October 13, 2006

Popping-'Indian'- Corn

I've always been the "caramel" popcorn type and my past 3 years here in Australia has been frustrating as sweet-sticky-caramel popcorn is hardly ever available at movie theaters in Sydney. Apparently majority movie-goers prefer their popcorn buttered and salted. The bright side to my disappointing disposition would be an excuse to skip the snack and scratching off the unnecessary calories.
My weekly browse through my favorite food magazines filled with endless pages of recipes brought my attention to a new creative twist to popcorn; Indian Spices! I couldn't resist playing around with this new innovative flavor of popcorn. I was hoping it would change my perception on savory popcorn.
50 g butter
1 tbsp garam masala
1 tbsp curry powder
1/2 tbsp cumin seeds
1 tbsp chilli powder (less if you don't want it too spicy)
1 tbsp dried coriander leaves
1/2 tbsp chilli flakes
1 cup hazelnuts
1 cup walnuts
1/2 cup popping corn kernels
sea salt to taste (ground)
Melt 3/4 butter in a large pot. Add cumin, curry powder, nuts, garam masala and chilli powder and toss on low heat for 2-3 minutes. Empty the spices and nuts into a large bowl. Add the rest of the butter into the pot and melt on high heat. Pour in the popping corn and cover pot with a tight lid. Shake pot occasionally till corn is well popped on medium flames. Pour popped corn into the spice bowl and toss well to combine. Season with sea salt, coriander leaves and chilli flakes.It got me licking my fingers *grin*
Be careful not to burn the spices as you gently saute them with the nuts (Mine turned out a little over-charred). Store popcorn in an airtight container after they're cooled.
The intense bursts of Indian-spice aromas and flavors from this recipe isn't for the faint hearted. Alter to suit your personal taste. I often feel like a girl of Indian roots hidden beneath an Oriental layer of skin *wink*. I guess that explains my large -far from'Chinese'- posterior! *laughs*

7 comments:

Lex said...

WOW! woman... you just amaze me time after time...

Brilynn said...

I will definitely be trying this. I like making popcorn at home that's sweet with heat, I combine sugar, cumin, salt, hot pepper.

Anonymous said...

Hi Su-yin!
greetings from Kuwait :)

i tried the banana cake yesterday... and it was abfab!!
my only problem was that the cake sank in the center after i took it out of the oven...and the sauce never reach a thick consistency.. dunno why

All in all ... it tasted great! :)

ps- i used Carnation evaporated milk instead of condensed milk .. could that've been the problem?

Su-Yin -Décorateur said...

lex: *blush* *takes a bow*...haha...stop flattering me! :P Haha

brilynn: My favourite is still caramel popcorn :P LOL....Its an improvement to butter and salt, but sticky toffee is still where its at ;) Haha

noufa: Hi! Im glad you tried the recipes; hmm...the evaporated milk would DEfinitely b the reason why it didnt thicken! Haha...It's okay though; what matters is it tasted good :)

Anonymous said...

Hi pretty lady ^^
Just a random surfer
I use to work at this popcorn store named bliss around sydney which made really nice caramel, butterscotch popcorn etc.

Im not sure if you're interested, but basically we used 3 sticks of butter for each bag of sugar (Brown for caramel, and white for butterscotch) Heat it up in this big machine thing that turned (Excuse my limited knowledge of machines : < ) and then poured freshly popped popcorn into it. The syrup coated the popcorn and tada~ caramel flavored popcorn : )
Sorry for the unnecessary spam~ keep up the great work, Im learning a few things here and hopefully will be able to impress my "better than me at cooking" bf... T _ T

Su-Yin -Décorateur said...

Jen: SO nice to hear from yoU! haha of course im interested! Sharing ideas was the main purpose of my lil blogs humble beginnings haha. Just out of curiosity; how much is one "bag" of sugar? haha
I wish I recieved more "spam comments" from pleasant readers like yourself! Haha opinions are always welcomed. Positive and negative ones alike!

thanh7580 said...

Indian spiced popcorn, sounds very different. I like honey popcorn, where the honey dries and glazes the popcorn and is delicious.