The World Table

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Trinidadian · Starter

Pholourie with Tamarind Sauce

  • Intermediate
  • 30 min
  • roughly 2 of 4 for cost
  • Vegetarian
  • Vegan

aromatic · bright · earthy · fiery Leads with aromatics blooming from the first bite, acid holding everything up to the light, on a slow, honest burn.

Ingredients

  • 150g split pea flour
  • 150g all-purpose flour
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp ground turmeric
  • 1 tsp roasted ground geera (cumin)
  • 3 cloves garlic, crushed to a paste
  • 4 chadon beni leaves, finely chopped
  • 1.5 tsp fine salt
  • 350ml warm water
  • 1 litre neutral oil, for frying
  • 100g seedless tamarind pulp
  • 300ml hot water
  • 80g dark brown sugar
  • 1 clove garlic, crushed
  • half a scotch bonnet, chopped
  • 0.5 tsp salt, for the sauce

The skills inside

Deep fryingDraining fried food: a rack, never paperStraining & passing through a sieveThe wobble & the skewer: testing a bake

Allergen screen

Found: gluten

Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.

Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.

Method

  1. Whisk the two flours with the baking powder, turmeric, geera, garlic, chadon beni and salt, then beat in the warm water to a thick batter that falls from the spoon in a slow ribbon.
  2. Cover and rest 30 minutes, until the surface looks aerated and the batter has lifted slightly in the bowl. 30 min
  3. Meanwhile soften the tamarind in the hot water, work it through a sieve, then simmer with the brown sugar, garlic, scotch bonnet and salt until it coats the back of a spoon, about 8 minutes. 8 min
  4. Heat the oil to 170C (340F) and drop in teaspoons of batter; they sink, then rise and roll themselves over as they puff.
  5. Fry 3 to 4 minutes to a deep gold that sounds hollow when tapped, drain on a rack and serve hot with the sauce. 4 min

How to tell it is going right

This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the techniques it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.

Draining fried food: a rack, never paper 77 recipes

  • The rack was in place before the first thing went into the oil, not fetched afterwards while food waited in a spider over the pot.
  • It lands on a rack with air moving underneath it. Anything set down on paper or a flat plate traps its own steam against its base.
  • Salted within seconds of landing, while it is still hot enough to take seasoning.
  • A minute later the underside is still as crisp as the top: no soft flat patch where it has been sitting.
  • Nothing is stacked or piled while hot, however tempting it is to keep it together. A pile steams itself soft from the inside out.

Where it goes wrong It was drained on paper, or piled up to keep warm. Steam leaving the food has nowhere to go but back into the crust, so the underside softens within a minute: the crispness the frying just bought is gone before the plate reaches the table.

Deep frying 96 recipes

  • The oil was at temperature before anything went in, measured rather than guessed, and the vessel is no more than two-thirds full.
  • Everything went in dry. Surfaces are patted down and any coating is not dripping, because water hitting hot oil erupts and is the one accident this technique actually has.
  • The oil recovers between batches. It is back at temperature before the next load goes in rather than falling further with each one.
  • A steady vigorous bubbling that slows as it finishes: the bubbles are the food’s own water leaving, so a piece that has gone quiet has stopped drying out and is done.
  • Seasoned or finished in the first seconds out of the oil, while the surface is still hot and will hold what lands on it. Anything applied to a cooled crust sits on top and falls off.

Where it goes wrong Too much went in at once and the oil temperature collapsed. The crust forms slowly while the food sits in warm fat absorbing it rather than shedding steam, and it comes out heavy and greasy instead of crisp, which no amount of draining afterwards will fix.

At the Table

The Pour
Off-dry Riesling (Mosel Kabinett)
Also Right
Gewürztraminer or off-dry Chenin
From the Taps
Crisp lager or pilsner
Zero-Proof
Agua fresca or iced jasmine tea

Sugar, cold, and low alcohol are the fire code: sweetness tames capsaicin while acid resets the palate; tannin would fan the flames.

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Film school

This dish, cooked on camera Search films of Pholourie with Tamarind Sauce The cuisine, deeper Technique films from the Trinidadian kitchen