Aloo Anday is simple, basic and economic. It reminds me of lazy afternoon lunches at home, or days when you’re completely hungover and in a food-induced coma and just need the simplest of the simple. These Aloo Anday are also approved by my 2 year old daughter, Z. I actually had a pretty hard time trying to take these pictures! She was busy by my side trying to prod and poke the Aloo and Anday, as children do with food they want! She very happily asked for them the next day for breakfast, which she had alongside some toasted bread.
How To Make a Good Shorba
I spoke about this in my Matar Gosht post - making a good shorba has been a challenge for me in the past. A good shorba is smooth, no visible large chunks of tomato and onion, it is flavourful and is dyed a shade of brown-red. And according to my Mother, something that has really stuck by me over the years, a good shorba will have a rim of orange running around the sides of the curry. In regards to a smooth shorba, this will require breaking down the onions and tomatoes completely, till they are melded into one jammy masala. This can be done by some hardcore bhun-ing at the masala frying stage - add a few splashes of water if you feel the masala isn’t smooth enough and continue stirring till the masala is smooth. If you don’t have the time or patience for this, then the food processor is your best friend. Blitz everything in the processor and you’ll have a perfect base ready in seconds. Additionally, you have to keep an eye on the amount of onion and tomato in a shorba. You need far less than you’d think - I learn this the hard way! If you use too much, your shorba will be thick, possibly gloopy and not smooth and soup-like we want. I would find this SUCH a difficult concept to get my head around for some reason! Eventually, a rule of thumb I managed to figure out was - 1 medium onion and 2 small tomatoes is enough for plenty of shorba to serve 4 people.
Handling the Anday (eggs) in your Aloo Anday
I like to serve my eggs halved, added directly to my serving bowl so the side that is facing me remains clear and not marred with shorba. I prefer how this looks - the lighter whites/yellows of the egg look great against the darker browns/reds of the shorba. When halving the eggs, I think it’s important to make sure you are halving directly through the centre of the yolk. Perhaps you’ll know from experience, when you blindly halve a boiled egg and you only get ¼ of the yolk on one side and ¾ on the other, the smaller portion of the yolk may fall out. Uhh, I don’t want bits of yolk floating around in my shorba, thanks! To ensure you’re hitting the centre of the yolk, just take a close look at the boiled egg. You’ll be able to see a darker shade peeping through the whites - that’s of course the yolk. Cut through the centre of that - ta-da! Perfectly halved eggs for your viewing and consuming pleasure 🙂 If you don’t have the patience or time to halve your eggs and add them at the end just before serving, you can add your eggs whole directly into the shorba just before serving
Note on Oil Use
There’s no two ways around this. To get that proper traditional-looking shorba that mimics the shorba your Mother or Naani or Daadi made, you’ll have to use a lot of oil. That’s just the nature of these sorts of curries. If too much oil makes you uncomfortable or it just isn’t your preference, you are very free to decrease the amount of oil stated. You will to some extent have to compromise on the end look of the shorba, but I can completely understand how excess oil may not sound too appealing if it’s not what you’re used to. On the flipside, if you find the amount of oil stated isn’t giving you the look and feel you desire or are used to, you can add additional oil. You can add the oil at the end if you so wish, just make sure you give the oil to heat up and meld into the shorba. OK, those are a lot of tips and information! They’re really handy for other shorba recipes and meals too which you may want to delve into. Without further ado, here’s my very simple, very easy and VERY tasty Aloo Anday recipe! Enjoy, with love x
📋 Recipe
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