The Henna Artist by Alka Joshi was our most recent book club pick. A very colorful book about a woman in India that is escaping an abusive marriage and runs to Jaipur, the “Pink City” in the 1950’s. She struggles to find fulfillment in a country where society pivots between traditional and modern. The book is so sensual in its colors and food you can almost smell the curry and cardamom. Our club discusses our books and makes a menu according to where the book takes place. This one was really fun. I love Indian Food. I only came to enjoy Indian food when we lived in London. There are so many fantastic Indian restaurants there. One we really liked was in a town called Forest Hill, which was just a stones throw away from our town of Sydenham. In this particular restaurant they had mirrors over the chef’s area so you could watch them skillfully put all the different spices into the dishes as they cooked.
We had many wonderful Indian dishes. I made a vegetable pilaf and the recipe is here:
https://www.indianhealthyrecipes.com/pulao-recipe-veg-pulao-recipe/
There were recipes in the back of the book that were very good. Dee Dee made Batti Balls and dal. We also had Bombay Potatoes made by Jeanine and a Curry Chicken from Babs that was fabulous. Joanne brought fresh Naan bread and Lynne brought a Cheesecake. (that’s another story lol)
The Henna Artist was a good read and the Indian Food a very good choice.
Namaste.
