(cheerful music)
- So I was just in Los Angeles.
- Hi Steven.
- Hanging out with you guys.
Now we're all in New York City, Big Apple.
And today we are doing curry!
Right now we are at a Malaysian coffee shop.
This place is called Kopitiam.
And curry is a very personal thing to me.
Some of the locations in this episode were biased
by my personal Chinese-Malaysian background.
Hence the coffee shop we're at right now.
Woo yes.
Whoa!
- [Andrew] Certified awesome.
- [Steven] This is literally
how stuff is served in Malaysia.
My favorite dish in the world probably is Roti Canai,
which is a Malaysian dish influenced by India.
- [Andrew] Are we gonna try that today?
- They do have it at one of the places
that we're eating at.
- We should eat it!
- Okay!
- It's your favorite food.
- Today we're gonna be trying three curry dishes
at three drastically different price points
to find out which curry is the most worth it at its price.
I'm gonna hit you
with a curry fact!
17th century British colonizers were perplexed
by the variety of dishes in India
and categorized them all under the term "curry".
People who visited India,
they didn't know how to categorize
all of these different foods.
So instead of actually identifying and learning all of them,
they just lumped them into one category.
- Before curry, you would just call it
what the individual dish name was.
- Exactly.
Okay so the first place we're going to is a bakery.
And we'll be having some curry puffs.
- Curry puffs.
So like a little pastry of curry, huh?
I got my drink to go, how about you?
- I might get one of those bags.
(energetic beats)
- Hi, my name is James Chou.
This is my father Han chou.
We're at Fay Da Bakery,
and we will be showing you our curry beef puff.
- [Han Chou] (speaks in Chinese)
- [James Chou] So basically the dough is mixed
same process as croissant.
So in there we use shortening and margarine to fold it in,
goes through that automated sheeter,
a little egg wash,
and then we have everyone putting the filling into each one,
baked and then you take it out
after about 20, 25 minutes,
you do egg wash,
and then you put it back in for another 15, 20 minutes,
and then you do one final egg wash.
- [Steven] What makes a very good curry puff?
- [Han Chou] (speaks in Chinese)
(register bell sound)
- [Steven] I got a watermelon smoothie to start off our day.
We'll be eating a lot of curries.
I gotta balance it out.
- I'm having ice malted milk drink.
- What?
- Yeah it's called Horlicks.
- Wow I didn't even know this existed.
Cheers!
- Here's one for you.
- Yes!
The most familiar smell
in the world to me.
Chinese bakery smell,
that was the Sunday afternoon,
family goes out to lunch,
and we hit a bakery afterwards.
Cheers.
- It's extremely satisfying,
because you have a very buttery nice pastry
along with a very savory filling.
It's not spicy.
It is actually a little sweet.
- It's like a pie.
It's like a ham pie.
- Yeah.
I think it's really cool
that you can have this savory treat
at what is predominantly a sweets bakery.
The fact that you can come to this bakery
and you can really build out
like a pretty well-balanced meal,
that's pretty unique I think, you know?
- I think it's a beautiful thing.
- [Andrew] Adam why are you eating that like a squirrel?
- [Annie] (laughs)
- So we just ate a curry puff,
but we're going to a Malaysian restaurant next.
So to prepare our appetite,
I was thinking that we bust open a durian,
which is the king of fruits in Malaysia.
Durian is a fruit that I've seen people,
kind of, laugh at, the smelliest fruit in the world,
but honestly, durian is a fruit
that my family, the first thing that we do
when we land in Malaysia when we visit is eat durian.
- Really?
- Yeah.
You just cut open a little bit
(durian cracks)
Oh!
- It doesn't smell that bad,
it smells like cheese honestly.
- Cheers.
- Oh it tastes good!
- Yeah.
- It's like a cross between a banana,
a pineapple, and a mango.
Hit me with that curry fact.
- Curry fact!
People who enjoy action movies and adventure seekers
are six times more likely to like spicy food.
- I love action movies.
I like spicy food.
I like getting my face to sweat.
- I've seen you sweat.
The next place we're going to is Laut.
It's Malaysian food.
- So you like this next place a little, or a "Laut"?
- (laughs)
A "Laut".
(energetic music)
- My name is Salil Mehta.
We're at Laut in Union Square.
And we're gonna be having the best Curry Laksa in the world.
- Oh wow.
- Wow.
- [Salil Mehta] Seven years ago, people did not know
much about a Rendang, much about a Laksa,
but a lot of people opened those doors up,
and then my background is slightly different
from most of the Malaysian restaurants
that are in New York City.
Being Indian, I was bringing the Indian influence behind.
- [Steven] So today we're having the Curry Laksa.
- Yes.
- Which is exactly what you're talking about,
the Chinese influence with the Malayan and Indian influence.
- Laksa comes from (speaks foreign phrase),
which means one million flavors.
You have all these great, amazing,
different kinds of Laksas all over Southeast Asia.
Then you have interaction of different cultures.
You have the Indian marrying the Malay,
the Malay marrying the Chinese.
Our Laksa, this is more,
Malay-Indian influenced Curry Laksa.
So the way we do ours,
we use onion, ginger, barley, fresh lemongrass,
grind it all up together in a paste,
cook it low and slow with some fresh curry
leaves brown spices in it.
Add the coconut milk slowly,
and we do a Lai Fun noodle.
This is like tapioca starch noodle.
And we do egg round noodle,
which is like a Lo Mein noodle.
Take some tofu puff actually soaks
in the soup from the Laksa.
I believe that Curry Laksa with seafood goes best.
Put the soup together,
garnish with some cucumber, lime.
That your bowl of Laksa.
- So we weren't planning on coming here
to eat the Roti Canai.
But saw in the menu,
so, could we also do that virtual quick?
- Roti's most popular dish in the restaurant.
Roti's something really unique and amazing
because it can be had as a snack,
it can be had as a proper meal as well.
The dough is prepped in pure Desi ghee.
So that's the way it was traditionally made
by bom in Malaysia.
And it comes from Canai, India,
so that's where the Canai come from.
- He just asked me if we wanna share this.
No!
There's a rule.
- Okay Steven.
- Two people, two roti.
This is actually my favorite dish,
because it reminds me of my time in Malaysia
staying with my grandpa.
And we would walk down to the local cart,
and they would just fry this up,
and hand me the curry in a bag.
I wouldn't even wait till I got home,
I would just eat on the way home
- That sounds awesome.
Cheers.
(tongue clicks)
Oh man that's good.
- Perfectly crispy.
It's almost like a croissant.
How flaky this one is.
- You have like the best textured bread,
and you get to just put it in the most luxurious gravy.
It cannot get better than that.
- Gravy makes everything good.
And now we have the Curry Laksa.
- So this is so pretty.
I love the color of the broth
that it's speckled with the oil.
- It's the million flavors of spice and color.
- Gotta make sure you don't lose any noodles.
- And then you know get some seafood.
The tofu is a flavor saver.
This is the mustache of ingredients.
This is what soaks the curry up.
And then you just take a little bite.
- I love that.
The mustache of ingredients.
What are you gonna try first, noodle?
Or just broth on its own?
- Uh let's do broth.
(slurps)
- It changes in your mouth as you're eating it.
- I like this too, because you have the coconut
and the curry just living together
but also porting their own identity and color here.
(slurps)
- I understand how this is like
a dish that emerged as the marriage
from a lot of people and the cuisines,
because it is like so many all-star things.
You have noodles, you have seafood,
you have this amazing broth.
- I save the flavors here for the end.
It's been just in here collecting juice, by the way.
My sponge.
Cheers.
- Cheers.
- (coughs)
Curry!
I love it.
Alright, so we just had some great Laksa.
We're now at a grocery store called Kalustyan's.
We're here because the next restaurant we're going to,
the chef recommended that we check this out,
because he comes here for all the inspiration
for his dishes.
- Wow, so many types of paprika.
- Yes!
Curry power!
Curry fact!
India is responsible for 70%
of the world's spice production.
- Wow!
That's wild.
I wonder if any other country has as much claim
over any other thing.
- We're headed next down the street
and it is an Indian restaurant called Junoon.
It was nice "ju-knowing" ya.
- Well now that it's "after-ju-noon" we can go to Junoon.
(laughters)
(funky music)
- Welcome to Junoon.
My name is Akshay Bhardwaj.
I am the executive chef here.
So Junoon is a modern fine dining Indian restaurant.
So what we try to do is maintain the aspect
of the traditional flavors in Indian cuisine,
but we try to give it
a more aesthetically pleasing look to it.
- So today we're getting the three-course menu.
And we chose the dishes are more curry-themed.
- So the appetizer that I'll be showcasing today
is the Butter Pepper Garlic Shrimp.
And then for entrees we have the Lamb Shank,
which is accompanies by Laccha Paratha,
which is one of the breads we cook in our tandoori oven.
For dessert, our Shahi Tukra.
- Indian cuisine is so broad and diverse,
how does Junoon see itself as drawing from
that huge spectrum of food?
- [Akshay Bhardwaj] What we try to definitely do
with the menu is utilize different regions of India.
We have coastal dishes which have a lot of seafood in it.
You have northern dishes, you have southern dishes.
The Butter Pepper Shrimp is more of a coastal dish.
It's a take on a very traditional dish in Mumbai, actually.
- And is the shank inspired by a particular region?
- [Akshay Bhardwaj] Yeah.
You have cumin power, coriander, masala,
that's definitely more of a north Indian style of cooking.
So with the butter pepper garlic shrimp,
whenever a guest comes and asks me,
well, what goes into it?
I say, well, you actually read the name of the dish,
it's literally those things that go into the dish.
We'll sear the shrimps, we'll saute it.
We'll add the sauce to it.
And then we'll pair that with
a traditional Indian bread called Pao.
Guests were actually complaining
the sauce was so good and so addicting
that they wanted to eat it with something.
So that's when we decided we'll pair this bread.
- [Andrew] Let's try a little bit of the sauce first,
and then we'll take a shrimp each.
- Always with the strategy.
- I'm a very strategic eater.
- All I think about when I have food
is how I get it from the plate to my mouth the fastest.
- Okay.
- Alright.
I understand why this bread is here.
- [Andrew] Wanna try a shrimp?
- [Steven] Shrimp!
There is this flavor that is still lingering
in the back of my mouth.
It's like a really peppery fiery taste,
just living back here.
- [Andrew] Then you take a sip of the cocktail,
and it washes it all away.
- [Steven] Oh I likey like that.
- (laughs) Yeah.
- Pao, oh man!
That looks so good.
- You know that makes me say?
Pao!
- So with the shank, we first braise the lamb shank.
And we actually use that as a cooking oil.
Then we'll add our onions to it.
And then we make something called the Putli,
which is we take a pull of whole spices
from the spice room and we wrap it in cheese cloth.
We throw it into the pot,
add some ginger and garlic.
We'll add some cumin powder, coriander powder,
red chili powder, turmeric,
as well as our Garam Masala spice blend.
And then we'll add the shanks and lotus pods.
Definitely adds a little creamy texture to the dish overall.
My favorite bread to eat is definitely the Laccha Paratha,
which is basically just whole wheat flour,
we'll baste it with a little bit of butter and oil,
stretch it out, so make it about seven to ten folds.
And each layer, the top layer will be the crunchiest,
the bottom later will be less and less crunchy as it goes.
And then we'll put it in the tandoori.
It's so enjoyable to eat with any curry, with any,
eat on it own also.
- [Andrew] Here we are Steven, to the main event.
The Lamb Shank.
- What's your strategy here?
Is it potato first, is it the bone?
- It's sauce first.
I definitely wouldn't recommend starting with the bone.
- [Steven] Woo!
- [Andrew] Look at that!
- You almost think for a second
that you could walk on water
when you put your knife on there.
It still holds the tension.
- It's so thick.
- That is so good.
- The spices are so vibrant in this.
- You're gonna to the Laccha Paratha first?
- Yeah.
There's a certain type of dress that looks like this.
Ridiculous tasting.
- It kinda does me a favor in picking up eating more curry.
It goes to the cracks,
so as I'm chewing it,
it's oozing through my teeth.
- [Andrew] Right off the bone.
- [Steven] Wow!
I'm getting chills right now.
- [Andrew] And it's crazy that we get so much pleasure
from watching meat fall off a bone.
- [Steven] Yeah.
- Which in any other context would be
a truly horrific image.
- [Steven] This is crazy, it looks so tender.
I can't really pinpoint what the flavor is
that it's like hitting me so hard.
- That's what's good about it,
you can't isolate any one flavor,
it's just a bunch of flavors.
It's really good
- Oh!
- So that's how you know it's good.
Adam tasted it, thought it was good.
Then took a few steps, and then said "Oh!",
because the flavor changed in his mouth as he was eating it.
- So for desserts we have the Shahi Tukra.
And I don't think there's anyone
better suited to describe it and explain it
than our pastry chef Gustavo.
- We made a brioche bread which is very buttery.
Then we pan-fry it, we soak it in a simple syrup
that was made with saffron,
which is one of the traditional spice in Indian cuisine.
We start putting in the rabri.
So rabri is the reduction of milk.
We put it on top of the Shahi Tukra.
Cashews, pecans, pistachios, edible rose petals,
and then pop sorghum.
And that's it.
- [Steven] So we have a dessert wine here
to pair with the dessert.
- [Andrew] Ready?
- Yeah.
- Oh.
Oh my God.
A cool and floral french toast.
- It's like got everything you want.
Chocolate and butter.
What the wine does,
it kinda expands the floral taste
of these dried rose petals.
Adam, I would love for you
to try this dessert with this wine.
I think you're gonna love it.
Okay Steven, New York was a great place to try this,
because we got to try curry
from a lot of different parts of the world.
- So, Andrew, then which curry spot
was the most worth it to you at its price?
- Laut.
I really appreciated his methodology.
I love his attention to detail
and his respect to history.
- I think the thing that I was most surprised by today
was the shrimp, actually, that was at Junoon.
Ah I don't know my winner.
I think my worth it winner, Fay Da Bakery.
- Oh okay.
- At least the value for this one.
I love curry so much,
and the ability to get it for two dollars.
It's so accessible.
- Annie, who's your worth it winner?
- Junoon.
- Laut.
- Okay so that was a day in New York City.
But it doesn't end there, because next,
we'll be doing something else in New York.
- Alright, so we're going out tonight, right?
- No.
(energetic music)
- [Narrator] Oh yes.