The Indian Cooking Course: Techniques - Masterclasses - Ingredients - 300 Recipes

This is a great book! It is a nice hardcover. Could be used as a coffee table book! High quality. Awesome recipes!! Great explanations!! Educational!

First off – I'm an American-born Indian that can barely boil his own rice. I've always wanted to learn how to cook Indian food but never knew where to begin. Indians always tell you to add "a pinch of this and a pinch of that." There's no standardization, there's no clear cooking technique. It's all just passed down as tradition. I'm an engineer at heart, so I'm very uncomfortable with just tossing things in a pan and hoping it tastes good. Monisha Bharadwaj does an incredible job of systematically teaching you how to cook. Her writing style is wonderful, as she weaves history and culture into her writing in a way that makes it so fascinating to read. All the bits and pieces of knowledge I had about Indian cooking all come together in a way that's easy to understand. She teaches fundamentals, like how to cook rice, how to do a waghar, how to cook different types of foods like bread, vegetables, etc., understanding the different types of tastes, Ayurveda, and more. Her recipes are presented in a way that progresses from simple to more complex. I enjoyed this book so much, I already bought several more copies and sent it to friends as gifts. If you want to learn Indian cooking fundamentals, THIS is your book.

The book arrived promptly within 24 hours and I was surprised by how heavy it was. This is not a complaint: this is a beautiful hard-cover book designed to last a lifetime, and with LOTS of full-page, full-color photos of the dishes and ingredients. The author clearly intended to make this the go-to book for Indian cooking that replaces all others, and I believe she succeeded magnificently. Besides mere recipes, the author explains the reasoning behind the seasoning, if you will excuse my rhyme. The intention is really to make this a MASTER CLASS on cooking Indian food, including the regional differences, discussion of ingredients, and the logic behind spice pairings. I daresay, if one dedicates sufficient time and care in the reading of this beautiful and practical book, and gets busy cooking the recipes in the kitchen...one will be able to cook authentic Indian food as good as/better than any Indian restaurant. Buy it!

This is a GREAT book. If you're just beginning to learn Indian cooking, this is the book to read. It explains the diverse nation of India in culinary terms, and it explains techniques and the regions that they are common to. The recipes are excellent. There is much emphasis on why the techniques are employed. It helped me to develop a sense of seasoning and ingredients to the degree that I seldom refer to the book now. I understand the method, and I know what to do. There's no higher praise I can give a book on cooking than to say that it has helped me to rapidly become self-sufficient in my thinking and preparation of delicious meals in the styles of India. Some advice to an American not used to Indian cuisine: consider using less spice and hot pepper than is indicated in the recipes. I found this generally to be good advice when regarding Indian recipes, not just recipes in this book. A common situation when I first tried Indian recipes was that there was too much green chili and the results were too spicy hot for our tastes. Using less made a big difference and we have found the quantities that are most pleasing to us. Maybe try using half of what is recommended, and see how that works for you initially.

This is a very good, but not great, introduction to Indian cooking. It is clearly laid out, with gorgeous photography and a ton of recipes. However, often, the pictures are not labeled with which of the several recipes on the facing page is pictured. Ingredients might be challenging for some to locate, if there isn't a good Indian market nearby (Amazon has a lot of spices, but some of the fresh ingredients are harder to source).The author is also sometimes casual with steps and ingredient amounts which will be a challenge to less experienced cooks. For instance, the author never gives salt amounts ("season to taste"), and does not have a specific base recipe for garlic ginger paste (noting only a two to one ratio of garlic to ginger). One roti recipe calls for 3-5oz of water to create a thick, pourable batter. That ended up being nowhere near enough water to create the right consistency. Similarly, another recipe called for sauteing onions over high heat, stirring in the other ingredients, then adding a "few tablespoons" of water and allowing to cook for 15-20 minutes. Someone following this recipe exactly would end up with some pretty burnt curry, but a more experience cook would realize that they had to turn down the heat and keep stirring. The recipes I have cooked so far have all been wonderful, despite these obstacles. In all, a very good introduction to Indian cooking and a beautiful book, but not for someone who isn't already comfortable in the kitchen.

I have a lot of cookbooks. I have a lot of Indian cookbooks, and recently I've been trying to cut down. That means Kindle only. But... Every now and then a book comes along that tests my resolve, and wins! I found this book while browsing: Best Indian Cookbooks. Many I had, some I had no interest in, but this one? I was intrigued by the description and reviews, and so I decided to buy it. I've been cooking Indian cuisine for decades, amongst the many styles I cook. I've cooked multiple dishes for 200+ people, and carefully constructed multi-courses gourmet meals that take all night, worthy of a top end restaurant (I've been told :0). Given the title you would think, why would someone so experienced need a Indian Cooking Course cookbook? Well, that's what I love about cooking, there's always something new to learn. Beautifully presented, great pictures, just dipping into this book inspires me to try new dishes. It's propped up in my bed, and after two months I still enjoy just browsing the recipes for something interesting and new. Pick a Masterclass, where pictures and instructions are more detailed, and you'll be an 'Indian' chef in no time. It's fashionable, these days, to get one's recipes from the web, and I do, and have found some great ones, but a good, well written, book is still my preference. Now, if only they would produce a Kindle version.

I gave this to my daughter in law who loves to cook international food as well. She lived it.

I own about 1,000 cookbooks of all kinds. This cookbook is awesome although it came slightly damaged. It is hugh with wonderful color photographs. The recipes look marvelous and doable for the novice Indian cook.

Pretty good, covers most of categories in food like, rice, vegetables, eggs, meat etc. It even has recipes for sambar powder, garam masala. Even how to make yoghurt and paneer.

Cabe destacar que no es simplemnte un recetario, es un curso de cocina India, pero más allá de eso, incluye un material gráfico espectacular, fotografías de la India increíbles. En cuanto a la información esta separada en recetas, información general de cada tipo de comida, ingredientes, etc., y también tiene "masterclass" donde explica con gran detalle cómo hacer una receta específica. Es un libro hermoso, la edición del mismo es increíble, es de muy buena calidad.

Great detailed hard copy book with amazing recipes

I have a large collection of Indian cookbooks and spend many a weekend walking around Hounslow or Wembley buying Indian ingredients for cooking at home or sampling various authentic dishes. Many Indian cookbooks concentrate a little too much in the area of Indian cuisine that the author grew up in and it is quite difficult to find a book that covers all the variety of regional India. It's even less likely that they include little masterclasses on how to perfect each technique. Quite bizarrely, a few months ago, a gentlemen started to talk to me at a bus stop commented on books that I had just purchased and mentioned this book. I am presuming he was the "crazy cow vet" who has also reviewed this book. (He mentioned he had been on Monisha's course, bought 6 copies of the book and couldn't praise it enough:-). The books strong points: Good high level regional coverage of different Indian Cuisine Authentic recipes Well Illustrated Simple instructions Well structured and edited Some commentary and background, but thankfully not the endless storytelling many cookbooks now suffer from. Its actually quite difficult to fault this book. There are more comprehensive and detailed books out there on regional Indian cooking, e.g. Dakshin for south Indian food which is superb, but If you want to get into Indian cooking and only want to buy one book, buy this one. (I have over 50 Indian cookbooks at home and would fling 90% of them out for this one book). At this price it's a steal. Well done Monisha, stellar book.

This book is amazing! As other reviewers put it, it's a true masterclass, it doesn't assume you know any of the basics as other cookbooks do. It explains how to properly make rice, Indian bread, side dishes. It explains the ingredients that might be hard to get and it explains a bit where the dish comes from. I wish there were books like this for other cuisines.