Spice and everything nice at The Pen’s North Indian food festival

It was with little hesitation – and more than a little unseemly cheerful alacrity – that I accepted an invitation to join a preview degustation lunch for the 14-day Northern Indian Food Festival at The Peninsula Manila’s Spices, that runs until May 19, with Sandeep Ahluwalia as guest chef.

But then this got me. Do you, like me, get hot and bothered when faced with the vexing question of what to drink with your nail rogan josh and paneer lubaabdaar?

"We normally drink just water. But if that doesn’t agree with you, I’d say a glass of chaas (iced buttermilk spiced with freshly broiled cumin seeds, ginger, coriander and green chilies) is the perfect complement to an Indian meal, especially in the height of summer," says chief Ahluwalia. "Or maybe a lassi. Real Indian cooking is intriguingly spiced so you should be careful what to drink with it."

For some people, red wine would be perfect, especially for the spicier regional cuisine. "A rule of thumb that I dispense to whomever’s willing to listen is to match whites with the fish and vegetables and reds with meats," the chef adds.

But beer or no beer, red or white, lunch had to proceed.

For starters, we had three kinds of roti (breads): mughlai naan (naan stuffed with pistachios and raisins and garnished with silver leaf, P120), masala roti (baked whole wheat bread flavored with cumin, yellow chilli, chopped coriander and mint leaves, P120) and bharvaan jhinga kulcha (naan filled with a tartare of prawns, cubed bell peppers, spring onions and cheese, P190).

This was followed by appetizers of haldi chilli jingha (stir-fried prawns tempered with turmeric and spring onions, P445), methi machchi ke tikke (tandoor-grilled lapu-lapu fillets marinated in dill, fennel, ginger, honey, P330/P660), kakori seekh khaas (minced kid kebab imbued with cloves, cinnamon, saffron and other Indian spices, P380/P750), and adhrak ke punje (lamb chops marinated in cardamom and saffron-laced milk, P760).

For our main course, we had murgh lubaabdar khaas (tomatoes, cream, fresh Indian herbs morsels of char-grilled chicken tikke simmered to perfection), tariwala murgh (Punjabi chicken curry), nail rogan josh (juicy lamb shanks cooked in gravy spiced with red chillies), methi chaman (a Kashmiri delicacy of fried cottage cheese stewed in a spinach-fenugreek purée) and dum ki daal (black lentils simmered for 16 hours using fresh tomato purée, garlic and fresh cream.

A major element of memorable meals is value. Fortunately, in these days, Spices’ Northern India festival menu is economically correct and delicious. This means that the breads were heavy and full meals all by themselves.

While the kid kebab could have been better, the good news is it came accompanied with perfectly cooked plates of lamb chops (definitely a must-have in the festival menu) and plump and sweet stir-fried turmeric prawns. The lamb curry was charged with Kasimiri chilies and the tender meat was coming off the bone. The chicken tikke cooked with cream clearly deserved its reputation as chef Ahluwalia’s specialty, and the black daal was as Spices’ chefs have been known to cook their lentils – to perfection.

Everything was truly good that the dessert of lychee, mango rabarhi mille feuille (layered puff pastry of lynchee and enveloped in cardamom rabarhi) served afterwards seemed almost like a superfluous touch.

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"The Wonders of North Indian Cuisine" at The Peninsula Manila’s Spices Restaurant is ongoing until May 19. There will also be a cooking class on May 18, for P1,500++, inclusive of cooking class and lunch at Spices. For inquiries or restaurant reservations, call 887-28-88.