Paging Mr. Masala, Mr. Garam Masala

My lovely wife is a gangsta disciple of WeightWatchers, so she gets their little magazine thing at the meetings. It often has a really interesting recipe in the back.

In last week’s issue, they featured “Spice-Roasted Butternut Squash and Onions” which looked pretty tasty. So I thought we’d whip that up for dinner. I ran off to my local grocery to find the ingredients – especially this Indian spice called “garam masala”. Unfortunately, they never heard of ‘im.
Not to be denied my crazy food choices, I whipped out my trusty Windows Mobile phone and Bing Mobiled my way to the recipe for garam masala while standing right there in the spice aisle. As you might expect, this is a concoction like curry powder or chili powder – that is, not a single spice, but a mixture of various other spices. As I learned from that recipe page:

This is the most aromatic and fragrant of all Indian spice blends. Used throughout North India in all types of dishes — from appetizers and soups to yogurt salad and main courses — this blend is indispensable to Moghul and North Indian cooking.

The ingredients for this version are (full hat tip to my source):

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons cumin seeds
2 tablespoons coriander seeds
2 tablespoons cardamom seeds
2 tablespoons black peppercorns
1 (3-inch) stick cinnamon, broken up
1 teaspoon whole cloves
1 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon saffron (optional) <<< I skipped this

Instructions:
Put the cumin, coriander, cardamom, peppercorns, cinnamon, and cloves in a dry heavy skillet over medium-high heat. Toast the spices, stirring occasionally, until they turn several shades darker and give off a sweet smoky aroma, about 10 minutes. Do not raise the heat to quicken the process, or the spices will brown prematurely, leaving the insides undercooked. Cool completely.
Working in batches if necessary, transfer the mixture to a spice mill or coffee grinder and grind to a powder. Stir in the nutmeg and saffron. Use immediately or store in an airtight container in a cool, dry place.

The smell of the toasting spices was amazingly good and this all went pretty well, except that we didn’t have a spice or coffee grinder and neither did the supermarket I went to. We have several nice kitchen stores in North Bend, but I didn’t want to bother with that. Instead I opted for a little mini-chopper/food processer thing that my mom got somewhere and gave to us. As it turned out, this thing was really not up to the task of dealing with the cinnamon stick pieces and the coriander seeds. To deal with this, I just had to run it through in many batches and ultimately started using a sieve to separate out the fine, finished mix and leave the chunks to go back for another trip in the chopper.   Until I ended up with something that smelled very good indeed and looked like a real spice you’d buy in a store.

This stage took about an hour.
Now it was time to make the rest of the dish…

At great risk to myself of the WeightWatchers sending their ill-fitting brown shirt thugs after me, here’s the recipe that drove all this insanity.

Ingredients:
2 1/4 lbs fresh butternut squash, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
1 medium red onion, halved and thinly sliced
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp garam masala   < yup, all that to get a single teaspoon
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/8 tsp freshly ground black pepper, or to taste
3 tbsp fresh, chopped cilantro

Instructions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Coat a large non-stick baking sheet with cooking spray.
Place squash and onion on prepared baking sheet; drizzle with oil and toss to coat.
Sprinkle with garam masala, salt and pepper; toss to coat.
Roast, tossing about halfway through cooking, until squash and onions are tender and slightly browned, about 25 minutes.

 

 

Transfer vegetables to a serving platter or bowl and sprinkle with cilantro; toss to coat.

And this is what you get in the end. We served it with a tasty rice pilaf (from a box) and some naan from the store, reheated in the oven. Very tasty – although a little peppery. The pepper kind of overwhelmed some of the more subtle flavors. So I’d cut back on the pepper in the recipe and if I every lose my mind and make the garam masala again, I’d use less pepper. The roasted red onions end up adding a very nice sweetness to the dish.

This recipe makes enough for a Moghul army, so our idea for the leftovers is to mix them with some chicken stock (and maybe a little skim or low-fat milk) and then grind up the chunks with “boat motor” and we should end up with a nicely seasoned squash bisque.