Pictures from a Goan Kitchen

I snuck up on my mom making lunch, and this is what I found:

An assortment of fried fish - the flat slices are Kingfish, Visvon or Surmai. The others are pieces of Kalli, a fih available in Mumbai as well - very bony but flavourful. The The Spice Paste used is deceptively simple - tumeric and chilli powder in equal quantities, and salt. After marinating the fish, they are dusted with Semolina and shallow fried.

Clams, or thisra, are one of the more popular shellfish in Goa. Here, they have been prepared with lightly fried onion, green chilli, freshly grated coconut and tamarind in sukke, which literally means "dry". The bigger brothers of the

clams, like mussels (shinanyo) and oysters (kalva) are also rava fried.

And the staple - fish curry rice, or sheeth humon. The base of a curry is coconut, ground to a paste with turmeric, pepppercorns, tamarind and chilli. Chopped onions are either fried or boiled till translucent, and then the paste is allowed to boil with the fish. This is prawn curry. Prawns in curry always come with sidekicks - raw mangoes, okra, starfruit - depending on the reason. Here, mom used drumsticks. Smaller prawns are supposed to lend a greater flavour to the curry.