Samhi C.
Features Editor
skc5908@psu.edu
The last time I told you about the Erie Curry House in Fall 2023, I told you about how I was going almost every other weekend.
The habit has held.
ECH is still home to the best chai I have ever had and they let me stay a few minutes extra so I can finish my work and save it before they kick me out if I lose track of time and I am still sitting at my usual table by closing time.
And with how often I have been going, of course, I was going to try a few new dishes between then and now. This week, I bring you their paneer pakora, rice, and mint chutney.
Paneer pakora is a dish that I think is experimental. Pakoras are basically fritters that involve deep-fried batter on the outside with some kind of vegetable on the inside. I have had aloo pakoras. I have had onion pakoras. But never have I had paneer pakoras. When I ordered them for the first time, it was more due to curiosity than anything else.
They are good. Really good. Addictively good. Second only to ECH’s mulligatawny soup which is still my favorite dish of theirs.
Along with the pakoras, the waiter that day offered me mint chutney and tamarind chutney, the usual sauces that come with most Indian snacks. The tamarind sauce was way too sweet and just overall not something that I thought paired well with the pakoras or anything else involving spices.
The mint chutney was a different story. At first, I thought it looked like toothpaste and I was apprehensive. But it is good. Tastes like chutney and not toothpaste.
The chutney also, surprisingly, pairs well with rice. The mint chutney I normally have back home is not something that you could have with rice. But this specific mint sauce is great to drizzle on top of your rice if you run out of whatever curry you are eating with your rice. It is also a great idea if you end up finishing your pakoras or samosas or whatever you were eating with the chutney and you still have chutney left over.
Which is exactly what happened to me and why I poured mint chutney on rice in the first place…
