The time has come for another in my (regrettably very) occasional series of posts about interesting and unusual soups. And this time, I’m featuring a soup that is not at all, and yet exactly what its name implies. And it’s another globe-trotter.
Until very recently, I had always believed that Mulligatawny was a soup of Irish derivation. Something laden with potatoes and cheap cuts of lamb perhaps; a cousin to the Scotch broth or the Welsh cawl. I even thought the soup was named for a particular town. After all, with that spelling, and how the sound of it rolls off one’s tongue, it does rather conjure the image of a sleepy Irish village nestled into green hills and populated by Maureen O’Hara lookalikes brandishing shillelaghs. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Mulligatawny comes not from the verdant Irish shores, but rather from the steamier climes of Southeastern India. What sounded so Irish to me was really the typically Anglo bowdlerisation of a Tamil name; Millagu-meaning pepper, and Thanni- meaning water. So Pepper Water. In it’s original form, it was actually more of a sauce than a soup, soup not really figuring prominently amongst the Indian or Tamil cuisine. This sauce would have been made from stock, coconut milk, spices and chiles, and served with rice over fish or chicken, or even lamb. It was during the period of the Raj, when cooks for the English had to meld cooking styles to satisfy their Colonial masters, that this “Pepper Water” sauce became a soup, as soup does figure prominently amongst the British cuisine. Then, like kedgeree, it found its way to Britain in its new form. Having made it to these shores- at least in the form of recipes- Mulligatwany got its new Anglicised name, and lost even more of its original form. Gone was the coconut milk (not usually available in the UK until the latter half of the last century), and the soup got thinner, becoming more of a spicy, currified broth. Rice was still added, although some even substituted pasta for the rice, which must have made for a rather odd combination. Mango chutney was still used as a garnish, and then was cooked into the soup, giving it a fruity sweetness. Most sacriligeous of all, it frequently used beef and beef stock as its base. When I told a Tamil friend of mine that the Mulligatawny I had sampled was a beef version, he roared with laughter. Beef is almost never eaten in India, as of course the cow is considered sacred among the largely Hindu population.
So the Mulligatawny I ate- and very much enjoyed even though it was of the commercially produced variety- bears really only a distant familial resemblance to its ancestor. It does however, merit appreciation, as it speaks of two very important aspects of the British palate: the love of culinary adventure, and the love of spicy heat. All too often I’ve heard complaints about the blandness of British food, and it’s a very unfair complaint indeed. It is not because of the large Indian and Asian population in the UK that Chicken Tikka Masala is the nation’s favourite food. In fact, said dish is yet another Anglification of an Indian dish, and for the most part eaten only by us caucasians. In fact Indian food became hugely popular here before the great migration to the UK. Long before every high street had a “Good Curry House”, kedgeree was being served at midnight breakfasts after debutante balls. Returning Colonists had brought back these flavours and spices, and so they trickled down from the British Upper Class. Which is not to say that this was Britain’s first introduction to hot and spicy food. Far from it. The English have long had a great love of heat-laden condiments. Consider the great tradition of “Deviling”. Chutney may be another name of Asian derivation, but the British have been pickling and spicing fruits and vegetables for centuries. This would of course have been due to seasonal needs, but these preserved fruits would not only have been a source of sweetness at the winter table. Piccalili- the hot and yellow pickled cauliflower- has been around for centuries, and in fact the English mustard used to flavour it is perhaps only second to Japanese Wasabi in palate-searing heat. And as for spices, since the spice route opened up back even before the time of Marco Polo, spice had been currency, and a major status symbol for any English household. Like most of Northern Europe, the British have a great love of horseradish, that eye-watering root without which no roast beef dinner is complete.
So now I am most eager to try Mulligatawny in its original form with all the true coconut-sweet heat of the Subcontinent. But I quite like our modern British version too. Beef or no beef.
There are so many ways to approach the topic of food and everyone does so in their own way. So I decided that to do justice to this most personal of subjects, I needed additional voices to chime in. Result? A series of fabulous foodie guest posters. To kick off this new feature, Maribeth tackles Oreos.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Navigating An Oreo Cookie World
by Maribeth MK
There are certain foods that I can just never buy, because I know when I bring them home I have to eat every last one. Oreos are one of them. I honestly don’t think if I queried anyone they’d say they eat them by the cookie. By the sleeve, perhaps. And we all know “one box of cookies” is somehow strangely more comforting than “sixty cookies” in ones diet diary. If one records such things at all.
I have no idea whatsoever why this is true of something as simplistic and un-home baked as an Oreo. Now, your plain, average “single stuf” Oreo is what I can’t bring home or it will be gone in a matter of days or, if I’m really on a roll, hours. Dipped in milk and bitten into. With double stuf you have to take off the top cookie, eat the ghastly middle, and then the remaining cookie (or, as my brother did, feed them to the dog). I had a friend tell me he simply crushed his Oreos into a glass of milk and ate the mixture with a spoon. Notice I said HE; no woman I know would ever admit to this behavior. I’ve revealed all I’m going to with regard to my Oreo hoarding, hiding and devouring habits.
According to Wikipedia, the Oreo was developed in 1912 (preceded by the very similar Hydrox in 1908, but Hydrox was overtaken by the Oreo and eventually withdrawn from the market in 1999). Originally its center was whipped lard (not surprising) and now it is supposedly “healthier” and made with hydrogenated vegetable oils which we’ve now been told will kill you even more quickly than the lard.
Frankly, if I was health conscious enough to care, I wouldn’t be eating Oreos at all, let alone fiddling with the ingredients. “Would you rather I drop a Prius or a Mini Cooper on your head from a great height?”
There are many variations on your average Oreo. Ones that I have tried (in no particular order):
Vanilla Oreos: Too sweet for me, but my son loves them.
Vanilla Double Stuf Oreos: See above, but these are meted out at a ratio of one double stuf=two regular Oreos.
Vanilla Oreos, chocolate cream center: OK, just polished off a package of those the other day and I knew damned well I shouldn’t have even looked at them but noooooo. They were especially good warm from the car. And at this point I do have to mention they come in sleeves less often-only at 7-11, that I can find – and now come in this annoying packaging that you have to peel back the top and it sticks all over to itself and God forbid you don’t put it back just right or they all go stale and my picky kid won’t eat them stale so I have to eat all the stale ones myself. So what if I’ve lied and told him they went stale when I’d actually just eaten all of them? Sheesh. Not like it’s going to bring down showers of frogs on my head or anything. But I digress.
Chocolate Oreos, orange flavored cream center: They should have said in big letters that the stupid things HAD ORANGE FLAVORING AND WEREN’T JUST REGULAR OREOS COLORED ORANGE FOR HALLOWEEN. Yes, they were awful and I think I still managed of eat most of them.
Chocolate Oreos, mint flavored center: Toothpaste sandwich, anyone?
Oreo Cakesters: Do these even count as cookies? I seriously doubt it. The chocolate ones turned my stomach and reminded me of Devil Dogs, which I used to love, but I got a bad batch once where the suet wasn’t blended correctly so there were all these little clear suet balls like tiny bbs of fat in my Devil Dog and it was night and I was watching Dumbo – the “pink elephants on parade” part. But I digress. Cakesters The vanilla version is sweet and gross and I like them better.
Chocolate-covered Oreos: Too MUCH. Plus don’t work with milk. Not milk’s favorite cookie.
Mini Oreos: Also not milk’s favorite cookie. In addition they tend to be all smashed to dust in the bag and the cream filling gets under your nails and apparently all over the beige upholstery in the back seat of your practically new and not yet paid for Outback. No, I did not choose the color of the car. Did I mention that I found the remains of mini Oreos in the pocket of a child’s winter jacket that had been repeatedly washed? I couldn’t get them out for love or money and the jacket had to go.
Deep-fried Oreos: Let’s face it – deep fried=good. But even one is a multi person job to eat and sits in your stomach like a rock afterward. For days. I prefer the deep fried pickles, myself. OK, now I want a pickle.
Vending-machine Oreos: Are apparently smaller than regular Oreos. 10% less mass. Wow.
100 Calorie Oreo Packs: Cream and fun free. Should be renamed “desperation.” Or maybe “disappointment.” But again, if dieting, why even visit the cookie section? Maybe you should just whip out a string bikini and stand there in the middle of the aisle waving and stuffing your face?
Sugar-free Oreos: I guess. They cost twice as much as regular Oreos but hey – 10 fewer calories AND 450% more fiber! But sorry, people . . . 0.5 more grams of fat. Never had em. See above.
Reduced-fat Oreos: Same price as regular Oreos. 10 fewer calories, all the sugar, 35% less fat. I know I’m sounding like a broken record here, but see above.
Triple Stuf Oreos: Who knew? Nice try, guys, but let’s face it…even double stuf are kind of gross and who the heck needs triple stuf? Apparently NOBODY because I never even saw them on a shelf and I hit the grocery store a lot. They came and went in 2006. You think they’d have learned with the Big Stuf Oreo in 1991. 316 calories and 13 grams of fat. FYI, a 4 ounce sirloin contains 9 grams of fat.
There are also Oreo Sippers – which I have refused to get , as I can see in my mind’s eye they will get too soggy and gross to eat after being used as a straw AND make the milk somehow undrinkable. There’s also Oreo cookies and cream ice cream (meh), Oreo cheesecake, Oreo Blizzards at Dairy Queen, Oreo candy bars, Oreo pie crust and Oreo cereal (are you KIDDING ME with the crap they try and push on the kids? Discontinued in 2007). No wonder they are “the best selling cookie of the 20th century.” I do have to admit it rankles me less than I expected that my son prefers them to a homemade cookie warm from the oven.
But I digress. In any case, off to have another Oreo before I turn in.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
About the Author: Maribeth describes herself as a single midlife mom of one, renowned for her brilliant handling of the bad choices she makes. I would add that she is a fine singer, an insightful cookie critic and knows how to really rock a retro look.
Happy Peanut Butter Cookie Day, all. I’d be more excited about it if I didn’t loathe peanut butter so much. But cookies? Cookies rock!
Still, the day is what the day – and we here at Fabulous Foodie are not all anti-peanut butter. In fact, some here hold such strong views on the topic that they called National Peanut Butter Day their “favorite food holiday of the year” and called for “parades with beige banners, complete with majorettes tossing their batons whilst smiling through clenched jaws because their teeth are stuck together with the ol’ pb, and Peter Pan scarfing contests.”
So, as you can see – he feels passionately enough about the stuff for both of us.
My favorite walking tour company in London – London Walks – has been filming parts of their walks. I’ve been on – oh, about 15-20 of their tours and they are GREAT! Oddly enough, I’ve never gone on their foodie tour but now that I’ve seen this video, it’s on the top of my “next time in London” to do list.
Last month, I was carrying on about cookbooks and specifically about a round up of 25 Beautiful Old Cookbooks on Abebooks and for a while I was all about cookbooks “of a certain age” (and subsequently spent some considerable time looking at vintage community cookbooks – community cookbooks being among some of my favorites since you can pretty much assume that these are recipes that have gotten a considerable workout from the contributor.
Not unsurprisingly, my book list just got longer and now includes “Porch Parties” for two reasons.
A) because I need some new cocktails to keep happy hour from becoming too one note and
B) because after years of saying I was going to do up my terrace, I actually did. Now it is more an outdoor room than it has ever been and I intend to use it as such.
All of which is a round about way of asking – what is your favorite summer cocktail and refreshing summer snack and/or treat? Me? I’ve been slowly developing a new cocktail called a cranky apple. It’s not perfected yet but I am committed to thorough testing (at least until the vodka and cran-apple juice run out).
There are certain foods that I can just never buy, because I know when I bring them home I have to eat every last one. Oreos are one of them. I honestly don’t think if I queried anyone they’d say they eat them by the cookie. By the sleeve, perhaps. And we all know “one box of cookies” is somehow strangely more comforting than “sixty cookies” in ones diet diary. If one records such things at all.
