Sunday, October 14, 2012

Spicy Vegetable "Samosas"

Spicy Vegetable Samosas 3

Our theme at I Heart Cooking Clubs this week, where we are cooking with the fabulous Madhur Jaffrey for the next six months, is "Spice Bazaar".  So many herbs and spices conjure up such wonderful memories for me.  I told you last week about my grandmother's spice cupboard - in a time when you typically would not have found much other than a bit of ground cinnamon and ground ginger in the cupboards of your typical Kiwi housewife, this was a pretty unique feature.  How I used to love the aromas of cumin, cardamom, turmeric and garam masala, smells which still transport me back to my childhood, though as a kid I never for a moment realised that wasn't the norm.  Not content with just her packets of ground spices, my grandmother also kept a small kitchen garden at the back door.  This wee garden always boasted several chilli plants, the ubiquitous clumps of parsley & mint, and lots of coriander plants.  Of course she would use this fresh, but she would also deliberately allow some of the plants to go to seed so that she would have a constant supply of coriander seeds.  Whilst such things might be common in many New Zealand gardens today, that was certainly not the case back then.

The other day I needed a bit of portable food to take to work for my dinner break.  With a bit of filo pastry in the fridge that needed to be used up, I thought some Spicy Vegetable Samosas would fit the bill perfectly.  Now do note that I am taking a bit of creative license here with the term samosa.  A true samosa normally uses quite a unique pastry which, after filling and folding, is then deep fried.  I'm still determined to give that a try, but on this occasion the filo was to hand, which made for a great substitute as well as saving on a bit of time.

The filling was delicious and "homely", and although I don't recall my grandmother ever making samosas, some similar kind of "savoury" - a flaky puff pastry case with a filling such as this - would have been far more likely to grace a plate for a gathering than the typical sausage roll.  Personally, I found these to be only very mildly spiced on the heat scale.  That said, the other mouth I feed declared them to be way too hot, so depending on your tastes you may want to cut back a bit on either the chilli or the cayenne pepper.

Spicy Vegetable Samosas Recipe
Adapted from a recipe by Madhur Jaffrey from
Makes 12
Vegetarian

12 sheets filo pastry
sunflower oil

4x medium sized potatoes (about 800g - 1-1/2 to 1-3/4 lb)
4 tablespoons sunflower oil
1/2 medium sized leek, thinly sliced
175g (6 oz) frozen peas, thawed
5cm (2 inch) piece fresh ginger, grated
1 small green chilli, deseeded & finely chopped
3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh coriander
3 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon garam masala
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
juice of 1x lemon

Cut potatoes in half and boil in their skins until fork tender.  Drain and set aside to cool completely.  Once potatoes have cooled completely, remove skins and cut into small dice.  You want the cubes of potato to be roughly the size of the peas.

Heat the 4 tablespoons of oil in a large pan over medium heat.  Add the leeks and fry until softened, and just barely beginning to turn golden.  Add  peas, ginger, chilli, fresh coriander and water.  Stir for a few minutes until everything is well combined and peas are warm and tender.

Add potatoes, salt, ground coriander, garam masala, cumin, cayenne and lemon juice to the pan.  Stir to combine, and cook over gentle heat for a few minutes, stirring from time to time.  Taste and add a little more salt or lemon juice if necessary.

Remove from heat and allow to cool.

Pea & Potato Filling for Samosas

Lay sheets of filo pastry out on a clean tea towel on your kitchen bench.  You will be working with one sheet at a time and, as sheets can dry out and become brittle very quickly, you should keep the remaining sheets of filo covered with a damp tea towel while you work.

Place a single filo sheet on another clean tea towel in front of you, and begin to fill and fold your pastries, following the directions in the following photos:

Folding Samosas 1
Lay sheet of filo on tea towel with long edge towards you and brush lightly with with oil

Folding Samosas 2
Fold in one third from one of the short ends, and then brush the folded-in section with a little more oil

Folding Samosas 3
Fold in the remaining third and again brush with a little oil

Folding Samosas 4
Place filling in a roughly "triangular" shape on the bottom left corner of the filo

Folding Samosas 5
Fold the bottom right corner of the filo over the filling

Folding Samosas Collage
Now keep folding, end over end, until you get to the top.
Then fold the end over and brush with a little more oil to seal.

Once all the pastries have been folded, place them on a baking sheet, seam side down, brushing the top lightly with a little more oil.  Put into a warm oven, preheated to 175 degrees C (350 degrees F), and bake until golden brown and crispy - about 35 minutes.

Remove from oven.  Can be served hot straight from the oven, or these are just as good warm or at room temperature.

Spicy Vegetable Samosas 1

If you would like to get to know Madhur a little better, then do go and visit my friends at I Heart Cooking Clubs and see what they've all cooked up ...

IHCC

... or check out Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking and many of Madhur's other great titles available from Amazon USA, Amazon UK or Fishpond NZ.

          Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cookery

I am sharing this post this week with my friends Michelle at Ms. enPlace hosting See Ya In the Gumbo, and with April at The 21st Century Housewife hosting Gallery of Favourites.


30 comments:

  1. You have done a fantastic job in making these samosas. They are simply irresistible!

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  2. Beautiful Sue! All those herbs & spices.....delicious :) Hope you are having a lovely weekend!

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    1. Thanks Mairi - this was a really nice combination of spices - warming & comforting. I think these will become a regular in my repertoire for sure. I had a lovely lazy weekend - hope you did too.

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  3. Samosas are one of my favourite Indian snack! I have always eaten the one with potatoes and meat filling. Your vegetarian version using cauliflower sounds delicious. A habit of mine while eating samosas is to have a cup of hot plain sweet tea together!

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    1. Joyce, these would definitely be great with a minced meat & potato filling, and Madhur does suggest another one of her recipes for those who want a meat filling. I'd like to try that one too.

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  4. These look delicious. I have a lot of arguments with my husband about samosas - in South Africa the Indian community often make them with filo pastry and a meat filling, whereas the ones I always had in Australia were like you described with the special pastry and a potato and pea filling.

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    1. Thanks, Foodycat. That's very interesting about the South African Indian community using filo. It certainly had its advantages I think - no standing over them while you fry a few at a time. They can all go in the oven at once and you can go do other things while they cook.

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  5. Funny, I've been thinking of making samosas all week. These look very nice with the filo dough, but yes, we always prepare them with a pastry dough. Looking forward to joining IHCC next week.

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    1. Thanks, Denise. I'm still eager to try them with the pastry dough when I have a little more time to spare.

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  6. Sue-I just love anything wrapped in flaky pastry, so your creative license with samosas sounds perfect to me. These little goodies sound just about right for Sunday lunch.

    I'm also really high on garam masala right now after cooking with it this week. Enjoyed reading about your grandmother and her spices.

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    1. Thanks, Michelle. Yes, these would be great for a Sunday lunch, with a bit of salad & a chutney they would make a really nice, light meal. Great also for a picnic. You could also make them smaller which make them a great pass around for a party. Now you're hooked on garam masala you'll wonder how come you've never used it before.

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  7. These look really great. I've discovered the filo trick for samosas too. Authenticity lost, perhaps, but they taste great and feel much more virtuous without the frying! You can wrap all kinds of odd bits of leftovers like this.

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    1. Thanks, Kaye. I agree with you - it may be a small sacrifice in authenticity, but really for me cooking is more about "borrowing" from other cultures & adapting their influences to suit my needs rather than trying to be truly authentic. I agree too that using the filo does seem a bit healthier than deep frying.

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  8. @Angie's RecipesThanks so much Angie, and thanks for visiting - hope you'll stop by again :-)

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  9. Oh wow these look good!!! These would be absolutely perfect for me to bring to school for lunch!

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    1. Thanks, Pam - yes, these are brilliant for school lunches.

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  10. I love samosas - what a great idea to use up your leftover filo for them!

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  11. Thanks, Natashya - using filo made me feel very virtuous, both on the "using up leftovers" front and the dietary front. These will definitely make another appearance around here.

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  12. Oh I can smell these from here in Auckland and just want a bite! Love spicy food and love that I can use filo.

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    1. Thanks, Lesley. Shame Auckland is a bit far away, otherwise I'd send some over for you. Using filo is definitely a whole lot easier than making pastry.

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  13. Thanks for linking, Sue! And thanks for the tip on making the samosas smaller for party food.

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    1. Thanks, Michelle - I think the little ones would be great - can't wait to try them.

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  14. Yum, those look delicious. I love samosas and reading this made me hungry for one straight away :o)

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    1. Thanks, Julie. I think that once these have been prepared, you could very easily freeze them. Then you could easily whip one out and bake from frozen when you really do feel like one "straight away" :-)

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  15. AWESOME recipe! I love all of the spices in this and samosas are really such a fun portable food!

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    1. Thanks, Joanne - I love things like this that are good for "food on the run"

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  16. I love samosas, but I have never made them from scratch. Your recipe is perfect for someone like me :) I also really like the filling recipe with all the wonderful spices.

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  17. Your Samosas were popular at last week's See Ya In the Gumbo. Will be featured this evening! Thanks again for sharing.

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  18. I found this recipe pinned on Pinterest and made it for iftaar last night. It was a huge hit at the mosque! So I've made even more of it today for another iftaar we're invited to elsewhere tonight. I wanted to send my gratitude to you for sharing this recipe.

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