Customer Reviews

Indian Vegetarian Cooking Sampler

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have watched the vegetarian series by Kurma and Alka Chandna. I am one of those veggie converts after joining yoga classes who was trying to dabble with Indian vegetarian cooking styles. One thing nice about this video is the autenticity of its recipes. There is a difference between an Australian Chef trying to imitate Indian cooking versus an Indian Brahmin Chef showing his trade as seen in this video. Mind you, this is a low budget production unlike the other videos but it conveys the cooking methods as practiced in India. Quality of video is good. As a side note, if you are one of those strict vegetarian who shuns garlic and onions, then you may have to skip them yourself since all these recipes contains those ingredients.

Reading the review before mine I have a solution to no onions or garlic called asafetida. You will need to breath thru your mouth once the container is open until it hits the hot oil and then a miracle occurs! It tones down to a wonderful smell not as strong as onions or garlic. Penzey's Spices has a lot of the basic Indian spices if you need a source that is used by thousands. I make my own ghee as it is very easy to make and you can stop the process when it is the right flavor for you. I cheat and use a mandoline to do a quick job of the little dices of veggies.Interesting that the cooks use all the bell pepper - seeds, ribs and all. How would you know this if you didn't have a really good video to show how professional chefs in India do it? I especially like the fact you see all the ingredience before the dish is cooked and some steps are repeated so you see more clearly how it is done. Guarantee you won't stop with just one video.

I purchased this item based on the two previous reviews. I anticipated seeing this DVD as I was thinking that this would be the answers to Indian style cooking that I lacked. After viewing this DVD twice I have to say I learned nothing from it.

The video is poorly done, as is the audio. The explanation of the procedures to Indian cooking is very vague. The views of the spices and ingredients are all done by "cookie-cutter" methods meaning you see the same video shots of the same spices and food in every recipe presented. The hosts' use of broken English is quite distracting.

I would pass up this DVD and purchase the Complete Vegetarian Cooking DVD's from Kurma Das.