7 Ways to Amp Up Your Summer Grilling with a Few Indian Touches
From grilled lamb chops and boti kebab, to the well-known chicken tikka and versatile vegetarian aloo tikki or paneer tikka, the Indian cuisine can offer great choices, old wisdom and delicious flavors to your summer grilling. Get ready to amp up the flavors. And if you’re looking for delightful ways to cook Indian food at home, check out my cookbook ‘Tikka Tikki and Spicy Bites’.
Marination and Rubs
Marinating is essential for all red meat kebabs and tikka - preferably overnight, even those with a dry spice rub. Marination takes place by refrigerating the meat in marinade for 4-6 hours or overnight. Make sure to let dry rubbed meats rest for a few hours as well.
Tenderizers
An old trick, common in the meat-centric North West Indian cuisine is to tenderize tough cuts of red meat with papaya fruit juice, paste or puree (or use any squash as an alternative). It helps denature or break down muscle fiber, rendering a succulent kebab. Lemon is also a great tenderizer for meat, but not recommended with fish or seafood marinades – you could end up with a ceviche. Lactic acid in yogurt also helps tenderize meat and is often used in small quantities for Indian tikka marinades.
Dry Roasting and Tempering
Dry roasting whole spices before grinding them into a spice rub is an amazing way to maximize flavor and aroma. Alternately a tempering style warm marinade, which is generally spices cooked in warm oil and used as a marinade, is a popular Indian cooking method to bringing out the full strength of spices.
Flavoring Grilled Vegetables
Indian spice blends like garam masala and chaat masala work wonders when sprinkled over vegetables – add either before grilling or when they are hot-off-the-grill. For adding a tangy flavor to vegetables, use any of the following: amchur (dried mango powder), black salt, tamarind, lime and lemon.
Grilling it Well
A vegetable grilling tray with holes isn’t only for vegetables, they are handy for grilling bite-sized tikka, mini tikki, small seafood and flaky fish. Another option for small pieces of meat is metal or wooden skewers. Make sure to soak wooden sticks in water for 5 minutes before use, so they don’t burn while cooking. When grilling indoors on a griddle pan, make sure the pan is only ‘lightly’ greased just like a grill. Too much oil and the kebab will fry instead of being grilled.
Chutney as an Accompaniment
Chutney is a classic Indian condiment with sweet, spicy & tangy flavors, either in a chunky or sauce-like consistency. Tikka and kebab depend on chutneys to kick their flavor quotient up a notch. Pairing them with a chutney-style sauce or dip will increase or decrease the spice level and augment the dish’s flavors. However, chutney is not just for kebab and tikka, feel free to add a cilantro mint chutney or mango chutney to any grilling menu.
Beyond the Grill
Use this fail proof serving trick for Indian grills - sprinkle lemon juice and chopped cilantro over any kebab, tikka, fish or vegetables when it is hot-off-the grill, griddle or oven. Let the meat rest while the lemon and cilantro add additional flavor.
One of best ways to eat tikka and kebab Indian style? Roll a bite sized piece of meat, fish or vegetable into a bite-sized piece of Indian bread like Naan, dip it in chutney and savor a mouthful of delicious kebab flavors. Chase your bite with a spoonful of Daal lentils or yogurt raita.
Shrimp Vegetable Kebab
Skewers are great for kebab
Some Fun Facts on Indian Grilling:
Kebab originated in the Eastern Mediterranean and is indigenous to cuisines in the Middle East and the North West Indian subcontinent.
The word ‘kebab’ has many different pronunciations. Some well-known ones are kebap, kebapi, kabob, kebob, and my native Parsi way is ‘kavab.’
Chicken gained popularity in Indian cooking in the past 3-4 decades. Earlier, the common meat of choice used to be mutton or goat's meat (even when I was a child).
India’s extensive coastline has given the regional cuisines of southern, western and eastern India many creative ways to spice and cook seafood. The preferred methods to cook fish and seafood is batter coated and deep-fried, lightly sautéed or steamed, or simply braised in a curry.
Parts of this article appeared in my cookbook Tikka Tikki and Spicy Bites.
