Homecooked INDIAN FOOD in Singapore!!! | DIWALI Festival RECIPES | MODERN Indian Cuisine

What's up you guys and welcome to Singapore! We arrived during the Deepavali month and so I thought of filming a couple videos for you. Today I was invited by Chef Ash to experience progressive Indian cuisine. Now is there such thing as modern Indian food? We're gonna learn more about it, so come with me and let's eat! Just arrived here at Chef Ash's home and it's here in Fajar or Fajar in Bukit Panjang. It's kind of near from Choa Chok Kang. I rode the MRT and it took me for about less than 30 minutes. Few minutes of walk and I'm here. I'm so ready for the 5 course menu. I think that is almost done when I went here. The last thing that he's gonna prepare is the fish. Because it's gonna cook quickly and I should eat it right away. And so I think now he's preparing the ingredients. I can't wait! I can already smell the food. Wow! I'm so excited! Before the dishes arrive, I just wanna quickly explain what he does. So Chef Ash has been cooking for his entire life. He loves food, he loves to cook. There's a lot of dishes that he loves that he wants to elevate. His vision when it comes to food is very much like progressive. So it's like he has Indian roots, history or experiences with food that he wants to bring to progressive way of adding like scientific ways to recreate or revamp classic dishes. And make it healthier, less oily but still taste flavorful. His thinking is very futuristic and so that's what I like about him. He calls himself a food rebel. Very, very cool guy. And so I'm really, really excited. Enough talking, I can't wait. We're gonna start with the set menu. The Deepavali set menu right now. And by the way, happy Deepavali. These are the main ingredients of Patrani Macchi. Now it doesn't follow any particular recipe but this is a chef's special. This is grated coconut with chili, dry chili. Just one, not too much. There is pine nuts, smoked paprika, cream, pepper, a little bit of ground cardamom as well as salt to taste. That's it. Keep it simple. Once you're done with this, all you need is a pestle and mortar. And this is what the final paste looks like. Keep it turbid so that it can coat the fish. And once this is done, that's pretty much it. Just make sure your hands are clean. Take a part of this and just dab this on top of the fish. And you can see the consistency of the sauce. It's thick enough to coat the fish. So just make sure that's done. That's it for the preparation. I'll turn it around as well and let me show you how to do this. Take a part of the sauce and dab it. Just dab it. You can take this and dab it. You can see the specks of the chili and that's basically the dry chili. And you need a little bit of balance with the coconut sauce because coconut is sweet and you need a little spicy and that's how it all, you know, gets together into the mix. We're ready with the marinade and I will just keep it in the fridge maybe for 5 to 10 minutes. It's time to be done with that. So this is an important step. What you need to do is just make sure you have your banana leaf ready. Of course, please wash it, dry it and then what you would like to do is this. And this is where, this is a really important step and see how I'm doing this. You can do it straight off of the fire. This actually softens the leaf, right? The texture of the leaf gets softened so that you can wrap it like a towel or whatever you call it, like a handkerchief. So this forms the wrap and you can see the color change. Don't worry about it burning but just make sure you get the, see it has to dry up all the moisture from the leaf. And it's ready. So the fish is ready. As you can see, you can just pour it on top of this. You got to wrap it up one fold, second fold, third fold and fourth fold. And that's about it. There are no rules to the game. You could perhaps finish it in three wraps, three folds and your recipe is almost ready. If you're wondering why banana leaf, right? What's so great about banana leaf? Obviously, it's a cleaner way of roasting your fish and it also brings in an added tea flavor. Goes from the banana leaf and it gets infused into the fish because if you notice the fish was raw. Very easy recipe now. It's a dry pan, not low flame, medium flame. Take the fish, just make sure it heats up a little bit, maybe about five minutes and you have to keep your lid ready. A lid that kind of seals it completely. For the fish, there's no oil. And since the heat that is generated will be so high in a completely dry pan, if you understand what I mean, it will completely cook the fish and the roasting happens due to the heat generated and in the enclosure. Introducing, you know, a signature recipe that you could cook for Diwali and it's called pathani machhi. Parsis cook this, the Bengalis cook it in their way. And what you will see today is the chef's club signature recipe where you add very unique, refined ingredients in the overall mixture. Get a very good, thick consistency to the paste. Coat the fish, roast it in a banana leaf. It's healthy because I'm not using any oil and there's a lot of conversations happening in Singapore about healthy cooking. This might be one of the ways you want to get started. I hope you guys can smell this aroma. Oh wow, I'm so excited. This is what I meant by the fish being almost cooked on one side and then the burned leaf gives you an indication that the fish is done on one end. What's the name of the dish again? It's called pathani machhi. Pathani literally means fish actually being cooked in a leaf, in a banana, traditionally banana leaf. Because it's my first time hearing the name of the dish. It's so fragrant, it's making me more hungry. I want to eat it right now. One thing that is unique about Chef Ashish's cooking is he doesn't use masala or any types of the classic masala that you will see in the normal Indian cuisine. What he used here is coconut cream, cooking cream, a little bit of chili, not really too spicy. There's paprika. For him you just make it flavorful in your own way without moving far from where you've come from. But recreating dishes, his own twist, this is like a modern kind of gourmet dish that he's making. And it's kind of fascinating to watch him cook and learn about his passion for food. Progressing into another world or another like a modern world, recreating something delicious. We're done. Oh, I hope it's all cooked. Give it a shot. Turn this upside down, easier for you to remove. Whoa, whoa. It is cooked. It's fully cooked. Wow. It looks so moist. You want to try? Can I have a spoon here and see? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. Oh my gosh. Oh, I'm gonna try this. I don't want to burn myself. Oh. It smells so, so good. Tell me what you think. Did you put garlic in here? One garlic only. I can't imagine like the flavor is enclosed in the banana leaf and everything is here. It's hot. Yeah, but eat it with the sauce. What do you think? Oh, wow. Savory. Fish is very, very delicate. Yeah. Very moist and it doesn't require you to chew it. It's not too spicy. It kind of stays there but it's not really, it's not gonna punch you in the face. Great job, chef. Spot on, thank you. So chef Ashish just finished cooking all of the dishes. We're going to have a five course set menu for today. And it's a special day because it's Diwali and it's a special occasion for Indians, especially the Hindus. And so now we're going to have the Deepavali set menu. This is a five course set menu. Chef Ashish has two set menus, veg and non-veg. Since I don't have a restricted diet, I'm gonna have the best of both worlds. And we're starting with the veg which is a portobello and tandoori wraps. Charcoal grilled with chef special masala wraps served with cheese sauce. It kind of looks like a crepe. What looks different is it's dark inside because of the portobello mushrooms. And it looks flan. Mmm, oh wow. It's so good. Mushroom is so meaty, earthy kind of flavor. Some creaminess, a little bit of saltiness from the cheese. And then the texture from the outside, it's crispy. Soft inside, it's very hot. I would say appetizer is like this. It's perfect because it's light and it makes you want to eat more. Or prepare you for the next dish, I should say. So good. It's really a great start. Now I'm ready for the next. The second course will be Hariyali Jinga Kebab. Grilled coriander and prawn kebabs with special chef orange sauce. It looks like a patty. So hot. And these are, what are these on top? Pine nuts. Pine nuts, fancy! Ah, it smells so good. Mmm, it's so hot but cilantro is very fragrant. Some people don't like it but I love it. It makes the dish bright and light and herby. So it's basically crumbled prawns inside with cilantro. Indonesian potatoes and pine nuts on top. So I want more. Oh, orange sauce. The saffron adds a little bit of color definitely in the sauce. Which make it very bright yellow orange. I love sauces. Mixing salty, savory to sweet and tangy and that's what I'm getting here. Kebabs are generally drier. You will obviously have a condiment with it which is typically Indians tend to use mint sauce or tomato-based ketchup. What I did was a very rich orange-based sauce and it has a little bit of moscato saffron and orange juice. What I'm also going to try is another special chef favorite. It's a little spicy because the concoction here has a little bit of chili as you might see. The zest comes from the vinegar and I've also added some manuka honey. Wow, that's a healthy and expensive honey. Yes and I use the best grade of manuka honey as well. Oh wow. If the dish gets cloying and you want to kind of cut through different richness, heaviness in there. You need something to freshen your taste buds and mint is one of them. I love mint. Oh yeah. I want more of this. I don't care if I get the green chili. It's so good. I grew up in the Philippines. We use vinegar anywhere from marinating to cooking to dipping. It's like comfort for me. Awesome! And the thing with vinegar is you always have to balance it with something to kind of tame down its acidity. So I like that he put the honey and of course it's a healthy type of honey. So for all the health conscious people out there, this is the dish for you. Whoo! Awesome! Third course would be Patrani Maki which is what he prepared in the kitchen earlier. White pomfret fillet in special green masala roasted in banana leaf. It just amazes me that he thinks about all the details like going to the market, making relationship with the best supplier to get the freshest produce, freshest seafood possible. I mentioned earlier that it's green masala but actually he changed it to white because all the rest of the dishes are green. Again there's not actually masala in here. I always like eating fish with rice but it's very delicate. It's already good on its own. Just by looking at the pomfret fish, it looks small. But when you actually dig deeper into the flesh, it's actually meaty. The only oil that is in here is coming from the coconut. So it's very healthy, it's roasted, it's kind of steamed in a way. You have to try this. Wow! So freaking good! The fish is so fresh and the white masala is really flavorful without being really heavy on the spice. Because there's no masala at all, no ghee, no butter, no oil. It's a very very healthy fish. I am amazed at how he can make this flavorful. What a brilliant dish! Fourth course would be Jafrani Masala Chicken with Peas Pulao. Saffron infused medium spicy chicken served with pilaf. Anywhere I go and every restaurant I would always see biryani. And this is green pilaf that has a layer of onion in the middle. Green peas and almond in there. He used a special type of green sauce. This is masala chicken. The most important ingredient here is the saffron. That also adds to the flavor, aroma and the color. I think it's one of the most colorful plates I've had. So let's try to get a little bit of meat in there. It looks so tender and moist. Let's get a little bit of rice. And chef Ashis mentioned that there's maize oil that he added in this rice. So he fried the maize first in the oil and then he sauteed it with the rice. To kinda incorporate the flavor with every grain of the rice. Mmm! You gotta savor the flavor. The chicken, it's moist and tender. It's a savory dish but the flavor is subtle. It's not overwhelming. For first timers who will eat Indian food, I think this is a great start for you. It's not gonna shock you. If there's such thing as culture shock, there's spice shock. Especially for people who are not used into spices. The flavor coats into the entire chicken. I like that cashew nut paste which gives it a rich flavor and sticky texture. And of course the fluffy rice that goes with it. There's no food coloring at all. It's a very good way to present Indian food. This plate is so beautiful and the orange color from the chicken. This is such a great main dish. I'm going to add beetroot tomato onion salad. Fresh and a little bit sweet and tangy. It just makes it a balanced meal. From textures to flavors. Wow! Mmm! My biggest bite of the day. Mmm! Fifth course would be a dessert. It's called Gajar Hawa. And it's slow cooked carrot based medium sweet pudding. Chef Ashish told me that it's usually really sweet but he lessened the sweetness of it. Wow! Look at that! Egg! Egg! No this is not egg! You want carrot? I like egg. Wow! It's hot! It's not egg. It's carrot. Say carrot. I like carrot. Mimi will eat it okay? Oh smell it! Smell! Mmm! Smells so good right? Yummy? Mmm! Oh wow! I don't know how he did it but it's so good. I don't have a sweet tooth. Either I would end my meal with a very light dessert or I don't have a dessert at all. But this one it's not greasy. It's not overly sweet. So it's not cloying. So he julienned the carrots first. I don't know what to call this but this is what he used. I'm definitely gonna have one more. Let's cut it and make sure to get the almond in there. Mmm! So good! Hi my name is Ashish. I represent the brand Chef Club. I run this brand for a while. It's been six months. The whole concept behind Chef Club is more of experiential dining. You're dining not just for the food and the ingredients here but basically dining in the company of a chef. It's the overall experience, the elevated experience that helps diners really enjoy. Deepavali is a very significant festival in India. It's a Hindu festival but it's also celebrated by the Jains and the Sikhs. But we don't discriminate. In a country like India, it's a festival for everyone. Just simply represents the victory of good over evil. Hence a moment for everybody to rejoice like all other festivals. Typically in Indian community you would invite friends over to your place, chat and you know once again get together. To me it's also a festival of giving. I am committed to give half the revenues from the earnings of this dinner to charity. But I really encourage you to attend and help support me in the dinner which is on the 7th of November post Deepavali. Your help rendered will be enjoying the food and paying the money and for me I give that revenue for a cause. What an amazing day! Chef Ash is really brilliant. I couldn't fathom like how he visualizes, how he conceptualizes his menu. He thinks about his menu in advance without having to try them. He offers set menus that he hasn't tried yet and it always turns out great. And what I love about him is he brings his past memories and experiences with Indian food. He kind of ties it to his modern take on the dishes. So it doesn't look like the classic Indian food, it kind of tastes like that. You get his roots from his cooking. At the same time you feel his passion and creativity. Indian food is really hard to present but he did an awesome job. I just want to thank you Chef Ash and I want to salute you. This specific Deepavali set menu that Chef Ash created, it's for a good cause. So I highly recommend his food along with his cause. You can reserve a seat with him. I will put his links in the description box below. And so that's it for today. I hope you liked the video. If you'd like to see more of this type of content, please do let me know in the comment section below. Please subscribe and like this video and I'll see you on the next episode. Goodbye from Singapore.