Masochists?
No.
My body never feels better overall than when it's fed a largely Indian diet. Fact!
I first ran into a GOOD curried lamb on a cold, snowy day in NYC back in '82, not too far from 39th and 5th Ave. Guy with one of those ubiquitous push carts on the sidewalk.
I was walking north with my head tucked down against the wind and light snow when I went by that cart. I made it about ten feet past when the wonderfull smell dragged me by the nostrils right back to it.
He didn't speak english, and I didn't speak ??? but point and grunt worked just fine and I ended up with a kabob of lamb-onion-tomato-something-lamb-onion, etc. He stuck a nice thick chunk of some sort of bread on one end of the skewer, wrapped a couple napkins 'round the other, took my $1.50 and I was off, trudging north again. Within six paces and two bites I was sweating. Within thirty paces I was heading south for another, big grin on my sweating face.
I tried to eat from that cart AT LEAST once a week.
I eventually figured out that part of our point and grunt negotiations involved him asking if I wanted one of the extra hot skewers and if I wanted extra hot curry sauce on it. My answers were aparently 'yes' to both. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
After that first time I always got two skewers and gave him a fiver - it was more than worth it to me.
(I'm sitting here drooling. Really! I am! *sigh*)
A good, hot, lamb vindaloo with garlic nan and some of that wonderful spinach veggie stuff (don't recall the name, but it does NOT look good /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/ooo.gif ) is my idea of nirvana in meals. Some of the hottest vindaloo I've had was at an Indian restaurant in downtown Eugene, Oregon - it took me a pitcher of ice water to finish it. I may have sweat it all out before I finished, but the waitress and cook knew I liked the vindaloo from my huge grin and nods in their directions.
Some of the absolute BEST vindaloo was at an Indian fast food place at the SeaTac Mall in Federal Way. It's not on the menu, but "Mike" would make some up if it was a slow day, and we'd sit there and eat it. He has a nice little behive shaped clay oven for the nan, too. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
I haven't made a decent curry since last Tuesday, so I need to make some more. Think I'll torture some chicken this time. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
(BTW: I'm Swedish/Polish so I have NO idea why my 'thing' for Indian food, but ... )
Oh, another BTW: My Thai GF would eat foods that I could not even think hard about eating without suffering a core meltdown - some of that stuff is just absolutely stark staring bonkers. I can do most Chinese, most Indian, and a lot of others, but Thai, *shudder* Thai is sometimes just a bit too much.