Over the weekend Calvin and I went with some friends to an Indian restaurant where you eat everything off of a banana leaf with your hands. I don’t know if that’s how they really do it in India, but the restaurant was packed with all Indian people so it must be doing something right.
Everyone gets their own banana leaf and then the waiters come around with various metal buckets/pots/cups and dish out the food. Above is a fried chicken leg on my leaf and salty banana chips and a salted chili pepper on Calvin’s. The pink stuff in the metal container is yogurt (not sweet at all even though it looks strawberry flavored) one of them is shredded fresh coconut and a third is a couscous-type grain.
Indian food is not her favorite (nor mine), but she was a good sport.
It was fun having him at lunch and telling me all about Germany. On his leaf so far (much more to come): pickled lemon (the red stuff) and then on the far side, the stuff that looks kind of like pasta salad is actually vegetables in a sauce — probably my favorite thing. Then the coconut, couscous and the pink yogurt.
both rice and bread — not paleo
The way you are supposed to eat it is to mix bits of stuff with the rice using your fingers and then scoop it into your mouth. I always thought I was fine with using hands to eat, but it was weird trying to eat things like yogurt without a fork or a spoon. I’m the kind of person who eats with a fork in a chinese restaurant, not because I can’t eat with chopsticks, but because it feels fake. Like, we all know I’m not Chinese so I won’t pretend I’m suddenly Asian because I can eat with two sticks (I know, I’m weird). So normally I would have said “pass the fork,” but the friend who brought us to the restaurant wanted everyone to eat with their hands. So I did. I loved the chicken curry and the vegetables in sauce and would have eaten those all day. Also liked the fried chicken and the fish was pretty good too. There was way too much food and I stopped taking pictures before they had even finished dishing things out.
If you come visit and want to go eat here I’ll take you. I’ll be using a fork — you can eat whichever way you like.