Cookbook Review: The New Indian Slow Cooker

The New Indian Slow Cooker: Recipes for Curries, Dals, Chutneys, Masalas, Biryani and More

By Neela Paniz

Published by Ten Speed Press

I love eating Indian food, but have always been reluctant to try cooking it myself. I head to a restaurant for my biryani and keema fix. On the other hand, the slow cooker is about the easiest cooking technique for making meals. This book combines the complex flavors and spices of Indian cuisine with the preparation ease of a slow cooker.

The cookbook starts with a very crucial aspect of Indian food, the spices. There is a section to start the book that explains all of the spices and some of the unique ingredients that go into the recipes. Quite a few of the recipes can be made with ingredients found at a well-stocked grocery store. Others will involve a trip to an Indian grocer or an online resource for things like green mango powder and kari leaves. Many of the spices are used in multiple recipes, so once they’re bought, you can use them in a variety of dishes.

While using the slow cooker saves some work, these aren’t the kinds of recipes where you dump everything into the cooker, turn it on and walk away. Often vegetables need to be sauteed before adding to the crockpot or tadkas (spices cooked in ghee) need to be made to add to the dish at the end of the cooking time. It’s a good idea to read through all of the steps in the recipe before beginning to make it, so there aren’t any unexpected surprises.

There is a great variety of recipes. Basics not made in the crockpot include chapatti flatbreads and paneer cheese. Then there are all kinds of recipes to explore from simple dals that cook quickly in the slow cooker to Kerala fish curry and even lamb biryani, a layered rice dish. I’m working on building my Indian spice pantry and I can’t wait to try many of the recipes in this book.

I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.

This post is part of Weekend Cooking at Beth Fish Reads