Chital Machher Muittha
My love for food and cooking was instilled by the motherly figures of my life. My ancestors are from East Bengal or Bangladesh and our family always takes pride in the cuisine they brought in from Bangladesh. On this Mother’s Day, I honor my mom, my mother in law and my aunts by cooking the delicacy from East Bengal – Chital Machher Muitha.
How to make the Chital Muitha (Fish Cakes)
I learned to cook this dish from my mom and my mother in law and it took years to bring perfection in cooking this dish. You need to make small pieces of fish cakes out of the boneless Chital fish. The craftsmanship lies in making sure the fish cakes do not break in the process. In order to make the fish cakes, you need to add a little bit of mashed potato to the boneless fish. Make sure not to add too much potato as it can make the fish cakes brittle. Then you need to make a couple of doughs of the fish and potato mixture and cooked it the boiled water for 5 min so that the fish gets cooked and the doughs harden. Now you cut those fish doughs in smaller pieces and shallow fry it. Now the fish cakes are ready.
Chital Muitha
How to make homemade Garam Masala
For the curry, garam masala is an important ingredient. For traditional Bengali cooking homemade garam masala is essential to use. In a coffee grinder, grind cinnamon, green cardamom and cloves in almost equal amount to powder and the Bengali homemade garam masala is ready!
Priya Banerjee
Yields 16 dumplings
Serves 4 dumplings
Chital Machher Muitha is a traditional delicacy for the Bengalis who are originally from Bangladesh (also known as east Bengal). It is made with delicate craftsmanship and enjoyed with traditional Bengali curry made with Garam Masala and other Bengali spices
30 minPrep Time
10 minCook Time
40 minTotal Time
Save Recipe5 based on 1 review(s)
Ingredients
- 200 gm Chital Keema
- 1/2 potato boiled
- 1 potato cut into cubes
- 1/2 onion grated
- 1 tbsp ginger grated
- 1 tomato diced
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 4 green cardamom
- 4 cloves
- 1/4 tsp cumin seeds
- 1/2 tbsp cumin powder
- 1/2 tbsp coriander powder
- 1/2 tbsp turmeric powder
- 1/4 tsp red chilli powder
- 1/8 tsp Natura sugar free powder or any other sugar substitute
- Salt as per taste
- 1 tsp homemade garam masala powder
- 6 tbsp mustard oil
Instructions
- Mash the potato and mix it with the Chital keema or the boneless fish. Add a pinch of salt and make two doughs of the fish and the potato mixture
- Bring water to boil in a pan and add the doughs of fish in there. Boil it for 5 min and take the doughs out from the water.
- Once the doughs cool down, cut it with knife into small pieces. 8 pieces of fish cake should come out from each of the doughs.
- Heat oil in a pan and shallow fry the fish cakes.
- Shallow fry the potato cubes in the same pan until it turns light brown
- Add the cinnamon stick, cardamoms, cloves and cumin seeds in the oil and fry it for 30 sec
- Add the ginger paste and fry it for 30 sec
- Add the grated onion and fry it for 2 min
- Add the tomato and fry it for another 2 min
- Add cumin powder, coriander powder, turmeric powder, red chili powder and let it cook for 2 min
- Add a cup of water, salt and sugar substitute to taste
- Add the fried potato pieces and bring the curry to boil for 5 min.
- Add the fish cakes (Muitha) to the curry.
- Check if the potato pieces are cooked well.
- Add the garam masala powder at the end.
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