Nikas Culinaria

I would like to introduce you to a product made by the Tiger Tiger company that I found at my big box grocery store here in Massachusetts (USA) that has wowed me to such a degree that I am actually writing about it here. If you are a regular reader, you would know that I don’t usually do this sort of thing.

I have used several of their Indian Sauces:

• Kashmiri Mild Korma Sauce
• Peshwari Murgh Tikka Masala
• A creamy butter sauce I can not find listed on their site

Tiger Tiger makes much more than these three sauces. They make Thai, Japanese, and Chinese sauces.

Their product range is wide, including:

• gluten-free noodles and nutty snacks
• many more coconut, wasabi, rice snacks
• cooking sauces
• salad dressings
• asian dipping dressings and sauces
• marinades
• soups
• various noodles and rices
• Indian and Thai spices and pastes
• all sorts of chutneys
• preserved exotic fruits and vegetables
• coconut products
• gift baskets (which they oddly call hampers)

One thing I know about Indian food is that the sauces, which can make or break a recipe, are long labors of love. I do not keep the whole Indian spice arsenal on hand at home so I never cook Indian recipes.

These Tiger Tiger Indian sauces taste so fantastic and are so useful to make just about any protein seem like a meal from the finest of restaurants.

If I had known that their product photography was so fantastically woeful, I would have shot the jar before I used it. For the purposes of immediacy, I have put one of their photos of the Kashmiri Mild Korma sauce here.

I am not at all certain what they are thinking using photos like this on the web. You can see from the packaging that they have done a professional job of branding and packaging but it is not well conveyed on their site.

What matters to me is the taste but its hard to blog such substandard hazy fuzzy photos!

The other night, I pulled out the Kashmiri Mild Korma sauce and, while crossing my fingers, poured it over some browned ground turkey. I usually never buy ground poultry but the price was right.

The korma sauce transformed the vague ground turkey into a resplendent delightful sauce that I poured over some authentic basmati rice.

For the basmati rice, I bought a tiny package of real basmati rice from Tilda.

Visit the Tilda site for sure. Their site is the diametric opposite of the Tiger Tiger site. Its beautiful, functional, evocative.

Try this link within the Tilda site for some Indian Recipes.

The directions were completely different than regular rice - boil one cup of rice in 6 cups of water for 8-10 minutes and then RINSE with boiling water.

Wild huh?

I let go of my “ingrained” Colombian rice-training and followed the directions to yield knock-out basmati rice.

I apologize for not having photos of any of this but it was night and we ate it so fast, there was no chance to shoot.

Bottom Line:

If you can find the Tiger Tiger products, buy some and try it.

I can see using this with anything from ground beef, pork, poultry, and small pieces of such meats, to tofu.

I am going to get another jar (or 10!) and use it on some cod and also some shrimp.

I just can’t wait!

Let me know if you try it too!

Where to buy online:

• Tiger Tiger (Beware that this site seems to be running on it’s last gerbil and the design is atrocious. I recommend using this as a way to see what they have and then track it down at your store)

Technorati Tags: Massachusetts, Kashmiri, Korma, Peshwari, Murgh Tikka Masala, butter, Indian, spice, India, Tiger Tiger, Indian, sauce, resplendent, authentic, basmati, rice, Tilda