Apparently rista and goshtaba are commonly served at Kashmiri weddings. Both dishes use the same meatballs, but serve them in a different sauce. I decided that I liked the idea of serving them together so that I could compare and contrast the two. The goshtaba were, of course, delicious in their creamy sauce, but I was surprised at how much I enjoyed the rista with their much thinner sauce. It is essentially water with spices in; no oil, no veggies, just... spice-infused water. And it's not like there are even that many spices! And yet, it was absolutely delicious.

Rista & Goshtaba

Slightly adapted from 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer

Ingredients

Meatballs

• 450g ground lamb
• 1 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 tsp. fennel seeds, ground
• 1 tsp. black cumin seeds, ground
• 1 tsp. ginger powder
• 1 small red onion, minced
• 4 large cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 c. mustard oil

Rista

• 2 c. water
• 1 tsp. ground Kashmiri chiles¹
• 1/4 tsp. saffron threads
• 4 black cardamom pods
• 6 whole cloves, crushed

Goshtaba

• 1 c. half-and-half²
• 1/2 tsp. Kashmiri garam masala
• 1/4 tsp. saffron threads

Directions

Meatballs

1. Combine lamb, salt, fennel, cumin, ginger, onion, and garlic and mix thoroughly.
2. Divide into 20 equal portions and form into balls.
3. Heat the oil over medium heat.
4. Brown the meatballs in the oil. Cook for 5-7 minutes, turning frequently, until all sides have been browned. (They don't need to be cooked all the way through as they will finish cooking in the sauce.) Work in batches if necessary.

Rista

1. Combine all sauce ingredients in a pot and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.
2. Simmer vigorously for 5 minutes.
3. Once meatballs have been browned, add 10 of them to the sauce and cook for an additional 10 minutes, basting every minute or two.
4. Remove meatballs with a slotted spoon and continue to cook the sauce, uncovered, for another 10 minutes or so.
5. Pour the sauce over the meatballs.
6. Serve with rice.

Gostaba

1. Drain any excess oil from remaining 10 meatballs.
2. Pour half-and-half over meatballs and add masala and saffron.
3. Cook over medium-high heat for 10 minutes, basting and turning meatballs as necessary.
4. Serve over rice.

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¹ If Kashmiri chiles are unavailable, substitute 1/4 tsp. cayenne + 3/4 tsp. sweet paprika. ^Back
2 Half-and-half is ~10% milk fat. If a 10% cream isn't available, you can mix cream and milk to get the right percentage. A 50:50 mix of milk and table/single/18% cream should result in a mixture that's approximately 10% milk fat. In a pinch, I think table/single/18% cream would be fine. It just means that the final sauce will end up being a bit thicker and richer than it would've been otherwise. ^Back