Indian Pizza Recipe: Tomato Chutney Pizza

Since I had my daughter, I haven't had a lot of time to cook so I got some ready-made pizza dough from Trader Joe's. instead of using regular tomato sauce I used indian tomato chutney to make the dish more flavorful. I topped it with fried paneer, smoked goat cheddar cheese, mozzarella and parmesan. This is not your average four-cheese pizza! 

Paneer Masala Pizza (Indian Style Pizza Recipe)

I ventured into the world of fusion and decided to break the rules by making pizza with Indian toppings. I prepared a traditional paneer butter masala with a mixture of flavorful, bold spices. I used the spicy sauce as the primary flavor for the pizza. In addition, I sprinkled a little Parmesan cheese to hold everything together and finished it with fresh cilantro.

The trick to coming up with your own fusion dishes is to use one recipe as the “base” and then replace a key ingredient with something from another culture. The sauce and cheese used on pizza are perfect targets and paneer butter masala takes care of both. If you wanted to make it even more Indian, you could replace the pizza crust with a naan. It’s a great way to introduce new foods to kids in a way that’s familiar but fresh.

Paneer Butter Masala Recipe

Paneer butter masala probably isn't the healthiest vegetarian dish out there, but it is surely delicious. Pretty much anything with butter in the title is a recipe for success. I remember a restaurant reviewer once saying that given enough butter and cream, sand can taste great. That may be a bit of a stretch, but when you layer this sauce over gently fried Indian cheese, it’s impossible to resist.

The sauce consists of a blend of butter, heavy cream, tomato sauce, lime juice, almond flour and a few other Indian spices. To that, fried cubes of paneer (Indian cheese) are added and simmered. You could always substitute fried tofu for the paneer, but I think it's better to go all out in the calorie department if you’re going to make this dish!

Paneer Korma Recipe

In Urdu, shahi paneer korma would literally translate to braised paneer in "royal" curry. Shahi means royal but when it refers to paneer, it usually indicates a creamy, decadent tomato sauce.

To make the dish I started by quickly stir-frying cubes of paneer. Paneer is Indian-style soft cheese. I made the sauce with caramelized onion paste, yogurt, tomatoes, ginger garlic paste as well as several Indian spices. The paneer pieces are braised at a simmer in the curry sauce until well coated. The final touch is a little heavy cream. It’s not something you want to eat every day, but paneer korma is a perfect dish to make when you want to treat yourself.

Vegetarian Palak Paneer Lasagna

Palak paneer lasagna is the result of my desire to not waste food. We had some leftover palak paneer from our dinner party, and I thought it would be fun to experiment. I made an Indian-spiced béchamel sauce and combined it with the spinach. The mixture was then sandwiched between layers of pasta sheets. I decided not to add additional cheese since there was already cubes of paneer in the dish. Instead, I crushed herb crackers on top to create a crust.

I’ve found that the most unusual dishes are created when your desire to create something new is constrained by the realities of what you have in your pantry or fridge. This dish is a great example. The marriage of Indian ingredients with the pasta really worked well.