shravana Palace was cooking everything in pure ghee when it opened up, and you couldn't find a place to stand in the waiting area. Within a month, Woodland's quality improved and Shravana Palace become worse to a point where Woodlands was better
Getting to the point:- I wouldn't recommend any of the Indian restaurants, that I know of, to someone who is looking for regular food, because the quality isn't consistent. THe only restaurant that had a consistent quality of food will stay unnamed because it was consistently bad
I meant that as a tongue in cheek statement lighten up.
Sparky,
The only place where I have had decent south Indian food in philly is close to Franklin Mills called Udupi Dosa House or something similar. There is another tiffin service recently started in New York, Jersey City area by the guy who started Earth in Chelsea.
I tried calling the 212 number from Manish's old entry but no dice...Anyone know if it's still around?
First you mock my cooking skills, now you order me to bleach myself? Cheee! My uber-brown skin is lowely, yaaaar. Don't take it, please be leaving it. Thank you, pun again.
(Someone take this fourth iced latte away from me, for all of your sakes...)
Ennis touched on this a bit (#15)... but I'm wondering if these services fly totally under the radar of health inspectors, or whether they'd legitimately have something to say about it. Believe me, I have no problem with these services at all, but wondering if it's technically "illegal" and how a big, well-known business like Annadaata specifically might be dealing with that. Not so much the preparation facilities, but issues with how long the food sits at "unsafe temperature" in transit while being delivered...? Anyone have the lowdown?
Also, Anna, what's the problem with buying someone's homemade dosa batter!? What's the difference if you get a dosa delivered already made by someone else, or if you just buy their batter and fry it up yourself! Would work for me! Tell your ma to save the pinches for situations where they're really needed! ;-)
I think you should raise that highly logical point with my Mother, with my full support and admiration. I will be totally behind you. Literally. She has short arms, so she'll hurt you first. ;)
I'd like to add two comments:
- My cousin, Vikram Sunderam, is the head chef of Rasika. He showed us how to make the palak chaat when he came home for the holidays. SUCH a good idea and really easy!!! The hardest part is having fresh spinach available ...
- Proper Indian cooking (in fact cooking in general) is NOT a giant time sink if you keep it simple. You'll find there are a lot of nice things you can eat that are not challenging. For instance, making a good, hot rasam with some nice vegetable is VERY easy. You can use frozen or canned things, tamarind concentrate, etc to cut down on time. If you are expecting mutter paneer with freshly made paneer, or masala dosa / rava idlis in your first month, then that's another story. I can't speak to meat and fish preparation issues though because I'm vegetarian.
The prices from the site that the NY times links to is currently $9 per delivery. Maybe I'm being a cheap ass desi but isn't that too much for a tiffin?
I see that I can't win here. I would never mock your cooking skills just saying.
Anyone up for an eleventh hour sort of meetup in DC this weekend? I'm thinking either dinner or Sunday brunch, @ Heritage Dupont, b/c they take such fantastic care of us. It's been a while, innit? Three months? Yeesh.
I'm guessing the title is an allusion to the G-Dep song..?
#u@%!n& finally! SOMEONE is paying attention. ;)
To someone above's point, the whiners on SM need to learn how to cook, guys, girls, the lot of you. Why be dependent on someone else's hygiene (lack of) and ingredients (quality of)? Catered food is always over the top in oil, salt, spices. If you're working 60 hrs a week then you need to get your life sorted. I'm sure you make time to shit, shower, shave, and shake yer booty etc. You wouldn't outsource those, so why leave the food prep to someone else? It involves your body too. If you ask me y'all have moms who spoilt you rotten.
You are too right. Please, feel free to pay my rent and student loans while I look for that mythical new job which requires that I only work 40 hours a week.
I posted this story because as a busy person, I could relate to it. I could make time to cook, but then I wouldn't get to blog or moderate here. Perhaps you wouldn't mind that, though. There are only 24 hours in a day. It's fucked up for you to denigrate how I choose to spend them.
I don't have time to address the other aspects of your comment; yes, I make time to shower and shave because that's what normal, clean people do. If it means I don't have time to make myself idiappam in the morning because I had the gall to take a bath, then that's the trade-off that I and all other ordinary people make. For fuck's sake.
Why am I suddenly craving some real Mumbai pav bhaji?
I've never experienced this NYC tiffanwalla, but i have had food from that dosa guy in Washington Square Park and it is excellent! As for some troll asking Anna to woman up and just make South Indian food, I mean the whole point is, it's a huge commitment, time-wise. If she's eating Raisin Bran at the office during dinnertime, chances are she doens't have time to properly make a curry or dal, she's probably busting her ass to make some deadline.
Plus, I find if you live in an apt, making Indian food is quite cumbersome. It seriously stinks up the whole place. Then again, my mother says that these are all my BS excuses and she made proper 7-course Indian food in small, confined apartment kitchens for years when she first came to this country. Of course, she makes sambar and dal look effortless and easy in a 30-minute way that Rachael Ray nor I, will ever aspire to understand.
GIADA! At least pick Giada. ;)
Quick note-- please use ONE handle in each thread. Switching handles to address a point that you made earlier is grounds for banning. Thanks for cooperating.
My issue with cooking desi at home is the waiting after it is cooked.
Desi foods need to sit for a decent amount of time after it is cooked. The film needs to form on top of the rajma.
I remember there was a desi tiffin-walla in the Richardson area (Dallas) when I was an intern there. One meal for $5. I wait for the Mc-production of a huge desi-tiffin network. That certainly is a business venture whose time has come.
Actually, I'm trying to find someone who will shit for me, but I haven't got any applicants yet.
I think the affect is 2 fold. Not only do the spices meld together, the people waiting for the food get hungrier
Dunno, but I know what I'm making this weekend - Neyyappam! Seems easy enough...
Desishiksa, did you know they're good for both Hanukkah and Yom Kippur? Not sure if they'll also go well at Passover though...
>Actually, I'm trying to find someone who will shit for me, but I haven't got any applicants yet.
LMAO!
actually i interviewed a nice Indian lady who wanted to babys**t for my son!
actually SI cooking is easy. pick up a copy of "Dakshin" or alamelu vairavan's book. It has all kinds of tips and tricks.
or go to SSVT in Lanham and tell one of aunties that you are missing home cooked SI food and they will hook you up. They may even start a tiffin service, since many of the old timers live near metro.
Anna: I would totally pick Giada anytime over Rachael. Serious. Even if neither one of them can make appam.
begtodiffer: I think the point is that some people just have a hard time fitting cooking into their lives, and these tiffin services are tastier (and sometimes at least seem healthier) than restaurant food. I can cook and do so maybe 3 or 4 nights a week, but there are those other nights.... and yeah, whipping up a 20-minute moong dal is easy, but who the hell wants to just have dal for dinner all the time? Don't be so critical... everyone has their priorities, and some are more than willing to pay for having someone else's auntie cook up some saag paneer or dosas or whatever.
Dunno, but I know what I'm making this weekend - Neyyappam! Seems easy enough...
Uh... sorta. But do you just happen to have an appakara on hand???
GIADA! At least pick Giada. ;)
I mean I totally am all about Team Giada vs. Team Rachael. But Giada does not boast a 30-minute meal, hence the joke wouldnt' have worked;)
That and we're talking about lunch. You have to have time to make dinner in order to take leftovers to lunch. That's why a tiffin service would be a blessed alternative to yet another chipotle burrito, for those souls-with-unsorted-lives who will take six hours of sleep over 4.5 after cooking and cleaning, after an exhausting day.
Just in case you didn't know what that was...Seems a bit drastic though - to go there just for South Indian food!
So very true. Your point is well-taken. Except when joking at Jaleo. :D
One of the recipes I read said you could fry the dough-balls in any kind of frying pan. Any contra-indications? :)
Chachaji, thank you so much for clarifying that...we in the bunker weren't sure and those moody monkeys are never useful in these situations.
ok. clearly you have not been to the cafeteria there or to the Ganesha temple in Queens. Many many people go there primarily for the food. It's that good.
The only bad thing I can say about SSVT food is that the containers are flimsy. The food doesn't make it all the way to Virginia without the sambar making it's way to the yogurt rice. You need one person to take care of the food, while the other drives.
Seriously, if they let me and if I have the time, I will stand outside SSVT and pack food for people in good containers. I guess they aren't thinking about profit, but I bet a lot more people will take food home if they pack it well
another article on the same: http://www.insidebayarea.com/entertainment/ci_5321059
interesting that this hasn't caught on anywhere else but in the bay - though seattle is mentioned as well.
Another great site for locating tiffin service in your area, enjoy.
I've tried AnnaDaata's weekly supply of food. It is fairly healthy but the portions of veggies are very small and for that the pricing is fairly high. In the bay area and especially in and around south bay you can do much better by just eating a thali at any of the tons of Indian restaurants and get some excellent healthy food (dee dee's comes to mind). Take-out is very cheap at some of these places too(Madras cafe for excellent dosas and idlis and Spice hut for general and mallu stuff)...so Annadaata may work well during emergencies but is not necessarily the best option in the area.
OK Anna, this post has inspired me to get some food delivered now by Jyoti on 18th St in Adams-Morgan. Their lamb rogan josh is so good! Thanks!
Since I can no longer eat spicy food, tomatoes, onions, I do with a lot of food hacks* and Trader Joe's shortcuts. No spice. I'm sure my food hacks would make the more rigorous ANNA blanche, but, hey!
*Food hacks was a Manish-ism. Remember that post? And all the funny short-cuts to making something vaguely diasporic and desi-flavored, like adding pickle to a cheese sandwhich, etc.
Oh, my point was I'd have to have order my tiffin American-style (no spice......)
And, finally (sorry SM intern, I know I'm probably breaking a rule tandem-posting and will try hard to stop in future), but I go for the easy and fast cooking. Basically, I lower my standards. Boil rice, heat lentil soup, doctor lentil soup with everything and anything at hand (garlic, yogurt, mild spices). Disgusting to some, to most really, but you have to understand that I have eaten in many hosptial cafeterias over the years and have no taste-buds left.
Kusala,
You don't need an appakara - it can be fried in a kadhai or wok.
As far as such tiffin/delivery services - almost every metro seems to have such a service. There are also subsets of such services, where you can order just chappaties and so on.
For those who do cook at home, but don't have the time to do so in the week, I don't think anyone has mentioned this option so far: why not cook in the weekends? This is what we do...both of us work long hours, and we have kids, who have multiple activities during the week, so no time in the evenings to cook. We make 5 or 6 dishes in the weekend - usually a sambar/rasam (kids love rasam), couple of veggies, and one N.Indian dish that can be eaten with chappaties. Then during the week, all we need to do is make rice (rice cooker, so gets done in 20 minutes). Lunch is variations of the above. Yes, it does get somewhat monotonous, but seems a better option to us than eating out or ordering food.
Anna, I am surprised your mother disapproves of buying idli/dosa batter - On a recent trip to India I found almost everyone does this, if they work outside the house - This was in Madras, Bangalore and Bombay. Noone seemed to think it was a shocking thing, and my cousins were pretty surprised to hear that I still grind my own batter.
Regards,
Bitterlemons.
This is not really an option for us single people who are cooking for a party of one. (But I do think it's a fabulous idea for busy families!)
When making subji you are not going to make one or two servings, you are going to make a lot for it to be worthwhile for the time you spent shopping, chopping and cooking.
I never feel guilty when I eat Indian food.
Huh?
I just noticed a desilet in the kitchen, under the counter!
i hear you, anna. i can't even get good north indian food in boston, much less south indian. on another note, i made dosa batter for the first time ever (yay!) but the sambar took too long and it was a bit disastrous (not so much yay). so i was forced to eat it with podi and honey. is it just me, or is cooking south indian food much much harder than north indian food?
#19 - you should totally start the tiffin service in philly. i know plenty of people who would be interested. philly is another one of those cities where finding desi food was terribly tough. it was a hard five years. sigh.
may i just say, anna, i am a newcomer to SM, but i already look forward to reading your posts. i guess it's a good thing, then, that i didn't have to suffer through your hiatus!
Yeah, I don't think they are quite K for P (kosher for Passover) but my husband does say his Passover menu has improved substantially since meeting me. I just make Indian curries and he eats them with matzoh. I eat them with rice like I always do.
I'll have to make them for Hanukkah. It must be because they are fried in oil.
Actually I think neyappams resemble sufganiyot more. Without the jelly.
I read that article a while ago. I don't know why no one wanted to write about my wedding :(
I don't know about matzoh balls in vindaloo, but matzoh ball soup with saffron is good.
I'm a party of one and I do it(cooking large quantities of food on weekends, or on a free evening) regularly. I usually have a handful of meals pre-stacked in Tupperware dishes in my refrigerator. The only drawback is that I end up eating the same thing four or five times in a row -- lunch, dinner, lunch, dinner...
ak,
Rani, on Beacon St. near Coolidge Corner, has pretty respectable Southie food, and the owner is a lowely man. Tamarind Bay in Harvard Square is not too bad either although it's more of a mix.
And yes, I am jonesing for dal, for the endless scratching of my grandmother picking through it for stones. . .
How difficult is it to make a different khichri everyday? Just switch around your dals and use different types f rice for the variety. The Indian style of meat and fish is not an easy thing to rustle up if you are single. Heated canned veggies with a little tarka with ghee/olive oil, and some papad, khichri etc., is very filling. And of course don't forget to use methi and crushed ginger. With all that daal you will need it if you aren't used to it!
And here's a great recipe for khichri. If you are feeling ambitious how about trying to make this lovely dessert with your friends?
If someone has a little capital and wants to invest in a franchise of Meenakshi Bhavan, it would be profitable, and I'm pretty it could be written off as a social service if you don't overcharge for idli/dosai.
NYC...POW!
TiffinBlog
(Hopefully their food is better than their site design!)
That is EXACTLY what I was hoping would come of this thread. :) A bunch of resources...please tell us if the food is good.
Sigh.
This is for everyone, not just Shiva: I loathe answering slightly different versions of the same question, but the problem is time, more than something being "difficult". I am also NOT talking about dinner. I don't have time to make dinner when I get home at 10pm and yes, I often work on weekends too.
Not that you had any way of knowing this, but I don't really have a kitchen in this otherwise awesome, extra-tiny studio apt. No garbage disposal, no counter, no fan, just a miniature stove and sink, neither of which work rather well. I like South Indian food, which, even with shortcuts, requires more than what's goin' on in this here crib. So when I say I can't, kindly give me the benefit of your doubt, that there might be REASONS for that. The suggestions that I cook "x" which is simple, or "y" on the weekends or...are getting frustrating. I am not an idiot. I'd do it if I could.
That is why it would be lovely to have someone deliver Southie food to our lobby mid-day. Comfort food. Delivered. Tiffin. Very specific need here, THAT is what I'd like to see addressed. What bliss.
If I have to eat take-out at lunch 80% of the time, back at my desk, why can't I spend that Chipotle or Pot Belly money on sambar?
Thanks for the post Anna. Reading this article a couple of days ago, i was hoping for the same - a few more resources. I scoured the internet for something similar in the NYC area, but found nothing.
Hurray for Pisco!
Annamoley! Pleeease! I didn't mean to diss your housekeeping and homemaking abilities! There's only so much of tiffin food one can eat. If not everyday, khichri once in a while is a welcome break. Here's a deal. Khichri for everyone at the next blog meet. I will make it!
I sincerely hope that's pronounced like "guacamole". Moley, moley, moley...MOLE.
Tiffins sound like a lovely idea, but I'm not so sure about the "there's no dearth of Indian housewives who'd be interested in doing it" proposition. Most of the desi women in the States are pretty well-educated and have better job options. To be financially feasible it would take a good deal of investment and relatively cheap labour, and if you wanted to make a business of it, a restaurant is more profitable, presumably (profits on booze always higher than on food). The home food delivery system as I know it in North India at least runs on housewives with low overheads (working out of home) and cheap labour (the household help who is paid a lowish flat monthly salary but gets roped in for the business), and the ladies who do it tend to be older, and of a generation or background where one didn't work outside the home. I don't think folks who had other options would do it, particularly on the low margins necessary to make these home-replacement meals. If this sort of thing exists in the States right now, I doubt it will last very long.
And at some point, folks, it's worth learning how to cook that nice homey food - otherwise it might be lost forever. I think about that sometimes with regard to pickles...
For those of you pinched on time, maybe you should try "Tasy Bites." You can buy them at Costco. My sister and brother-in-law have eaten them and said that they were pretty good, and they work fine if you are in a hurry (and seriously tired of Chipotle).
You actually get lots of South Indian food mixes in desi stores, speaking of shortcuts - I love MTR Rasam mix. Most of the South Indians I know at home also use bought sambhar powder these days and I'm pretty sure idli mixes too.
Vivek, that Cook and See book sounds like a gem! Madhur Jaffrey's books were like that for me when I first started cooking away from home, couldn't get precise recipes out of my mother and MJ really holds your hand through it all.
you just defined a generation. genius.
so the above comment was obviously meant for the other thread... that's what happens when you try to catch up on all your mutiny reading in one go with multiple windows open.
Old news...this was reported in the SF Chronicle YEARS ago...
Come on, now. Beans thoran: Microwave french cut beans, diced green chilli and salt for about 15 minutes on medium high. Heat EVOO (hah), fry mustard, uzhunnu parippe, add grated coconut and the beans. Stir fry for a couple of minutes. Done.
That observation added so much to this thread. Perhaps you should also note this while you're dismissing it.
That's hardly "proper" preparation, which is what I think she was referring to. Look, if people don't want to take shortcuts, especially if they weren't taught such things, why be so haughty about it?
...I always felt desi cuisine was fully hacker/borg like (in a good way)...take an ingredient brought from a near or distant land and smother in fragrant spices fried or crushed..with or without onion/garlic/ginger/tamarind...then a second layer of taste...or a third or fourth
..or a thousand combos of somesuch and there you are.
Forgot to add that if people are missing home/Mom's cooking, then hacks won't cut it, which is not to denigrate ingenious solutions in any way-- hacks are probably how we all survive. It's the idea of someone cooking the way their mother would, and having that cuisine delivered which is the point of this thread.
It isn't proper preparation, I agree. I wasn't being haughty and I am sorry if I came across as such.
I was just trying to point out that alternate forms of preparation (maybe quicker) can also taste close to the food prepared the proper way (whatever that might mean - after all, often times the recipes and the method of preparation varies between families).
Perhaps we can do a separate recipe/updated hacks-thread, if there's interest. Until then, has anyone else heard of or tried tiffin services like those in the post and if so, what did they think/what cities did this occur in?
Okay. For the SFBA, Annadaata is okay, but like many folks pointed out expensive for food delivered daily. Spice hut does a 2/3/4 item veggie lunch special (varies every day) but they dont deliver. I finally found that the best way was to get someone to cook for the week and just pick up the food.
Venu- excellent information, thanks much. Anyone else?
Bad form to follow-up one's own post, I know, but I forgot to mention that this works out to about $50/week for rotis, rice and 3 to 4 veggie dishes.
Also, in the SFBA, there are folks who will come home and cook as well with ingredients you supply. Posting a wanted ad in craiglist, sulekha or your local grocery store works. I have found Punjabi and Gujarati food galore, but Mallu food is hard to find.
Rasika is DC is the best Indian food I have had in a long long time in the US. Nothing in New York has even come close to their near-perfect sauce for Lamb RoganJosh. Baluchis in NYC is good too. And Brick Lane for buffet.
SORRY ANNA
I wasn't trying to lecture, just rambling on.
I agree with one of the commenters above; Rani in Coolidge Corner is pretty good for Boston. Gourment India down the street is pretty fast foodish, but okay. Neither does a tiffin service, alas, as far as I know.
proper south indian (atleast tamilian food) as in Kootu, Kozhambu, Rasam, Rice, Varuval/Poriyal, appalam requires a good pressure cooker and a good frying pan and 1 hour if the veggies have been precut(15 to 20 minutes)......... seen my mom and paati do it for 20+ years. It never ceases to amaze me even today!!
all it takes is practice and interest!! now that is something that has to come from within :-)
why can we not edit our posts?
Sorry ANNA about the crib and the lack of cooking space!!
Slightly OT but while we're talking south indian food, anyone have a good homey recipe for Mallu style Tomato Fry? Was hungry and had tomatoes so quickly fried up some per Maya Kaimal's Spice Coast of Kerala cookbook (which I otherwise adore) but these were NOT very good and nothing like the divinely delicious Tomato Fry I've had in Kerala. Or if anyone can comment on how brown/fried the onions are supposed to be, and whether the tomato should cook together with the onions and spices or if latter should be put over tomatoes at the end after separate cooking as per Kaimal...
Tomato curry (fry?).
Mmm, that looks good but the one I'm thinking of is more on the dry side, and doesn't have coconut or cinnamon in it, more chunky and spicy.
TiffinBlog: I tried their food last week & their food is actually very good. it's like home cooked they deliver in NY & NJ I was very impressed with the quality of the food & presentation. very professional
WWW.TIFFINBLOGCOM. 908 504 1970
Anyone tried Suvir Saran's restaurant Devi in NYC? He wrote a good US-ingredients-oriented cookbook, Indian Home Cooking. The recipes pare the ingredients down to the basics, for good quickie week-night dishes. Plus, his descriptions of prepping and shopping with his significant other Chuck in various NYC neighborhoods make it "not your momma's cookbook". (My mom was surprisingly only amused by it all)
But be warned, the cookbook has been dissed on Amazon by desis as not authentic enough. Serves the purpose, tho.
pinch my thigh so viciously I'd need a skin graft
..hmm I thought that was my mom's original composition. Turns out its a standard mallu threat huh? My mom would go.. "Adi thodail kayy veccha ara kg erachi edukkum" ha ha ....
Nice to bump into Anna "Pterodactyl" again. I first saw you (very briefly) at Fraud Mallu on Orkut. Not seen much of you after that first blip about 2 years ago. That community is 6000+ strong now. (that's me indulging in some shameless promotion of my community :). Do drop in sometime.
Nice posts. Keep 'em comping :)
Hey, Pondatti, didn't know that the comments were meant to "add to the thread"! Thought they were just that: comments.
Why yes, that is exactly what comments should do. If they don't, they're just useless blather, unnecessary noise.
Look, on a thread like this which has a relatively specific request/purpose, I just didn't think your "this is old...*yawn*" contribution...contributed much.
There's an amazing weekily Tiffin food delivery service available in New Jersey. Generally quite flexible on locations they are willing to deliver to. The indian food is soooooo good!!!.. They deliver weekly tiffins so its really convient for all those who just don't find the time to cook. I've reccomended it to many people and they've all been really impressed. Hopefully, im helping other people who were in my situation before find a great solution like i did... Enjoy good food with out the hassle of cooking! 908 504 1970
I tried Annadaata's food a couple of weeks ago and found it absolutely delicious. Being a nutritionist and a die-hard homestyle food fan, I was hesitant at trying their food initially, but boy! when another review went up for them on yelp - i decided I was too curious to let it pass. I decided to order one of each of their thalis and I was quite impressed with what I got. The serving sizes were measured to perfection - they had a three compartment container - with about 14 ounces of rice, 2 phulka rotis, about 12 oz. of Dal / kootu in the south indian meal and about 7 oz.