8 July 2010, 5:49pm, Irish Embassy Pub & Grill, Yonge & Wellington, Toronto
Chicken Curry - Indian Style.
Really? Duh. What other style could a curry be?
I'm being mean. Props to the Irish Embassy for having desi dishes on the menu. Never having been to Ireland myself, I was surprised to learn - during an after-work session at Fionn MacCool's on University & Adelaide a few years ago - that South Asian food served in Irish pubs was quite normal.
(That evening I also locked eyes with a very hot desi guy as he was leaving the pub with his friends and I was entering with my friends. A very filmi moment, but without the filmi ending since I never did find out who he was. Sigh.)
But I digress. I love that Irish pubs in Canada carry on their traditions of keeping delicious desi dishes on the menu. Too bad for me, most of those dishes involve some form of chicken while I'm a vegetarian. And, on this particular evening at the Irish Embassy with my girlfriends, I was craving fries in the forbidden-food way that only a 30-something-old metabolism can crave a-thing.
The Irish obliged, offering me poutine, but not the traditional French-Canadian version of hot fresh fries smothered with gravy and cheese curds. No, they offered me an Irish Poutine of hot fresh fries covered with mayo and melted cheddar. How to resist that? I didn't even try. I even added ketchup on the side.
Which leads me to wondering...what if there was a Poutine - Indian Style? How would that work? Hot fresh fries - check. Instead of gravy, which chutney would work better: mint, mango, imlie, tomato, coconut or a create-your-own mixture? Should we try substituting crumbled paneer for cheese curds, since the paneer likely wouldn't melt the right way? Or, what about scrapping the chutney and cheese altogether and just drowning the fries in a very thick and creamy version of the malai kofta/butter chicken sauce?
Hm, next step: establishing an Indian pub in Toronto to serve it...
If anyone's up for that idea, I've got a whole menu planned out. Cheers.
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