Kebab Sauce

Ok, stay with me here. I know it's still Joe-Month, and this article does contain some G.I. Joe stuff, but I felt like focusing a bit on food today.

 Indian spices, funny toys, home made sauce that can go with any fast-food. Read on!



Back when I was living in the big city, I loved a good kebab. And we had a favorite place were we went at least a few times every week. The healthy life of a student...
I know there are many ways of doing a kebab, the one we ate was a pita bread filled with fried lamb meat. The meat had a very particular seasoning, that I felt was familiar, but it didn't really occur to me until more recently what it actually was. The kebab also contained some vegetables, a delicious spicy red sauce and a milder white sauce.

I found out that the spices that made our specific kebab so great were a mix between ginger, coriander and cardamom. After some research, I concluded that the Indian spice mix Garam Masala was as close as I would ever get.

The meat is beef, and obviously prepared in a very different manner, but this was just to make it as simple as possible, and I was more interested in how the Indian spice mix worked than making actual kebab meat.

This is good and all, and as usual, I just winged the entire process. What I didn't realize was that I would discover an excellent sauce that could be perfect for anything from kebabs and burgers to pizza and pasta.

The recipe was simple. Mayonnaise, sour cream/sour milk, garlic, some chili powder and a dash of ketchup or chili sauce. The result was amazing. Spicy and refreshing, sweet and strong. It was the perfect fast-food sauce.

Mayo, sour milk and garlic. Mix together. 

Chili powder and chili sauce. Mix some more. 

The sauce is done. 

But ok, I used Indian spice mix, but in no way can you call this Indian food. I also believe that the kebab originated from Turkey or Iran or something. It may be worth looking into.
The following two toys, on the other hand, are very much Indian.

Made by Indian toy company Funskool, using molds borrowed from Hasbro. The Indian-made G.I. Joe figures are easily recognizable by poor plastic quality, awful paint jobs, flimsy cards and bubbles and absolutely hilarious versions of the original characters. Toys are meant to be fun, and Funskool really made an effort (all though probably unintentionally) into making G.I. Joe more fun.

First up is Windmill. He came originally with the experimental aircraft Skystorm in 1988, and has a sculpt that's very similar to Ghost Rider from the same year. When Hasbro made him, they gave him bright colors, and I'm sure this would be a more popular figure had they released him in black/dark green or something.
Surprisingly enough, Funskool's take on Windmill has decent color combinations, quite possibly better than Hasbro's. Sure the paint job is still very uneven on the Indian-made Joe, but what really makes this a fun toy is the hilariously literal take on Windmill's codename.

Yes. He comes with a windmill. And he's serious about it.

The back shows some other funny repaints, like Big Brawler, Tripwire and Cross Country.

Next up is Sky Diver. This is not a repaint of an existing character, but using different molds creating a new. It looks to be Crazy Legs head on a Beach Head body painted in primary colors. I like the blue belt in particular. It's kind of lame to ridicule the colors, because as you know even Hasbro went full retard on the colors in the early 90s.
What I do want to ridicule, on the other hand...

That there is pure gold. Is Sky Diver the coolest or what?