Savoi Plantation

My trip to Goa a few months back was packed with so many different culinary adventures, and one of my favorite experiences was visiting a 200-year-old, organic, spice plantation called Savoi . The farm was about an hour outside North Goa in an area called Ponda, and I ended up making that trek TWICE. I was rained out the first time (of course, the rain started when I was five minutes away) and walking the grounds in mud was not an option (why did I wear flip-flops?).

The first time, I ended up staying for lunch inside the tree house-like pergola. After a greeting of cool kokum juice and some biscuits, a feast ensued! Deliciously-stuffed, fried pomfret, fried shrimp, fresh salads and pickles, lentils, spicy crab, sour plum masala, finishing with cool, vermicelli pudding, and cucumber cake. The experience was pretty magical – watching the rain pelt down in the middle of lush, misty forest, in India and stuffed silly. Amazing.

The plantation has crops like coconuts, pineapple, jackfruit, and betel nut along with intercrop spices – black pepper, clove, cardamom, curry leaf, turmeric, and vanilla bean to name a few. Walking around the plantation, you learn where all the spices originally come from, how they are grown, and medicinal qualities to the different plants.

Betel nuts, by the way, are the seeds of a type of palm and are widely chewed (wrapped in betel leaves) because they’re a stimulant. The telltale sign that someone is chewing is a blood red-stained mouth. Check out how dangerous betel nut picking is!

Although there are a few other spice plantations nearby, many (shadily) offer commissions to taxi drivers, which Savoi doesn’t do. There is a pretty cool temple 15 to 20 minutes away called Mangueshi Temple – a great day would be driving out to see this temple in the morning, followed by lunch and walking the grounds of Savoi, and then heading back to North Goa to hit the beach for the afternoon…

Teflam

This is a bit of a one-off post. I usually try to give you posts that have a spice or an ingredient that you can find (perhaps with some digging) to incorporate into the food you cook at home. This is a bit different because this spice is one I discovered while in Goa. It’s nothing I had ever seen before, and I have been unable to find it anywhere here. But I feel like holding on to this is like keeping a secret – so I thought I would share it with you.

One of my favorite things to do when travelling is to go to a local market. And it’s always amazing to me to see that what is commonplace somewhere, literally growing like a weed and in everyone’s homes, can be so exotic elsewhere.

This allspice-looking berry is called teflam. I’ve also seen it referred to as tirphal or teffal fruit. It’s grown along the Konkan coast in India and is a distinctive ingredient in Goan cooking.

I bit into the fresh berries, which have a stronger taste than the dried, and, to me, they have a taste that is strongly reminiscent of kaffir lime, though with a bitter, peppery edge. The Portuguese called them “acrid lime”, and many believe that these berries are related to the Sichuan peppercorn. Quite frankly, there’s not a ton of consistent information out there about them.

I’d love to learn more about this spice myself, so if you have more information or have your own experience with teflam, please share!

Amigos

I am not going to do this post, this place, this experience justice in my writing. But I will still try.

Under the Nerul bridge in the Bardez district is a small, unpaved road that rolls down and loops around dead-ending into this amazing little restaurant, Amigos. Across from mangroves and right at the Sinquerim river’s edge (umm, not the easiest to find), arriving there gives you the feeling that you’ve happened upon a little slice of sublime privacy, cut off from the rest of the world. The restaurant is family run, helmed by Chef Sabitha, the matriarch of the family, and represents Goan home cooking at its finest.

This was to be the first (and best!) of a few restaurant experiences I planned during my trip. I arrived the first day excited to see what culinary delights were in store for me. I overzealously brought a chef’s coat and shoes, while the guys in flip flops and loose t-shirts expertly crumb-frying looked at me a bit skeptically. But then…the power went out! Day 1 was foiled.

I came back a few days later (more casually dressed mind you) and spent the day delving into Goan cuisine. Sabitha and I became fast friends, and I found myself somewhere between guest chef and guest – her tying my apron on me as I’m triple-washing the greens and tea breaks to chat about her daughter’s desire to travel the world.

With 18 years of running this restaurant under her belt, Sabitha is fastidious, focused on the quality of her masalas and the freshness of the ingredients. All of the recipes are her own – no training or cookbooks could teach her what she knows. Her palate is expert, so that even when I came back to teach her a few dishes (my favorite part of the trip), she could identify when the spiced pumpkin soup needed more acidity or how much sweetness should be in the dark chocolate pudding we made. And her speed? Let’s just say working quickly because you never know when there’s going to be a power outage makes you lightning fast…

The fish recheado is judiciously made – tangy, spicy and sweet. Recheado really means stuffed, and it’s a vestige of Portuguese culture. The whole fish is split open and stuffed with a deep, red masala that includes kashmiri chilies, sometimes onions, garlic, ginger, cumin, cloves, cinnamon, sugar and vinegar. I loved it rava-fried; in Goa, they use semolina instead of bread crumbs to fry, and it’s delicious.

Amigos is well-known for its fish, which is brought in fresh daily. I know first-hand – a flapping fish unnerved me more than once when I was chopping… And the crab masala is to die for! You have to call ahead or stop by and give them notice a day or two in advance. You will then have some of the most delicious crab you’ve ever eaten.

This is a must if you are in Goa. It’s where the locals go to get amazingly high quality, casual home cooking. Gazing at the river, with an ice-cold shandy, and a plate of rava prawns…it doesn’t get much better. I’m a huge fan of Sabitha, so please say hello for me if you do happen to make it there.

Amigos

Tel: +91 832 2301123

Below Nerul Bridge, Nerul, Bardez-Goa

Mace

I love this picture! I actually took this while visiting a completely amazing spice farm in Goa. We were walking through the lush forest of trees, examining spice by spice, and here we picked nutmeg and mace. The brownish-black pit is the nutmeg, and the red web or aril is mace.

I was inspired to post about mace by a culturally fantastic article about nutmeg from this month’s Saveur magazine. In it, you can see how nutmeg is used across many cuisines in so many different foods, from savoury West Indian dishes, to American desserts, to Italian greens. And, inextricably intertwined, so it is with mace.

Mace’s flavor is quite similar to nutmeg though I would say a bit more delicate in some ways and stronger in others. The warm, pumpkin pie-ness of nutmeg is a bit tempered here, whereas a peppery quality emerges and kind of hits you in the middle of your tongue. It’s completely versatile like nutmeg, cinnamon or cardamom in that it’s additive to both sweet and savoury dishes. I love to throw it in to soups like a bay leaf and let the flavor permeate the liquid. It’s also delicious in baked goods – biscotti, shortbread. I like it in meat dishes as well – the peppery part picks up so well with beef, pork, or even game.

The crimson red of the mace lace turns to a more burnt orange through drying, but it’s one of those spices, like nutmeg, that retain its flavor well when stored ground. So if you can only find it ground, it will still have great flavor.

Lucknow Fennel

Roaming around various markets and farms in Goa, I was overwhelmed by the abundance of fresh spices. I brought back the most beautiful cinnamon from a farm I visited, incredible white poppy seeds from a popular indoor market, and all sorts of nonsense from the famed, outdoor Mapusa Friday market the day before I left. I smuggled in the lot (smuggled as in declared them, carried them in my hand, and chatted away with the customs officer about cooking after…) and am now happily sitting on some prized spices. They are incredibly fresh, distinct, aromatic – it’s sad how much of their potency is lost by the time they get to the supermarket shelves.

One of the spices I brought back is Lucknow Fennel, which is believed to be one of the highest quality fennel seeds out there. These seeds are primarily grown in Lucknow, the capital of Uttar Pradesh in India. They are smaller, greener, and definitively sweeter and more aromatic than traditional fennel seeds. In South Asia, they are often used as a digestive or breath freshener.

I’ve seen this spice used in desserts and am debating baking them into a shortbread cookie myself. They also would be fantastic in a riz au lait or kheer or even with yogurt, honey, and fruit. I usually prefer traditional fennel seeds for more savoury applications (LOVE it in sausage and pork dishes), but love the sweeter crunch these provide for breads.

This type of fennel seed is easily found at ethnic grocers and online spice providers.

Ritz Classic

I’m back from Goa and reflecting on all of the amazing food experiences I had while I was there. I’m incredibly thankful I stayed with family – it allowed me to get a completely non-tourist perspective on everything from what restaurants locals really go to, typical foods that are cooked at home, and even what the best markets are for food shopping. I packed in a serious culinary schedule over the last two weeks (and have the extra lbs to show for it…).

Ritz Classic was just one of these restaurants located in Panjim and I went there for lunch during the first few days of my trip. Now, don’t let the décor fool you. The yellow crown molding, palm trees painted on the walls, waiters in bow ties – it’s all part of the charm. And, besides me of course, I did not see a single tourist in there. The food there is a trifecta – authentic, delicious, and cheap.

Since this was one of my first few days, I went all-in and ordered the pork vindaloo. For those that don’t know, vindaloo is one of the hottest curries in India and is actually a Portuguese tradition – tangy, serious heat, and a touch of sweetness. The waiter brought out some sort of rookie vindaloo, which I didn’t find hot at all, and I had to level with him. I told him I can take the heat, and he should give me what he serves the locals. So he came with the thunder and brought out the real vindaloo. I seriously sweated through the rest of the meal – it was, if I’m being honest, almost too hot for me, but I couldn’t fold after all the fuss I had made.

My aunt goes there for their crab, which she claims is the best in Goa, and given my crab obsession, I had to try it. I made the HUGE mistake of going into this feast wearing silk. Why? The flimsy little paper napkins were no match for the flying, masala-coated crab, and I finished the meal satisfied though grease-stained.

Shrimp-stuffed papads were first out and were flavorful and perfectly crisp. Fried, “rawa” fish, a Goan specialty using semolina in lieu of breadcrumbs, was ridiculously fresh with the perfect amount of crunch. Of course, the pork vindaloo was rich and spicy and painful…and the crab was perfect. Particularly since I’ve never eaten that much crab for something that converts to around $3!

In fact, the whole meal for the four of us came out to something like $14. It was insane. This is definitely a first stop for anyone visiting to get a true taste of Goa…

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