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Spice Affair, a Place to Indulge

That isn't your everyday taco on the plate at the top. 

The wrapper is an Indian bread called phulka, and the filling is chicken tikka masala. It's lounge food at the new Indian restaurant Spice Affair on La Cienega Boulevard in Beverly Hills. 

Replacing Tanzore, with new owners and management, Spice Affair tweaks Indian food with contemporary and California touches. A wine list and innovative cocktails carry out its brand, "an Indian indulgence."

To the left of the taco is sev puri, stuffed with white peas and sprinkled with fine strands of sev, a fried Indian snack made from chickpea flour.

Really cool with these spicy flavors is the Mumbai Mule--vodka, ginger liqueur, cardamom honey and a lime wedge in an icy copper mug (above).

Then on to dinner in an elegant, quiet, dark room decorated in soft, earthy tones drawn from the subtle colors of Indian spices. Quiet means no sitar music, and no incense or Ganesh figures. 

Start with tandoor-grilled marinated artichoke hearts (left). At the right you can barely see a mixture of duck meat and dates on a bit of Indian bread that is as seductive an appetizer as you can find. In the center is a plate decoration, not something to eat. 

The menu is long, and heavy on frilly adjectives. But there's no nonsense about rack of lamb that is marinated for 48 hours with yogurt and Indian spices (above). 

Chicken biryani comes sealed with a layer of dough (above). Lift the lid and you'll inhale the exotic scents of kewra and saffron.

There's everyday Indian vegetarian food too, like okra seasoned with garlic, onion, tomatoes, amchur (mango powder), cumin and red chili. And eggplant with caramelized onions and almonds.

The eggplant and okra are at the back of this plate. At the right are shrimp and scallops cooked Kerala style with coconut milk and curry leaves. At the bottom are South Indian black pepper shrimp. A spoonful of chicken biryani is at the left.

Another vegetarian specialty is chickpea and crackling caramelized walnut kebabs, accompanied by walnut-yogurt chutney. 

Desserts include classic carrot halwa, rose-flavored kulfi (ice cream) and mango mousse with strawberries and blueberries (above).

The menu--click here to see it-- was created by Anupam Bhatia, who also oversees the cocktail list, and chef Nimish Bhatia. The owners are Sonia Batra and Puneet Chandak, who have another Indian restaurant, Broadway Masala, in Redwood City. The menu there was also designed by Anupam Bhatia.   

Spice Affair, 50 N. La Cienega Blvd, #120, Beverly Hills, CA 90211. Tel: (310) 400-6800.

Top Treats from the Hospitality Expo

It's great fun to roam the aisles at the Western Foodservice & Hospitality Expo, even if  you're not in the market for restaurant supplies.

This year's show at the Los Angeles Convention Center (at top) included an International Showcase, Japan Pavilion and Latino Foods Pavilion along with dishware, machinery, food containers, plastic cutlery, pest control services and other behind the scenes restaurant needs.  

I picked up samples of everything from Pumie, a pumice scouring stick for cleaning porcelain and tile (or scrubbing feet) to Bon Appé's nutella fudge brownie cake that will stay fresh at room temperature for 14 days, or so they claimed. The maker is Upper Crust in Toronto, Canada.   

One of the tastiest snacks was Pepe's caramel popcorn laced with chile de árbol--hot, sweet and impossible to stop eating (above). It's from Rudolph Foods in Lima, Ohio. 

Its rival in the Japanese Pavilion was T-Pops Tokyo style sweet and creamy matcha popcorn, one of several types of popcorn with Japanese flavors (above). These were  "proudly made in L.A.," the labels say, not Japan. 

El Guitarrón agave wine from Oaxaca (above) is aimed at restaurants that need to make margaritas without tequila. It's a nice drink on its own, I thought.

Ice Dome sake (above), which comes from a 600-year-old family-owned company in Japan, was processed in an ice dome at 10 below zero. After all that chilling, this premium sake should be served cold, not warm. 

Healthtasty offered juices made from frozen fruit pulp from Colombia (above). It was a rare chance to taste Colombian lulo fruit, along with guanabana, passion fruit and others. 

Satsuki rice (above), a short-grained rice for sushi, is being grown in Uruguay, where soil, water and climate are similar to those in Japan. Recommended also for porridge, rice pudding and any dish that requires a stickier rice, it will come in handy if the California drought decreases rice production here, a rep at the booth said.  

Aguacates Chahena from Uruapan, Michoacán, handed out bags the color of avocado pulp  Right now, all Mexican avocados exported to the United States are from Michoacán, a booth attendant said, but in the future we may also get avocados from the state of Jalisco.

Nature's Charm exhibited a condensed coconut milk fountain in which to dip banana slices (above). The company's evaporated and condensed coconut milks come from Thailand.

Sri Lanka provided cinnamon sticks (above) that were surprisingly sweet when you chewed them. 

A real winner from California was lamb bacon produced by Superior Farms of Davis. This cured and hardwood smoked slab bacon is made from lamb breast. It's new this year, but only restaurants can get it. Sadly, it won't be in retail markets, because you'd love to put it into a BLT, which in this case stands for bacon-lamb-tomato.

Fortunately, Fresh Origins sugar crystals flavored with herbs, flowers and fruits  (above) are being launched into retail. These colorful little shots of sugar can be used in countless ways. Cilantro sugar may sound weird, but it's delicious, fun for rimming a margarita glass. Basil crystals on vanilla ice cream? Why not? Other flavors are cranberry, mint, rose, hibiscus and fennel. The herbs and flowers are grown on a farm in San Marcos, California.

Don Chente Bar-Grill & Lounge on Figueroa Street across from the Convention Center handed out tastes of mole poblano on chips and cochinita pibil smothered with pipián sauce. Pretty girls in elaborate costumes and a skull-faced catrina figure (above) brought over from the restaurant made this one of the most colorful booths.

Working a show like this is hard, so massage chairs were full, and electronic gadgets that ping muscles to relax and soothe them were getting lots of use. Another place to relax was the California Craft Brewers Pavilion, where one could chill out with cool IPAs, Pilsners and others before heading out into the warm evening. 

Attended by restaurant and food service industry professionals, the expo opened Sunday and ends today.   

Rougail--An Exotic "French" Dish

What a surprise, to discover in a French cookbook a sausage dish so spicy and delicious that I'm going to make it over and over. You'll love it too, because it's easy, fun for company, and you can change it around as you please. 

This dreamy dish is Sausages with Tomatoes and Golden Rice from Susan Herrmann Loomis's new book, "In a French Kitchen" (Gotham Books, $26.95, above).  

Its French name is Rougail Creole, and it is worlds apart from my vision of French cooking, which is creamy sauces, lots of butter, wine, complex stocks and expensive ingredients, well seasoned but mild.   

The recipe is legitimately French, because it came from one of Loomis's friends in France. But its real source is Reunion Island, a French department in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Africa and east of Madagascar.

Reunion is tropical, with a cultural mix that includes Indians, Africans and Chinese. There, a rougail can be anything from a crushed mango or tomato salad to a main dish such as Loomis's sausage and rice.

To show how important rougail is, there are 19 versions in a Reunion Island cookbook, "Les Meilleures Recettes de la Cuisine Reunionnaise" (Times Editions), that I picked up in Singapore.

But I put that on a shelf and didn't learn about rougail until I went to Melissa's Produce, where Loomis presented and signed her book (above).

There, rougail was one of the dishes set out for lunch, along with mushrooms stuffed with Spanish chorizo, melon salad on shredded zucchini, lettuce with classic vinaigrette, braised broccoli, radishes on buttered bread sprinkled with French sea salt, and chocolate-lined raspberry tarts.

Loomis's recipe calls for fresh smoked pork or chicken sausages. Made that way at Melissa's (above), it wasn't highly spiced.  My version was really zingy, because I used Mexican chorizo, not the greasy crumbly kind you get in supermarkets, but high quality chorizo from Marconda's meat shop in the Original Farmers Market in Los Angeles.

This type of chorizo can be sliced without falling apart, which is essential for the recipe. It simmers in tomato sauce along with onion, garlic, ginger, thyme sprigs, lime zest and a small hot chile, which is optional in case you don't like much heat.

This mixture goes over basmati rice colored bright yellow with turmeric. On the side you could serve Loomis's salad of mixed greens with classic vinaigrette and afterward one of the homey desserts from the book. The one that caught my eye is a quick lemon cake that, conveniently, is the next recipe after the sausage dish. 

SAUSAGES WITH TOMATOES AND GOLDEN RICE
(Rougail Creole)
From "In a French Kitchen" by Susan Herrmann Loomis

For the Rice:

1 cup basmati rice, rinsed
2 cups water
2 teaspoons ground turmeric
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 fresh or dried bay leaf

For the Rougail:

1 pound fresh smoked pork or chicken sausages, preferably not lean, pierced with a skewer in several places
2 large onions, diced
2 large cloves garlic, green germ removed if present
1 (1/2-inch) round fresh ginger, peeled
1 (28-ounce) can whole tomatoes
Zest of 1 lime, minced
10 sprigs fresh thyme
1 fresh or dried bay leaf
1 birds'-eye pepper or other hot pepper (optional)
Salt, pepper
Fresh herb sprigs, for garnish

To make the rice: place the rice grains in a medium saucepan. Add the water, turmeric, salt and bay leaf and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.

Reduce the heat so the water is boiling gently and cook uncovered until there are holes in the top of the rice and the water has evaporated below the surface of the rice.

Reduce the heat to low, cover and cook for 10 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and do not remove the cover. Let stand until you are ready to serve, at least 10 minutes.

To make the rougail: Brown the sausages on all sides in a large, heavy-bottomed skillet over medium high heat, about 6 minutes. (If you are using lean sausages, you'll want to brown the sausages in a generous tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil.) Remove the sausages from the pan and transfer them to a cutting board. Let them cool and then slice them. 

Place the onions in the pan and cook, stirring, until they are golden, 6 to 8 minutes. Add the garlic and ginger, stir, then add the tomatoes with their juices and stir, breaking them up into large pieces as you stir.

Reduce the heat to medium and add the sausages, lime zest, thyme, bay leaf and hot pepper to the tomato mixture. Season with salt and pepper, stir, and cook until the mixture is boiling, then reduce the heat to medium. Cover and cook, stirring from time to time, until the sausages are cooked through and the sauce has thickened, 25 to 30 minutes.

Remove the herbs and the hot pepper from the rougail. Adjust the seasoning. To serve, divide the rice among four shallow soup bowls. Divide the rougail among the bowls, placing it atop the rice but leaving some rice to show. Garnish with the herbs, and serve immediately.

Makes 4 generous servings.