Banquets of the nations

Make a good dough of wheat or maize meal, with water and a little salt. Knead well and roll out rather thin, and cut in small portions. Bake on a gridiron and immediately spread with ghi or clarified butter, and rest one against the other. Poori. (Fried Cakes.) Mix wheat meal and salt in same way as for phulki, Take small pieces, roll as thin as wafers, and cook in boiling ghi or clarified butter. Shirmal. (Sweet Bread.) Baked in the same way as ordinary household bread with yeast, adding raisins and sugar. Made in small cakes or like buns. Chanval. (Rice.) Wash two pounds of rice, and put in pot; cover it with two inches of water, bring to the boil, and stand on a slow fire to simmer till all the moisture is evaporated and the rice quite dry. Dal. (Spiced Lentils.) Wash lentils. Boil in water until soft. Put into a pan some ghi or clarified butter. Cook in this the following spices (ground) : — Cloves, garlic, cumin seed, turmeric, and salt and pepper. Add dal, and cook until soft. When ready, add more of the spices. Pulav. (Pillau of Mutton.) Fry eight ounces of sliced onions in eight ounces of boiling butter (ghi) till browned. Remove the onions to one side, and in the butter fry for a few minutes one pound of lean mutton cut in small pieces, and four ounces each of ground coriander seeds, cucumbers (gherkins) sliced, and green ginger, one ounce of garlic, a teaspoonful of salt, and a sliced red chilli. Put the meat in another pan along with four ounces of curds, half a stick of cinnamon broken into pieces, twelve large and twenty-four small cardamoms, an inch of mace broken into pieces, twelve whole cloves, and a little more salt. Simmer at the side of the fire till meat is tender. See that the pan is kept closely covered. Wash twenty-four ounces of rice, and fry till slightly browned in eight ounces of ghi; then add another eight ounces of ghi, and cover closely, and stew till soft. Take two pounds of the back ribs of mutton cut in small pieces, a few cloves, two ounces ginger, a point of garlic, and a little salt, and boil in sixty-four ounces of water till quite tender and the stock is reduced to twenty-four ounces. Strain and add to the two meats, fried onions and rice. In another pan heat four ounces of ghi, and add two ounces each of sliced almonds, pistachio nuts, raisins, and a little cayenne pepper, a quarter ounce of musk, and the juice of two limes. Toss the pan till all are thoroughly heated, then add to the meats, etc., giving all a good stir to mix thoroughly. Hermetically close the lid of the pot, and stew very gently for fifteen or twenty minutes. Pasundee. (Fried Mutton.) Grind the following spices : — A teaspoonful of cumin seeds, half the quantity of cloves and cardamoms, with a seasoning of salt, black and red peppers. Cut mutton into long thin pieces. Rub spice well in, and fry in ghi or clarified butter till one side is cooked, then turn and fry the other side. Cover with onions cut in fine slices, which you had fried in the ghi before frying the mutton. Gourda. (Sheeps' Kidneys.) Skin, salt, and split six sheeps' kidneys, leaving the two halves attached. Prepare and cook the same as " Fried Mutton."