Sweet Corn with Cumin, Curry Leaves, and Chilis

As you read yesterday - when I posted a lovely recipe for Chicken Curry - my friend Sid, who regularly sends me videos showing how to prepare delicious traditional Indian recipes, told me that I should look into a bloggers' link-up that involved cooking from the fabulous book 660 Curries.

Well, as someone who loves Indian food, you can imagine my glee in perusing the cookbook!!! I had to start cooking right away, after being led into temptation, so I made several recipes with ingredients I had on hand, tweaking ever so slightly to accommodate my pantry.

One dish that I made on a cold, dreary day and brought to work for lunch sounded so simple, so much like a throwaway; but the ingredients had been available, so it won the coin toss.

I was so surprised and delighted to find that this was a fabulous dish! Bright, spicy, addictive - I kept eating and eating, enjoying it so much!

Instead of using the red chilis called for in the recipe, I put a small piece of my lone ghost pepper into the mix. And just before serving, I mixed in some of the Indian snack mix I had recently bought, which contains all sorts of lovely crispy tidbits with a hint of sweetness. (If you don't have access to an Indian market, here's a recipe; just add a handful of golden raisins to approximate the mix I bought at the store.) It was one of the best lunches I'd brought to work in a long time!

You could serve this corn as a side dish with meat, over rice, with naan ... it's up to you. But serve it, even if it sounds a bit unusual. It really is fabulous!


Sweet Corn with Cumin, Curry Leaves, and Chilis

• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
• 1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
• 3 cups frozen corn
• 1 cup water
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped cilantro
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 6 large curry leaves
• 1 small red pepper, finely chopped

Heat the butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the cumin seeds and turmeric; cook for 10 seconds. Add the corn, water, cilantro, and salt; bring to a boil over high heat, then lower heat to medium. Add curry leaves and pepper; cook for 8-10 minutes until most of the liquid has been absorbed. Remove the curry leaves and serve immediately.

4-6 as a side dish.