Like other fellow Indians, the family is obsessed with Chinese food – hang on, better correct this to “Indo-Chinese” to acknowledge the fact that the Chinese food we eat in the motherland doesn’t taste anything like the real thing.

Oh, we Indians love our ” Chinese”:our Gobi Manchurian – I don’t know what it is but it is delicious – our sweet and sour hakka noodles, our chow mein 62 (don’t even ask) and our pot rice – speaking of which, next time you are in Bombay do try out the pot rice at my favourite Ling’s Pavilion (husband and I got engaged there by the way, sealing the deal over some pot rice, yum!).

But for the little person at home Chilli paneer is always the winner by a mile – the son just loves this stuff and the spicier the better. I have never ever made this at home and so when I was asked, or rather ordered, to rustle it up I adapted a Ken Hom recipe for Prawns in chilli sauce and substituted the prawns with Paneer (Indian cottage cheese) .

Here is the original Ken Hom recipe.

It was quite delicious, although next time I would coat the paneer in some kind of flour before frying to make the pieces crunchy. And no matter what the son says I WILL CONTINUE TO NOT ADD MSG.