Another triumph for the 'Yoghurt King'
One of the more interesting political nicknames, applied in this instance to Marc Ravalomanana, president of Madagascar. Source. In one of those 'log cabin to the White House' scenarios, he started off by selling milk from his bike, and went on to build a business empire, get elected as mayor of Antanarivo and president in 2002 and has just got re-elected. He looks to be the Berlusconi of Madagascar, in that he now owns radio and TV stations, inter alia, so I can't help wondering about conflicts of interest.
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Yoghurt King does not have the same quirky charm as Sir Gulam Noon's media appellation of "curry magnate".
i must say 'curry' with its numerous ingriedients does suggest a lot more intrigue than yoghurt.. but well as they say it is often the simple things that are most complicated..
i would kill to know how to make a real curry , i have scoured the net , bought books but there is always "something" missing from the taste.
And no smart arses say indian waiter spit.
A pal of mine who is a very good cook swears by the Pat Chapman books. I can just about manage to boil pasta without making a total hash of it.
Meanwhile, I am thinking happy thoughts of Rogan Josh and so on.
Mmmmmmmmm ... curry. Indian food really is the best cuisine on Planet Earth.
I cant find a decent curry down here, even supposedly good places like the bombay bicycle club, i can come up with a fairly nice one, but it still lacks bite.
I have tried Chapmans recipes, still not what im after.
having said all of that i can make a better curry than the dross i have had down here.
must visit the cinnamon club that's supposed to be v good
An asian booy i know recomends a place over in wembley but i have obviouslt turned native and like anygod londoner i now think that travelling more than two miles is like going half way around the world
I know a few very superior Indian restaurants on the right side of the river - The Spice Cottage in Streatham, one near me that I forget the name of and Indian Ocean (?) in Balham. Croydonian's iron law of Indian restaurants is that if you see Asian folk eating in one it will be a good / very good one.
Likewise you should definitely avoid any Chinese restaurant that is not packed with Chinese.
Very true, and there is nothing to compare with bad chinese food for the truly inedible.
well.. well.. ny1 care for a list of some good indian restraunts in a few cities like london. cardiff.. newcastle.. will make a list nd put it up.. as for recipies.. search for sanjay kapoor (chef) there is also an annoying actor who goes by the same name.. he cooks good food. though i must admit i have not really tried cooking his dishes.. :)
Well, Croydonian, truly inedible Japanese food is a contender, given that it can kill you. What is that Japanese fish that is toxic if it's not cooked properly?
he cooks good food. though i must admit i have not really tried cooking his dishes
So how do you know if he cooks good food??
none of those TV chefs give out real recipes (except blumenthal and I cant be arsed spending 26 hours making steak and chips)
P{ Hitch - I am a mate of C and a chef by trade. Send him an email & I will happily send you a recipe for a fantastic curry. I take it you aren't a veggie???
Well well not only is Verity being funny as hell but she likes a good curry . The men of England are clearly missing out on a top bird . We have Madonna here I suppose who does some fine work with a fur coat but what a loss . If this brain drain continues every woman in the country will be a dull little do gooder or a foxier moron.
I also like a hot one in my mouth (arf) and many is the tie I have lost to the aromatic sauces of the sub continent…other tie stains are also on my character……
So if Verity has two qualifications for “The Perfect Woman” what would the others be . I am skipping the obvious anatomical requirements . I know a local, Conservative for example . She is an Arsenal Season Ticket Holder ,Classical Music agent and aficionado , theatre goer ,a sublimely articulate woman yet magnificently rude to Councillors she despises ,will not suffer the insufferable but is as kind as anyone I know .
Unfortunately she is about 60 . I wonder some times when we couple off, if time and place do not play far to large a part . My parents who divorced bloodily after thirty five years loathed the sight of each other for most of that time . I asked my father why he had married this most inappropriate partner and he cut to the heart of the problem
“ Welll…I was young and …she had great tits “
A young roister doister like PHITCH will sneer but after all these years I am starting to realise “Great Tits” are not by any means enough.
I suppose the one rule is never have anything to do with anyone who has a collection of teddy bears etc which are introduced by name.
Avoiding your own immiediate family is another but again I daresay PHitch will deabte the issue
My bearer in Delhi made a spectacular curry. It sounds, grand, but everyone has a bearer. Most people also have a sweeper, but I just had a bearer. So in a sense, I was marginalised and caught in the "relative poverty" trap.
Anyway, I have a curry cookbook called, with a sharp eye to relevance, "Indian Cooking" by Lalita Ahmed and it's published by Galley Press. I sometimes look at the photos and wish I could cook.
a curry cookbook called, with a sharp eye to relevance, "Indian Cooking"........see what I mean! Snorted my wine snickering again Verity ; but you can’t cook . Alack and alas ,I suspect your long held ambition to be Mz Congeniality may stumble on this omission .I trust you can bear the disappointment stoically .
I trust you can bear the disappointment stoically.
Well, Newmania, I shall have to as I left my bearer in Delhi. Otherwise, he could have borne it for me.
Mr Mania
I can always tell when you are pissed.
Please leave Verity alone, I have had a go at her in the past and regret it, she is one of "us".
I mentioned yesterday its very easy to give/take offence over a keyboard.
Verity is above all a lady, please treat her as one.
Nick
I now leave chateau Hitchens in search of alcohol and weeeeeeeemin.
"please treat her as one"
More keyboard dyslexia
..and in the daily performing of that task he might have reached an enviable self knowledge and spiritual peace.....
Goodness gracious me you have trotted the globe V. I hope you will , one day , return to assist in administering the enema this slave colony , the Broon , with charming antiquarianism , calls” Britain”
But I don`t wish to pry. Allow it to be a dreamt of Grail , for then we shall know it is fit for your habitation.
PHITCH I am not "having a go " as you say , at Verity !!! What are you talking about .
I wouldn`t dare. I was trying to be polite and I `m not pissed !!!
Sorry if it came out wrong
And sweetness and light descends upon the blog. A happy state of affairs.
Verity , C knows very well I am an admirer of your contributions and you will not , I assure you , be getting any cheek from me .Sometimes I do wonder if PHITCH delights in mischief making ,
I have myself promised to write a long and tedious missive on the Nu Lab desecration of the family . I must away to my garret. Incidentally I will be feasting at JT`s tomorrow. He is a marvellous contributor to C Home and reads the C .
Salutations JT
PH - The Cinammon Club is very good if a tad on the pricey side. The one you speak of in Wembley is well worth the effort to get there. I'm not sure where you are based in London but Le Taj in Brick Lane is also a winner. If you want good recipes try the Cafe Spice Namaste cookbook by Cyrus Todiwalah.
Got to agree with you, most tv chefs recipes are crap. The only one who seems to give decent recipes which work is Gary Rhodes.
V - the japanese dish you are referring to is fugu or puffer fish. The organs, mainly the liver & ovaries, contain a poison called tetrodotoxin which paralyzes the victim whilst they are still conscious. There is no known antidote.
The newly arrived Mr R has been mentioned by me before:
"A mate of mine went to the same catering college [as Jamie Oliver] (and got higher marks...)".
theres a place in bear wood birmingham,lordswood road,go up the hagley road,turn right at the big pub 2miles from fiveways roaundabout,got ove the traffic lights and it's on the right
good west indian food in handsworth/lozells but only go there when the black lads are driving so don't know the way as well
I read somewhere that there are more Indian restaurants in London than the whole of India. Lucky us, eh?
C - there's also more Starbucks in London than there are in Manhattan. Shit overpriced coffee too.
Well I'll be da-nanged. I rather like their coffee, actually.
I find their coffee bitter & over-roasted. Illy is so much better.
C: I read somewhere that there are more Indian restaurants in London than the whole of India. Lucky us, eh?
Oh, pulleeze! Give me a break! How many Indian restaurants are there in London? Two hundred? Five hundred (I doubt that)?
There are more Indian restaurants in Delhi than there are in London, especially if you consider - and why should you not? - the street traders! Then we are talking about Calcutta, with a population of around 10 millions and how many restaurants? Chennai (formerly Madras); Mumbai (formerly Bombay) zillions; wealthy Bangalore; wealthy Hyderabad.
What an ethnocentric statement, Croydonian! I am surprised at you. Even given that so much of India's population lives in rural poverty - this is improving, but it will take a long time for the wealth to work - there are hundreds of millions of Indians living in cities and they like eating out. London is nowhere. India is jam-packed with restaurants and cafés. What a bizarre statement, and how unlike you!
I wouldn`t dispute your point Verity but I think there must be 200 Indian restaurants in and around Bricklane.In my youth I may have been sick in about half of them.
"I read somewhere...." said C. Good get out clause . I read somewhere that Nu lab has been responsible for an explosion of start up companies( DT actually ...nonsense of course) I have also read somewhere that a rubbing dung on my head will cure baldness.
...My temples are of course covered with dung but you get the gist.
Have completed boring family crisis stuff which is on my blog . Do not read!!!
V - I did say that I'd read it rather than seen the evidence.
It will be way, way more than 500. A quick check of various online business directories has already thrown out more than 500 within 10 miles of Croydon. I guess there are questions of definition, but consider me semi-chastened.
Meanwhile, I've found some other figures:
Indian restaurants in the UK
2001 - 8432 (24% takeaway)
2004 - 8750(est)
Croydonian - Those figures are such a pittance! India is a huge country - not as big as the US - but immense, and with a population of 1.2bn. To imagine that there may only be 8,000 restaurants is too crazy for words.
Then give that you admit that in 2001, 24% are takeaway (or, as we know it in India, off food carts) the figure becomes laughable.
India's big cities are sophisticated - and have been for millennia - and rich. Of course there is the awful, awful tragedy of agrarian people trying to survive, and the government is trying to help them, but to suggest than the tens of millions of Indians in big, wealthy Indian cities don't have as many restaurants as they do in London is just not like you.
(Before Tejus Ramakrishnan jumps in, I am not denying the tragic poverty of agrarian India. Please believe me. And, as is universal, poor people are drawn to the cities. I know all this. But the self-congratulatory statement that there are more Indian restaurants in London than there are in India, a huge landmass with a population of 1.2bn souls, was irritating.
No offence, Croydonian.
None taken. After all, there's no virtue in being wrong.
There is something abou the "Not many Indian restaurants in India "position , that might have alerted the finely honed instinct to the possibility of error C.
Where would you say there wasn`t much sand , for example . I `m, relying on your knowledge of the Middle east here ?
Newmania - ha ha ha ha ha ha! Thanks!
There is, perhaps, the possibility of my being in error, but I'm beginning to think that N is mocking me..
(Tilts back head, presses back of hand to forehead, rolls eyes: "The indignities I have to suffer").
Hitch,
I have recently begun a blog, much of the content of which concerns tasty curries:
http://the-scoffer.blogspot.com/
This post on curry cookbooks may be of interest:
http://the-scoffer.blogspot.com/2006/11/curry-books.html
Scoffer.
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