Goan food

[spindrift]

I'm off to Goa soon. I'm hoping that I'll be able to persuade some Goan ladies to teach me the basics of the local cuisine. To me it is the best food that India has to offer.

I'd like to start by accompanying the cook to the market to watch how she chooses the fish/meat and vegetables. Then I'd like to prepare the food alongside her prior to cooking it. I know a lot of time and ingredients go into the red masala paste they use. I'd like to be able to tell one type of chilli from another.

Has anyone any hints for me?

Just imagine the recipes I'll bring back

[auntieannie]

oooh! true Goan food is a mix of Indian and Portuguese, isn't it? I will only suggest that you enjoy and go with the flow.

[Deleted]

Yes, I would suspect that it still has Portuguese influences. The food of Macau certainly does.

The young stranger who shared my meal in Paris with Mr & Mrs Baz is currently in Goa. His mother wrote this today:

He’s had no complaints about Goa. ”I’m halfway around the world exploring beautiful white beaches dotted with coconut trees and beautiful women … Life truly doesn't suck!"

He’s been staying mostly at Palolem Beach, a somewhat developed beach popular with Israelis, for 250 rupees a night. But, being the Scruffman, he’s found a better deal.

He decided to walk from Palolem to Patnam Beach, a more secluded beach about 20 minutes away on foot:

”Along the path I stopped at a small hut to ask for directions and ended up staying and chatting for a while. They are an older German couple who moved to Goa about two years ago to sit on the beach and play music all day. After a nice jam session I continued my journey and finally reached Patnam. What a gorgeous beach! I jumped into the sea and just floated around for a while before turning around to head back. As I was climbing over a bunch of rocks I noticed an older fellow sitting between the rocks so I said Hi. As it turned out he was from Ann Arbor [Michigan, one of his stops across the US]. We had a really great conversation about books that we had read and life and the universe. I left feeling really inspired.

“The sun began to set as I continued down the beach. I noticed a few people playing guitars and drums so I went and joined in. The sunset was so beautiful I don't have any words to describe it. When darkness fell the others invited me into their place, called the Magic Cinema, and we played music all night long. I ended up staying there in a treehouse (seems to be a pattern) instead of walking through the dark roads with a stick to fight off packs of stray dogs as they go hunting. They offered to let me stay in the treehouse for 50 rupees a night [about $1.25]. They also said that when business is good musicians eat (and drink when business is really good ) for free. Unlike every other place I have been in India, the people in the Magic Cinema really all seem like a family, from the travelers to the people who run it. I think I'll stay here for a little while.”

One of the Scruffman’s favorite DJs will be playing in Goa on Valentine’s Day (!?!?!), so at this time he’s planning on staying that long before heading south. He admits it will be hard to leave paradise to throw himself back into the fray:

“India is dark...profoundly dark... I've been here less than a week and I've already seen some things that have been hard to come to terms with, but only fools (and the rich) come to a place like India to sit on a beach for months and ignore the reality of it all.”

Oh, to be 21 again! Yes, I know that this has nothing to do with Goan cuisine, but one does not live from food alone.

[spindrift]

Paolem to Patnam? Yes, I remember that walk well. We did it every day. We stayed just behind Paolem beach. I preferred the beauty and peace of Patnam. We lazed all day on mattresses in a shaded beach caff, when we were thirsty a chap brought us watermelon juice. The dogs round and about became my friends. They'd follow me, guard me and if I slept on the sand, lick my nose . One day a macho Italian, showing off by running at the water's edge, threw a stone at the dogs and was bitten on the ankle in return. You could see the bone exposed. He just cursed, washed the wound in seawater and returned to the caff. I told him he'd better get to a hospital for a rabies jab but he knew nothing about rabies, perhaps hadn't even heard about it but due to my insistence he eventually took my advice. As he seemed to have no money I offered to pay his taxi fare. He refused to take it. l

Oh, yes, Patnam, the best of places, absolute heaven. How I pitied the tourists staying behind their hedges and wired fences at the Intercontinental on the next beach afraid to mix with the locals. They must have wondered who the wild woman was dressed in flowing Goan trousers and wearing a turban of sorts (my kanga).....

How wonderful to be returning...


Yes, Annie it is....and I was surprised that vinegar features in a lot of recipes.

[bazfaz]

I have stayed at Benaulim and I have no idea where that is in relation to where spindrift and scuffman have been. Benaulim is a few kilometres south of Colva which has a lot of small hotels that Indians favoured. Benaulim had three permanent restaurants and a couple on the beach that were washed away each year in the monsoon. Our room was just a few rupees. The beach was empty. We lay there and were summoned by fishermen: Come helping. So we helped drag in their net. I suspect we ate some of the fish that evening.

[imec]

The food I remember most is the Sausage Masala served on these beautiful Portuguese style rolls and the largest prawns (grilled) I have ever seen. Mmmmmm!

[spindrift]

Prawns cooked Goan-style are the best I am determined to bring the marinade recipe home. They are finger-licking good.

[bixaorellana]

Oh, Spindrift ~~ this is exciting. Please be sure to have a little notepad & a pen to catch those recipes on the fly!

[hwinpp]

Vindaloo is from Goa.

That's all the Goan food I know.

[bazfaz]

I had some sausages in Goa. I think the Portuguese left them behind because I was very sick after eating them.

[Deleted]

Sausages and India just do not seem to go together for some reason.

[hwinpp]

In fact I mistrust sausages in most hot countries unless they're developed enough to have a good power supply and cooling facilies...

I stupidly bought and tried some beef sausages last year, out in the provinces, the strings of sausages were hanging over a barbed wire fence and looked very tasty.
I got a tape worm from those damn things...

[bixaorellana]

EEEeek ~~ that's horrible, HW. Were you very sick, or was it diagnosed fairly quickly?

[hwinpp]

I won't tell you. It was disgusting.

Gone now, no fear. For this kind of stuff they have very good medication indeed.

[spindrift]

Tapeworm? how awful. Poor you. The very thought of it

[auntieannie]

I am vegetarian when visiting India. (apart from when visiting the restaurant of the Alliance Francaise in Pondichery)

[bixaorellana]

Two very complete links for Goan cooking have been added to the Recipe References thread.

No way of telling so far if they're truly authentic. We await word!

anyportinastorm.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=recipes&thread=445&page=2 -- Reply #50

[existentialcrisis]

I am guilty of grouping all Indian food together with no knowledge of region. I am only familiar with Goa due to a type of music called Goa, which was probably invented in Goa. k2, do you know the name of the DJ your 21 yr old friend was going to see?
I would also be a vegetarian in India. I would have no problem with that, and wouldn't miss meat at all. In fact, I didn't know that meat was widely available in most of India, aside from certain regions... my Pakistani co-worker has given me the impression that Indians don't eat meat, and Pakistanis eat nothing but meat!

[spindrift]

As a rule I don't eat meat in India or Nepal...but as I stay with Indian friends in Goa I eat what I'm given and sometimes it's meat. For instance the Goan lady-next-door might offer us her speciality which has something to do with pork intestines. Of course by the time it has been thoroughly cooked and smashed around, it could be anything. But when it's served at table I have to eat it to be polite.

Goa is cleaner than the rest of India and the population seem quite well-to-do. I have no hesitation in ordering fish or prawn dishes in restaurants that my friends frequent.
In fact I'm determined to come back with the recipe for marinading seafood. Yummm....but it's very very hot.

[Deleted]

Feb 16, 2010 9:00:58 GMT existentialcrisis said:

I am only familiar with Goa due to a type of music called Goa, which was probably invented in Goa. k2, do you know the name of the DJ your 21 yr old friend was going to see?

Not the slightest idea, but I do have a CD of Goa trip hop or whatever it is called.

[existentialcrisis]

hmm... I'm thinking of a type of trance music. But the trip-hop certainly sounds interesting!

[hwinpp]

Goa? Wasn't that in and out, all in the 90s? And I thought I was old fashioned...

I'll happily eat meat all over India when available. There seem to be some holy cities there that make you leave the city limits if you want a nice mutton curry...

[Deleted]

I don't remember having many vegetarian meals in India except when I ate at the Sri Aurobindo temple, and there we had to just about wash our own dishes after the meal.

[existentialcrisis]

hw.. yes, I believe it may be outdated... overtaken by a type of music called psytrance. But I wasn't sure if people in Goa still made Goa-trance.

[hwinpp]

I don't remember having many vegetarian meals in India except when I ate at the Sri Aurobindo temple, and there we had to just about wash our own dishes after the meal.

Sounds like a youth hostel... did you also have to make your own bed and take out your rubbish? Just kidding, Jack. But I'm sometimes interested in knowing the reasoning behind going to stay in an ashram in India...

hw.. yes, I believe it may be outdated... overtaken by a type of music called psytrance. But I wasn't sure if people in Goa still made Goa-trance.

I had friends who were really into it. I believe though, that the epicentre of creativity moved to Tel Aviv though Goa was where it started out.

[Deleted]

Actually, the Aurobindo people own just about everything 'nice' in colonial Pondicherry. I stayed at the Park Guest House operated by the ashram -- did not have to make my bed -- and they only notified me of two rules: no smoking and no guests (you know what kind of guest).

It was possible to buy meal tickets for the communal dining room for US$0.50 which was actually a magnificent French colonial mansion in the center of town, which is what made me want to eat there even though I suspected that the food would be terrible (it was). You had to leave your shoes around the tinkling fountain in the courtyard, get a metal prison tray and stand in line for the attendants to shovel slop onto it. Then you could go into any of a variety of formerly magnificent rooms outfitted with long tables and benches to eat.

Some people appeared to meditate before digging in, but they may have just been steeling themselves to the idea of spooning it into their mouth. Once you finished, you had to take your tray to the wash up room, put any food debris in the waste receptacle and then give it to the washing crew.

[bazfaz]

In Goa we ate fish and prawns exclusively (except for the one disastrous meal of sausages).

I went for a walk out of Benaulim one day and came across a gang of women with barrows taking sand and gravel to a cement mixer while other women sat on the ground hammering at stones to make the gravel. The women were doing the work while a man stood around supervising. I asked him what they were building. It was to be a large tank to raise prawns. But these were not going to be the usual farmed prawns. When the youngsters grew a bit they were going to be dumped in the sea to grow to maturity. This would then supply the local fishermen with something to catch. I liked that.

[spindrift]

Hello to you all from Goa... 30degreesC, sunny, colourful and a wonderful change from grey england...I am eating the most delicious food cooked by a variety of ladies who are also patient with my efforts at photography and lack of understanding of the many chillies on offer and what can be done with coconuts.

I doubt I'll be able to replicate true Goan flavour in my cooking when I return but I shall try my best. I've asked wonderful Maria, next door, to make me a large jar of Red Masala paste to take back home. Into this she will put her home-brewed Coconut Vinegar and home-grown chillies. There is nothing better to eat than grilled Masala paste prawns or fish....

How I love India

[Deleted]

hey....nice to hear from you, all the way from Goa!

Have you been taking lot of pictures?

I want to be in India too

[spindrift]

I am taking pictures whenever I can. As I'm always a passenger in my gf's car I often dare not ask her to stop for photo-taking. I have come to realise that I must take a course (in the UK) for riding a Scooter...and in future I'll be free to go where I like when I like. I have missed a lot of excellent photo opportunities.

I'm enjoying every second of my time in Goa.....