One of the more interesting bouts of tasting we had back at ZestFest was this treasure called Tarka Masala, courtesy of the great folks at Kaurina’s. Kaurina’s won a Golden Chile award for their Pistachio Almond Kulfi, but they should have won one for this concoction as well. As it stands, Tarka Masala was a Third Place winner in the Cook-Off – Specialty category for 2006.

While there’s quite a few hot sauces and other spicy sauces that originate here in North America, there’s relatively few that come from overseas that carry any level of popularity. Tarka Masala, with its Pakistani and Indian origins, pays homage to both its skill in preparation and the flavor it seeks to emulate. We first tasted some of this which had been made by stewing it with some chickpeas, which turned out to be pretty tasty. Checking the ever-important ingredients list, this has:

Ingredients: onions, tomato paste, soybean oil, ginger paste, garlic paste, green chili puree, salt, coriander, cumin, red pepper, garam masala, black pepper, and turmeric

So far, so good there. This is one of those that seemed like the final product would certainly be greater than the sum of its parts. We set out to try this stuff in our own kitchen, having brought home two bottles with us from the show. One bottle disappeared in relatively short order months ago when we were a little swamped to write about it, but we saved one for use at a later time (that being now) and cracked it open. Now we’ve had relatively little experience making South Asian food at home, so we were hoping that the Tarka Masala really would be Cooking Made Easy.

For our gourmet dinner, we decided to keep it somewhat simple. As you can see below, we limited ourselves to three ingredients…some chicken strips (meant for fajitas), some chick peas, and the Tarka Masala. The Tarka is advertised to make many more meals than this, but since we had used a bottle previously for a bunch of stuff, this was destined to be entirely one meal for a couple of chileheads.

No complicated preparation instructions here. Adding all the ingredients to a skillet pan, we let it simmer for about an hour or so. Simplicity at its finest.

Cooking up a little Jasmine rice, we ladled our now-cooked Tarka Masala feast over some rice and began to dine on our evening repast. We would have used Basmati rice if we had had some, but this worked out just fine.

Taste: Before mixing up this recipe, our previous jar went for a variety of uses including as a veggie dip, sandwich condiment, and as a meat marinade/coating right out of the oven. In each case, the flavor came through in outstanding fashion. Not too hot, I’d say the heat was about 4/10 or so…and it doesn’t build all that much either despite how much you might eat. The flavor is so rich with its mix of spices that it seems to go well with just about anything we tried it upon. The great thing about this sauce is that not only does it taste good in its own right, but it makes other foods taste better.

As for the dish we prepared, chick peas were a good choice. Adding a little substance & starch that wasn’t rice gave an added stick-to-your-ribs quality that left us satisfied after a modest-sized bowl. Simmered to taste, we didn’t even need to doctor this up in the slightest, either to make it spicier or anything else. For ease of preparation, it doesn’t get any easier than this.

Overall recommendation: What this sauce proves is that you can incorporate the flavor of South Asian cooking into just about any dish, from sublime to the gourmet, and that this sauce will make it taste great. We liked it because it helped accentuate the flavors of the food without overpowering the flavor, and that can be a tough chore for any sauce. Mildly spiced and full of flavor, you will likely find many uses for Tarka Masala beyond what even is suggested…at least we did to an extent. Our only suggest is that we’d like to see this made in different levels of heat for both the spice-challenged and heat-craving amongst us, but Kaurina’s has a real winner with this sauce as-is. Whether you cook it up in some Aloo Gobi or just spoon it over some veggies right out of the jar, Tarka Masala is sure to please. Enjoy!