Around the World in the Hetzel Kitchen

For India the Third we mix things up a bit. This is a Northern India recipe that comes to me via my former boss in Virginia. She's actually from Pittsburgh, but we will still take her word on authentic Indian cuisine. :-) We may have gotten a little excited about Christmas and I have relatively few pictures of just Joey... Not only that, but we were in Colorado! Nothing better than trying out a new curry recipe on the in-laws, right? Kevin prepped by sharpening some knives. First note: make sure you actually use a Dutch oven, or something that is intended to go on the stove top, not actually in the oven. It is very important. Anyway! Cumin seeds and cinnamon sticks? Not the way I'm used to starting a heavily-spiced dish, so let's try it! And of course onions. Always onions. I read in one of the comments to mix the chicken and yogurt and some spices ahead of time to enhance the flavor, but I can't find it for the life of me now. That's what I did ...

This is another recipe from Sadie, and therefore from the Kerala region. We went the vegetarian route this time and picked Aloo Gobi , a cauliflower dish. According to the description this food is in Bend it Like Beckham? I don't remember that particular scene but I now have some high school religion class memories coming back... It said to cut the cauliflower into eighths, which still made some pretty big chunks. Eight of them, in fact. I think this part may have either been lost in translation or I had an abnormally large head of cauliflower. I also apparently didn't take pictures during the process? As always, it started by sauteeing some onions. Then more coriander (but really cilantro), turmeric, and other spices. Seeing any similarities from last time? There were also potatoes in addition to the cauliflower to get coated in the curry sauce. It called for Garam Masala as well and more cilantro added at the end. I'm seeing lots of trends. Completed ...

Picture from the state of Kerala, India courtesy of user Thangaraj Kumaravel on Flickr . India has an incredibly long and rich history which I could not do justice in this blog. Suffice to say there are a lot of influences in India and it influences the world. It is in Southern Asia and is the seventh biggest country in the world. It is slightly more than a third the size of the US. The World Factbook lists at least 13 spoken languages. It has the second highest population in the world at over 1.2 billion. Read more! India is a country I've been looking forward to since starting this journey. I had some grand plans. Different recipes from different parts of the country! Sharing food with friends! Finding some amazing curries! I got some of this done. I did multiple Indian recipes, but not necessarily from widely varying areas. Instead I asked some people I know that either lived in India for a while or had Indian ties to send me some recipes and I tries some of thos...

Guyana is a country in Northern South America between Suriname and Venezuela - one of the smaller ones on the top right corner on the map that people seem to have a hard time remembering.  It is slightly smaller than Idaho.  It has been both a Dutch and British colony.  Three quarters of the population are Afro-Guyanese or Indo-Guyanese.  A lot of indentured laborers came over from India and made a huge cultural and ethnic impact.  Read more in the CIA World Factbook . This Indian influence explains the recipe that stood out to me when I was looking through lots of lists: Chicken Curry .  Yes, a curry recipe that claims to be authentically Guyanese.  This I had to try. The recipe didn't specifically say you had to start with a full chicken, just "3 lb chicken cut up into small pieces."  I decided I had to do this, though.  Despite the fact I've done it a lot, I still don't enjoy it.  I was also highly disappointed at the yield. ...

Ugh, losing everything you wrote is awesome.  Let's try this again... Guatemala is a Central American nation slightly smaller than the size of Pennsylvania.  There are over 14.5 million people living there, and the capital city is Guatemala City.  Learn more on the CIA World Factbook . I didn't have anything in mind when looking for a recipe to make for Guatemala.  When I saw Guatemalan Tacos (second on the page), however, I figured it was a match made in heaven.  We do Taco Tuesdays almost every week, but these were definitely different than the heavily seasoned meat + flour tortillas we were used to.  Plus there were ingredients I wasn't used to using.  Perfect! This was also the first around the world cooking after the twins were born.  In fact, they were four months old by this time.  Wasn't going to get anything done before that. Amelia left, Emily right Around the time of this dinner So anyway, back to cooking.  Boi...

You know what?  I could write out a bunch of facts about Grenada for you, or I could just l ink to the source .  The CIA Factbook is full of info.  And it is doing stuff like this that gets me so far behind.  So instead, let me summarize. Grenada is in the Caribbean.  It is small, like most islands.  Twice the size of DC, it was "discovered" by Columbus himself.  Oh, and we went there on our honeymoon cruise. It was a Sunday and my brother's birthday, so we took a taxi to a Church and also found a restaurant with WiFi so we could send him a birthday message.  Grenada is known as the "Isle of Spice" because of all of the spices grown and sold there, so we decided to order some stuff at the restaurant.  Kevin wanted to try a "Cheeseburger in Paradise." It was awful. So instead we went and explored and looked for some spice shops and stands.  We know we must have been getting into local flair because people kept asking if we were l...