Thursday, March 11, 2010

Ayesha's Kitchen - (Aunt Becky, you could do this!!)


In January, Mark and I took an Indian cooking class. Ayesha runs a cooking class in her kitchen, and she teaches 6-8 recipes in a class. (I wrote a HelloMiami article about it. Read it HERE if you want. I love clicks.)

I read about Ayesha months ago, and I've been saving money to do this. (Also, I love Indian food these days, and I like to try and cook it, so this was fun!) The class we took was called Vegetarian Delights. So naturally, all the dishes were veggie dishes. I can't wait to cook some mean meals for Chels! :) 

Here's the palak paneer cooking (literally, "spinach cheese"). In it there is ginger, onion, tomatoes and spinach (so far), all blended and cooking. 



When we got there, Ayesha passed around an appetizer and a homemade dipping sauce (a chutney) and we devoured them (we all came hungry, I guess!). Then we sat in her kitchen and got copies of the recipes that we were going to make. She had pre-cut everything and had it in clear containers. That really sped up the 6 meal process! 

We made a salad, two entrees, a rice dish, bread, and dessert. Ayesha had everything timed perfectly. At the end, we got to help roll out the dough for the Pooris (the type of bread we learned to make). Here's Mark frying his Pooris. 



Here's me in the kitchen and Ayesha's behind me laughing. I was trying to make it look easy!!


Here's me cooking Pooris. 



Before and after!


This is the dessert cooking. In it there were dates, figs, pistachios, cashews, sugar, and one other nut that I can't remember...

After it cooked, we rolled it into balls and it was very fudge-like, just without chocolate! It was really good.



Here's the rice pilaf and the chole (chickpeas). 


At the end of the class, we had a sit down lunch in Ayesha's dining room. She usually has the lunches outside in her tiki hut, but it was unusually cold that day, so we all opted to stay indoors. 


Here's Ayesha bringing in the food! She also made us warm chai tea to drink. It was lovely, and I can't wait to take another class! She has an All About Indian Breads class, and Mark wants that to be the next one we attend. :) The Bread Man.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

It looks awesome! That actually made me hungry. Can't wait for you to cook me those meals!

Becky said...

I'm so proud of you Jessica. You definately have come a long ways. Keep up the good work. I'm sure taking those classes are lots of fun. I love learning new cooking ideas. I'll open up my kithcen to you when you are in sometime and you can show me your chef skills. Glad you are back to posting.

The Bates Girls! said...

Looks like fun! Practice and if you ever move back home I'll hire you to be my personal chef!