Gobi 65 - Restaurant Style

The first thing this Gobi 65 reminds me of are how me and my cousins were not allowed to eat this in my paati's place when they made this. :(. Usually Gobi 65 is made on Sundays as a special vegetarian item for my Grandad/uncle who did not eat non-vegetarian dishes. So the rule in the house was that , those who were non-vegetarians are not allowed to eat Gobi 65 as it was reserved for the vegetarians. Hmmp! ;)

How many of you have wondered where this tag "65" came from for various dishes such as chicken, Gobi, paneer etc. I have - many a times but never looked it up until now.  There are many different stories for how the name came about. Below are the two interesting ones from wiki :)

Chicken 65 is alleged to be a dish introduced in 1965 at the famous Buhari Hotel restaurant in Chennai by its founder A.M.Buhari, a pioneer in the South Indian food industry. They also offer Chicken 78, Chicken 82 and Chicken 90, introduced in 1978, 1982 and 1990 respectively.

Another storyline is that northern Indian army soldiers frequented a military canteen in Chennai. Its menus were written in Tamil, the local language. As most soldiers could not read Tamil, they made their choice by citing the number of the dish on the menu. The dish's popularity spread among the soldiers by word of mouth. They'd simply ask for "number 65"; soon, the dish became known officially as "Chicken 65".

Gobi 65

Ingredients

Serves - 3
Prep Time - 20 min
Resting time - 30 min
Cook time - 15 min

Cauliflower - 1 medium sized
Maida/All purpose flour - 1/2 cup
Corn flour - 3 Tbsp
Red Chilli/Curry powder - 1-2 Tbsp [adjust according to spice level]
Ginger Garlic [GG] paste - 1 Tsp
Salt - as per need
Water - 1/4 cup to make the marinade [ adjust accordingly]
Red food color - a pinch [optional]
Turmeric - 1/2 tsp + a pinch
Oil - for deep frying [1/2 cup]

Lemon - 1/2 [ to squeeze juice on top before serving]

How do you do it

Separate the cauliflower florets , and slice into medium sized pieces. We first need to clean the cauliflower. Boil few cups of water [2-3] . Add a tsp of salt and 1/2 Tsp turmeric to the boiling water. Now throw in the cauliflower pieces mix well,and let it boil for 2-3 minutes on high flame. Switch off flame. Stir the cauliflower pieces well and drain completely. By now your cauliflower pieces must be half cooked. It should be firm to bite. Use tissue paper and pat the pieces to remove excess water from the cauliflower. Keep aside and let it dry.

Mix the maida, corn flour,chilli powder, GG paste , salt , a pinch of turmeric , red food color in a bowl and form a thick paste of this with water. The consistency of this is important, it should be as thick as your toothpaste. I used 1/4 cup of water, but adjust accordingly when you make the paste. Taste the marinade to check for salt-spice level and make changes as needed. Add the cauliflower pieces to this marinade and wrap well, so all the pieces are coated well. This needs to rest for a minimum of 30 minutes.

Heat oil [medium heat] in a kadai for frying the cauliflower pieces. Drop a little marinade to check if the oil is heated properly, if it rises above immediately, you are ready to go. Drop 8-10 pieces of cauliflower into the oil, deep fry until it turns into a nice red color. Remove from oil and drain on tissue paper. Repeat the same and fry them in batches.

While serving you could squeeze lemon on top of these pieces. Needless to say it makes an absolutely delicious starter :).

Notes

The cauliflower pieces needs to be firm to bite and only half cooked. Do not overcook them.

It is important to drain the water completely from the cauliflower and gently pat with tissue paper to remove excess water without damaging the florets.But don't try to remove too much , little water content of the gobi will help to easily wrap the Gobi in the marinade. Standard rule for deep frying is that water content has to be very low

The consistency of the marinade needs to be thick, as thick as your toothpaste.

When frying,I dropped the cauliflower piece by piece, instead of dropping a handful of pieces together. They tend to stick together in the oil and trying to break them up while frying or later seemed difficult.

If you do not want to deep fry it, you could take a baking tray lined with foil, apply some oil on it, spread Gobi on the foil, drizzle few drops over the Gobi and the grill it in the oven for about 20 minutes for 200 deg C, turning the Gobi over after10 min to grill evenly


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