From: sbhattac@sales.GBA.NYU.EDU (Shankar Bhattacharyya)
Newsgroups: rec.food.cooking
Subject: Re: Info. wanted:  Chutneys
Date: 15 Apr 92 04:24:44 GMT
Organization: NYU Stern School of Business

In article <8APR199221151209@juliet.caltech.edu> aaron@juliet.caltech.edu (Packman, Aaron I.) writes:

>I'd like to get some informations on chutneys...I know the general concept,
>but not much else.  I'm tempted to just go out and buy a jar, but I though
>that I'd try to get more info. and see if I can make some myself.  Can 
>anyone help me out with recipes for chutneys, recipes using chutneys, 
>and anything else that might be useful?  Any advice would be much appreciated.

Well, given recent interest in chutneys, here is a bigoted overview. These
are my opinions, and they are undoubtedly parochial.

First, I disclaim comprehensiveness.

Chutneys cover a sizable range. At one end are the condiment chutneys, such
as those from coriander, mint, tamarind, and coconut, which get used as
dips, or get added to idlis and dosas (comments on which I will leave to my
southern compatriots). These are usually intended to contribute flavour,
and that is it. They are our logical equivalent to ketchup.

A fair number of recipes for these have been posted recently.

I'm not sure I would call the onion and pepper stuff a chutney. I'd
probably call it the onion and pepper stuff. That's probably parochial.

Then there are the dessert chutneys, which are real dishes, served towards
the end of meals, before the deadly serious desserts. In some communities,
as in mine, they would get served before yogurt and dessert.

Dessert chutneys can be made from a wide range of things. Popular items are
tomatoes (very popular in eastern India), pineapples, plums (usually dried
plums, which I'm told are identically equal to prunes), and other fruits.

Tomato chutney ranges from rustic to elegant, and is terrific stuff.
Pineapple and plum chutneys are elegant. The plum product is one of my
favourite dishes. Pineapple chutney has prestige, but I find it somewhat
bland. Besides, it is probably immoral to eat pineapples in any way that
does not involve getting the juice all over your shirt-front.

Dessert chutneys could also be served as a snack, often with puris.

You then slide over into murabba's, which are sort of like preserves. I
particularly like those made from mangoes, and from some Indian fruits for
which I don't have English names (awla or amloki, and chalta).

Then there are some things, like the Gujarati chhunda, which is a sweet and
spicy preparation of shredded green mango, of which I am enormously fond,
but I'm not sure whether I would call that a chutney, or a pickle, or a
murabba. Hey, I'm just a consumer. I won't attempt to categorize someone
else's dish. You can buy that in the stores, but that's only so-so.

I like chhunda on a chapatti. Pita serves for me, since I'm too lazy to
make chapattis, and I can't bring myself to buy them.

Finally you have things like Major Grey's. Those are an abomination unto
the lord, and are likely what you get if you buy a bottle of chutney. No
offense, Aaron, I confess to bigotry on the subject.

Actually, I rather like them on a sandwich, and they don't taste bad at
all, but they're not much like any other chutneys I know. I'm simply
pulling an authenticity kick here. Only because I am in a confessional
frame of mind am I even admitting that I kind of like these abominations.
Of course, no one else need take that bigotry too seriously. I think there
is a point to the authenticity police in terms of standards of identity,
but there is no reason to let a name interfere with whether one likes a
dish.

I would not consider buying something like that in India, where real
chutneys are abundant, but over here I confess to buying a bottle every
few years.

If there is interest in the desert chutneys, I'll post recipes for the
tomato and plum jobs. I have posted them before, and have a copy on
my machine.

- Shankar