Jhinga Goan Curry

Times and attitudes to pairing wine with fiery food are changing. Dina de Bruyn of Indian Restaurant Chandani has a nose for wines that stand up to the complexities of the dishes found on her restaurant menu. Vicki Sleet reports.Indian cuisine is like wine in many ways. It has a distinctive nose. You feel the flavour sensation on the tongue followed by the roundedness of the key ingredients, then its body, and finally you’re left with its aftertaste,” says Dina de Bruyn of Chandani, the popular Woodstock-based Indian restaurant she owns with her Gujarati-born partner Jagdish van Zara. The pair met two years ago and it was Van Zara’s skill in the kitchen that stole De Bruyn’s heart.

On deciding to set up a restaurant of their own, this dynamic duo travelled to India to order everything from the Tandoor ovens in the kitchen to the tableware and decorative details.

Since opening in July 2007, they haven’t looked back – feeding grateful diners a host of flavourful vegetarian and meat dishes traditional to the north of India.

While wine has tended not to be considered as an accompaniment to spice-laden food, attitudes are changing. When WINE magazine asked De Bruyn to match a dish to the highly rated Kleine Zalze Pinotage 2006, she chose the restaurant’s popular Goan curry (one of a handful of dishes from the south that feature on the menu).

“For me it’s symbolic that this [South African] Pinotage goes so perfectly with this dish that originated from the coast of Goa, where the Portuguese sailors first landed after rounding the Cape of Good Hope,” comments De Bruyn, who spent many nights tasting each and every dish with local wines when compiling their winelist. Discussing this particular food and wine combination, De Bruyn says, “Onealmost can’t imagine a coconutbased dish marrying with any wine, but the firm tannins and fresh acid of this Pinotage are an ideal match.”

Jhinga Goan Curry

75ml ghee
25ml mustard oil
25ml sunflower oil
500ml finely chopped onion
175ml dry, unsweetened coconut
5 curry leaves
5ml mustard seeds
25ml tomato paste
10ml finely chopped garlic
10ml finely chopped ginger
250g cleaned prawns (Jhinga)
5ml chilli powder
5ml turmeric
400ml coconut cream
salt and pepper to taste

Heat ghee and add onion, frying until the onion starts
to brown. Add dry coconut, curry leaves, mustard seeds,
ginger and garlic. Remove from the heat when the mustard
seeds start to pop, let it cool down and add a little coconut
cream. Blend in food processor until smooth.
Heat the oil and add prawns. Stir to seal and add chilli,
turmeric, salt and pepper. Add the onion mixture, tomato
paste and remaining coconut cream and cook through,
taking care not to overcook the prawns or curdle the cream.