added this 18 years ago
Chaat
What you need:
1 sweet potato
1 large potato
1 can chickpeas (garbanzo beans)
1 banana chopped
juice of three lemons
teaspoon of roasted and ground cumin
ground chilies to taste
salt to taste
What you do:
Chop sweet and regular potato in to cubes and boil until soft. Chop banana into thin slices. When potatoes are cooked, cool and mix all ingredients together. Improves after chilling for a few hours or overnight.
Preparation Time:
30 mins
Cooking Time:
Servings:
4
Recipe Category:
SO HOW'D IT GO?
I had what was called Chaat at an indian fast food place and it was one of the most delicious things I've ever eaten. So I was excited to make this and try it.
But what I ended up with was a mush of potatoes flavored with banana and lemon juice with garbanzo beans mixed in. And when I tasted it, I was very let down. It was like mashed potatoes soaked in lemon juice. Nothing at all like the dish I had at the restaurant which was more of a sweet and tangy red sauce with garbanzos.
I did some research and found that the word Chaat simply translates into "snack food". I get the impression that it means a certain category of fast snack dishes, but it's still pretty broad. Calling a dish Chaat without any more description is probably like calling an entre "Pasta with sauce"
I put it in the fridge to cool overnight as recommended, but at no point in the week since I spent a half hour working on this have I been interested in eating cold lemon potato mush. So it sits in the fridge till clean out time.
Everyone has different tastes, so maybe this dish has a place for someone. But the author made no reference for how to serve this. And I haven't been able to think of a way that makes sense.