Attention, foodies! There’s a contestant who specializes in Indian food on the current season of The Next Food Network Star (Sundays 9p/8c.)
Aarti Sequeira is a Los Angeles-based food blogger and the host of Aarti Paarti, her own Internet cooking show. After working as a journalist for a few years, Sequeira’s life took a Julie and Julia-esque turn after her marriage:
A few years later, a freshly-married Aarti moved to Los Angeles, with no job prospects. Cooking dinner for her husband, actor Brendan McNamara (director and cameraman on Aarti Paarti, as well as fellow popcorn jig-er!) became the highlight of her day. She worked her way through both The Joy of Cooking and her mum’s carefully typed out recipes, each dish turning out just a little better than the last. She began to fantasize about each night’s dinner, usually as soon as she had finished her lunch, which she had fantasized about when she finished breakfast, which she’d fantasized about since going to bed the previous evening (seeing a pattern here?).
(Here’s an interesting fact about Sequeira’s journalism career: she was the co-producer of Sand and Sorrow, the 2007 documentary about Darfur that was produced and narrated by George Clooney.)
Watch a clip from the season premiere below. During her introductory package Sequeira said that her goal is to “simplify Indian cooking and make it easy for the average person. I cook rustic family meals with a lot of specific Indian spices: garam masala, turmeric, cardamom pods.”
It gets a bit emotional at 1:48 as Sequeira describes what winning would mean to her parents, who live in India:
I am very curious to see the kinds of recipes Sequeira will come up with over the course of the season. The first dish she made on the show was a very simple rasam. You can find the recipe she used here.
I used to follow her blog until a couple of months ago and then lost the bookmark. I love her videos more than the recipes and writeup. She seems like a cheerful person. A little background. She’s actually from Dubai. She was raised there by her Indian parents and moved to the U.S as an adult. She’s also on goodbite.com.
PLEASE stay true to that! I don’t think I can handle more “fusion” quackery.
Ok, now I’m a new fan. I love how she name checks hobbits in her blog post. Hobbits are awesome. Thanks for sharing this ;0)
I watch Food Network Star religiously and although I wasn’t aware of her online presence before, I love her personality and so far it sounds like the judges love her food too! Objectively (without any pro-desi bias), she’s one of my favorite contestants so far…
Her last name sounds Goan or Mangalorean? If so, I hope she will also bring that influence (Balcaos, Vindaloos and Prawn Ghassis- yummm!) rather than only the “generic” Mughlai stuff most Americans have been exposed to as Indian food. I could be totally wrong though…
Best of luck Aarti!
I second this. And Goan clams with coconut! I think it’s called teesrya or something like that.
Guys,
I must get something off of my chest regarding the Indian restaurants here (and everywhere in USA): They all add a lot of sugar to EVERYTHING!!!! It’s making me furious. Moreover, the restaurants are all LOUSY, and the food is insincere food, and the are NOT AT ALL AUTHENTIC! The big named Indian restaurants here in Boston add sugar to raita, many – if not all – of their dishes, and once I ordered coconut chutney with my dosa, and EVEN THE COCONUT CHUTNEY HAD A LOT OF SUGAR IN IT!!! This is not the way coconut chutney tastes like at all. Moreover, I had some sambaar, and my South Indian friends use tamarind for their sambaar as a souring agent. However, these people at the Ghazal Restaurant used VINEGAR as a souring agent. We all know that vinegar is NEVER used in South Indian cooking as a souring agent (I’m not including Goa), and moreover, we also know that working with tamarind is a little bit more labor intensive and expensive. This is why they use vinegar here as a souring agent. I hate the Indian restaurants over here.
I hope that this girl goes far with her cooking, and that she cooks very authentically, with fewer ingredients and fewer steps.
I think the Indian Restaurants in the USA are probably catering to American tastes. I reckon most people are aware most food in the USA has a lot of sugar, partly because it’s so cheap (due to subsidies). I think you’re be fighting a very general trend towards sweetening food, which probably affects all kinds of ‘ethinic’ cooking, Mexican, Thai, Japanese, etc
Nonsense. Raw tamarind absolutely, but you can buy concentrated tamarind paste by the bathtub-load pretty easily which is not a problem at all. Sure it’s not as authentic, but it’s better than vinegar! Where did you bear witness to this apostasy? I need to make a mental note to never eat there.
I think the bigger issue is that most cheaper Indian restaurants here will make one batch of generic curry with various spices (and loaded with cream) and then boil some lamb into it to make it a lamb curry. Or chicken to make it a chicken curry. The meats or veggies themselves don’t stew in the pot like they would when you make it at home. The assembly line process does terrible violence to the food. Indian food is actually better suited to either a buffet style restaurant where they can make big batches individually or to a very short menu where they don’t need to have one-size-fits-all spice mixes mixed in heavy cream.
Why do people say most of the Indian food served in restaurants is Mughlai when most of it was invented by Punjabi hindus/sikhs. Biryani, kebabs, rogan josh are mughlai. But butter chicken, chicken tikka, tandoori chicken, parathas, sarson ka saag and makki ki roti were all invented by hindus/sikhs. Although muslims frequently claim the first three chicken dishes but the tandoor is native to india and tandoori chicken was invented in pakistan by punjabi hindus who then opened those restaurants in the dehli area.
10 · Interesting on June 12, 2010 9:42 AM · Direct link Why do people say most of the Indian food served in restaurants is Mughlai when most of it was invented by Punjabi hindus/sikhs. Biryani, kebabs, rogan josh are mughlai. But butter chicken, chicken tikka, tandoori chicken, parathas, sarson ka saag and makki ki roti were all invented by hindus/sikhs. Although muslims frequently claim the first three chicken dishes but the tandoor is native to india and tandoori chicken was invented in pakistan by punjabi hindus who then opened those restaurants in the dehli area.
You’re 100% wrong. THe Tandor was actually from Turko-Mongolians who lived on the steppes. The Mughlais were Turkic, and they perhaps brought it down to India, although there have ben other Turkic speakers prior to the Mughals.
Therefore, tandoori chicken and chicken tikka masala were both Central Asian in origins originally.
Also, I’m appalled by “Chicken Dosa” and “Chinese/Mexican Dosa”. This is horrible. I am urinated off. Why are us Desis so money-minded at the expense of developing/maintaining culinary excellence?
Now I’m feeling hypoglycemic…let me enjoy this sugar-coated Chicken Dosa.
The Turks made the tandoor popular but it has been found in the Indus valley civilization sites. Tandoori chicken is a recent invention invented by Kundan lal Gujral who ran the Moti Mahal restaurant in Peshawar, NWFP. He opened more Moti Mahal’s in Dehli after partition.
Btw the Mughals might have been Turks but they spread Persian culture. Most of the food in India is the original hindu food with the rest being Iranian muslim cuisine and afghan food. Urdu and persian were the court languages. The clothing was persian etc
http://www.enotes.com/food-encyclopedia/indus-valley “Cooking would have included roasting, boiling, and baking, as suggested by the handi-shaped pots, and frying, as documented by the copper-bronze frying pans. By 1500 B.C.E. the tandoor, a clay oven, is documented. This implies that this distinctive cuisine of modern India and Pakistan has a 3,500-year history.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tandoor “It is thought to have travelled to Central Asia and the Middle East along with the Roma people, who originated amongst the Thar Desert tribes. In India, the tandoor is also known by the name of bhatti. The Bhatti tribe of the Thar Desert of northwestern India and eastern Pakistan developed the Bhatti in their desert abode, and thus it gained the name”
Why are some allowed to pronounce on south Asian regions as.if by dint of their community affiliation they are the true south asians? They may be from the majority community on some areas of south Asia but they are not the champions of the true authentic south Asian heritage. There are many and the mania for monoculture in south Asia hopefully is temporary.
THIS. There seems to be a mimicry of US “Chinese” restaurants with the one-sauce-fits-all philosophy. It’s kinda gross. There are a couple of decent joints where I live, though. I think it could be because most of the kitchen staff is central American and they have a feel for some of the desi cuisine flavors (tamarind, cumin, coriander, HOT peppers, etc.).
yay! so glad you wrote about Aarti! i went to college with her and she is a sweetheart.
hi!,Aarti paarti you’rerepresenting all Indian’s keep head up and strong foot farward in every step follow mr,fray advice,and you will win.