Click for Bri: Home made Mustard, Bengali Kasundi

Ironically, after getting officially labelled as a chatterbox, there has been a sudden silence on my blog. We have been eating and cooking at home as often, with the enthu of a food blog fresher, but after reading about Bri, i just knew that my next post had to be Click for Bri. Every time I logged on to my computer, our past meals stared at me hopefully, patiently awaiting publication, but I had totally lost the inclination to post them, till I completed Click for Bri.

Briana Brownlow-'Bri' to her friends is one of the 5% of women diagnosed with breast cancer under the age of 30. That was two and a half years ago.In August 2007, she started Figs With Bri - a serene, beautiful space where she shares with us her creative experiments with wonderful local organic ingredients. A month and a half ago, her worst fears came true. She learnt that her cancer has returned and metastasized to her lungs, her lymph nodes and several areas in her bones and is at Stage IV. Jugalbandi has organisd a fundraiser for Bri, to empower her to explore holistic treatment alternatives, which her health insurance company has shockingly denied !

Please visit jugalbandi and Bri to know more about her, and contribute in any way that you can to help her win this battle. You can make a difference in any or all of the following ways:

Contribute for her treatment

Participate in this special edition of click

and,

Help spread the word

I have made my own humble contribution, and would like to post this recipe, which is special for me, only for Bri.

I normally dread mustard sauce, my memories tainted by years of escaping Nirula’s illogically popular mustard. But a couple of years back , at a Bengali restaurant called “Oh Calcutta” in Delhi,a freshly made version of mustard sauce called Kasundi, totally swept me off my feet , so much so that I tried to convince them to start retailing these. The restaurant manager, who knew that their flavourful mustard is what makes its customers repeatedly ordering those wonderful chops and cutlets, diplomatically managed his way out of my request. Ever since, I have tried all the different brands of kasundi that I could find, but none measured up to that one.

So, when this event was announced, I knew I had to finally try my hand at the lovely yellow kasundi, and began a frantic search for the right recipe, but managed to find only one recipe and dozens of kasundi fan clubs. It seems that most kasundi lovers buy the stuff readymade, from their trusty old sources. Since I am not so lucky, with much trepidation , I decided to use that lone recipe. Thankfully, I lucked out, as it was comfortingly close to the fabled Kasundi that I was seeking.

This is how I made it:
1 small raw mango (green)
2 tbsp mustard seeds-I used a mix of brown & yellow
5 green chillis
5 cloves of garlic
1 tsp salt

Simply whizz them together in a blender, adding some water to facilitate blending. Despite adding yellow mustard seeds, the paste initially was pale green and not pungent enough, so in a moment of panic, I added a pinch of turmeric and 1 spoon of raw mustard oil. Later I realised that this was perhaps unnecessary, as the colour and flavour both intensified over the next few hours. The above proportions resulted in a nice and thick kasundi which was pungent and spicy, but does not batter your olfactory senses like some commercial ones do.
Verdict : This was so lip-smackingly good, that I actually skipped dinner and dipped anything that i could lay my hands on from crudités & crackers to ripe mango in it. It was also a fabulous dip for the pumpkin korokke ( the closest I can find to Bengali chops!) that I bought from a local Japanese deli, especially for this.

In fact, it was so addictive that I had to keep it by my bedside table, just in case !

So, finally how yellow was my Kasundi ?

I got so carried away, that I clicked it against all the yellow objects that I could find on my desk

As you can see, a little later I almost completely lost it

Dear Bri, sending this your way, with all my prayers for your speedy recovery. Your wisdom, warmth and wit so inspire us and we are all rooting for you.
Go Bri !