This is a drink that turns from light and refreshing to butter and candied nuts with the zap of a hot wand. For the home mixer, Dave says that an old, very clean fireplace poker will work wonderfully. (Read this post on their blog for details.) Just heat it in the fireplace or on a stove burner until it’s glowing hot to the core, like bright-red terrifyingly hot.

But do be safe: Use a heavy pint glass. Hold it with a thick, dry towel. Don’t aim it toward yourself, because flames will shoot out of the glass several feet in the air once you put the poker in. In fact, it’s best if you have a protective gloves and eyewear. (But isn’t the danger part of the fun of it? Now excuse me while I get my lawyers on the phone.)

Red hot ale

3 ounces Abbey Ale
1 ounce cognac
1/4 ounce lemon juice
1/4 ounce simple syrup
2 dashes orange bitters
1 orange twist

1. Combine all ingredients except orange twist in a heavy pint glass.
2. Using a thick bar or kitchen towel, hold the glass, pointing slightly away from you. If you have protective gloves and eyewear, put them on. Be careful! The drink will bubble violently, ignite and shoot flames once you stick in your red-hot poker. Stir the drink with the poker gently, being careful not to hit the side of the glass. How long you do this depends on exactly how hot your poker is, so since you’re doing it by sight, Dave advises you to watch the fire. If it’s a real flamethrower, keep the poker in there until the flame just starts to die down. If the flame shoots out and vanishes, it’s possible your poker isn’t super-hot, but keep it in there anyway and let the drink bubble and boil until you smell a nice toasty, caramel aroma.
3. Pour the drink into a warm serving glass (the mixing glass will be too hot to drink from, and by pouring it out, you can watch for any stray particles from your poker) and garnish with an orange twist.

For more home-friendly holiday drink recipes from Nils and Dave, go here. 

(To my dal-less friends: if you don’t have a South Asian market near you, “Modern Spice” author Monica Bhide recommends Indian Foods Co. or just plain ol’ Amazon.)

Seema’s Dal Chawal (Indian lentils and rice)
Makes enough for a mother, a young daughter, and a guest
Active time: 20 minutes. Start to finish (including soaking): 1.5 hours 

For the lentils

½ cup masoor dal, tiny split “red” lentils (really the color of orange soda)
5 cups water
1 teaspoon salt (for dal)
5 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 teaspoon black mustard seeds
1 teaspoon whole cumin seeds
7 cloves garlic, cut slightly smaller than pea-size
Dash of asafetida (also called hing)
6 (or to taste) mean hot chilies, short and green, halved lengthwise
½ teaspoon turmeric powder
½ teaspoon salt (for spice mix)
½ cup chopped cilantro (about ¼ bunch, stems partially removed)

1. Soak the dal in cold water for 45 minutes to an hour. “You soak the dal to get rid of the starch, or it’ll be sticky,” Seema says, scrunching her face in displeasure. Now would be a good time to get your rice washed and soaking (see below).
2. Drain the dal, give it a quick rinse, and bring it to a boil with the 5 cups water and the 1 teaspoon salt. Skim the foam off the top if you want. (I do out of habit, Seema doesn’t. It doesn’t taste like much.) Turn it down to a moderate bubble and cover, leaving a crack for evaporation. (The amount of water doesn’t actually matter, Seema says, because if it’s too loose for you, you can always just uncover it and let it reduce, and if it’s too thick, you can just add more water.) Take a peek once in a while to make sure it’s not bubbling violently, but pretty much you can just hang out for about 40 minutes, uncovering it for the last 10. Give your mom a call. She misses you.
3. Check on the dal, which by now will have lost its Sunkist sparkle and be a mustardy yellow. If most of the lentils have dissolved and you’re looking at a loose soup roughly the texture of a thin batter, get ready to make your entire house smell amazing.
4. In a heavy-bottom pan, get the oil hot enough over medium-high heat so that it just barely shimmers and flows as quickly as water. Add the black mustard seeds. When you start hearing them pop, add the cumin. As it sizzles, add the garlic and swirl the pan to coat it in the oil. Seema says, “I like it when the garlic cooks slow,” which toasts it evenly, bringing out its sweet notes without burning it. She does this by lifting her pan half a foot above her flame and swirls it, but you can just turn your heat down a little and stir, until the hissing turns into a slow sizzle. Cook it until it turns even golden brown, and you begin to wonder if you’re going to smell like this food for the rest of your life.
5. Once the garlic is ready, add a few dashes of asafetida. Note that the name of this spice contains the word “fetid.” That’s not a mistake. It stinks like brimstone. But when you cook it in hot oil, the funk disappears and leaves a mellow, oniony flavor that accents the garlic and undergirds all the spices. So use it! Just bear with it for a second. Then add the chilies until they wilt, the turmeric, the ½ teaspoon salt and cilantro.
6. When the cilantro is wilted, dump everything in the pan into the dal. Seema likes to make sure it all gets in there by actually dunking her pan into the pot, but unless your pans are scrupulously clean on the bottom, maybe just use your spoon. “Now turn up the heat and boil it together so it looks like one,” she says, pointing toward the slicks of oil floating to the top. I gear up in my head an explanation about emulsification, the starch helping to bind the oil and water as the oil slicks start to disappear, but then she says, “See, it thickens it a bit, too.” And I realize there’s nothing more that need be said about that.

For the rice

1 cup basmati rice
2¼ cups water for cooking
½ teaspoon whole cumin seeds
1 teaspoon ghee or butter
½ teaspoon salt

1. Wash the rice by soaking it in a big bowl of cold water and swirling it with your hands. The water will cloud with starch. Pour it off and repeat until the water is clear, around five or six times. Now drain the rice well — using a strainer — and soak it in the cooking water for at least 30 minutes and up to 2 hours.
2. Pour the rice soaking water into the rice cooker and turn on. When it’s boiling, add the rice, salt, and ghee or butter. Put cumin seeds into the palm of your hand, and with the heel of the other, crush them into the rice lightly, as if wringing your hands with worry. But don’t worry. This is going to be great. Cover and let the rice cooker do its magic.
3. If you don’t have a rice cooker, reduce the water to 1¾ cups. Boil the water in a heavy oven-safe pot with a tight-fitting lid. Add the rice, salt, ghee and cumin as above, and bring back to a boil. Cover and pop into a 300-degree oven for 10 minutes, then take out and fluff lightly. (By the way, for Luddites and other rice-cooker-free folk, cooking rice in the oven really is the way to go. For more on that, look here.)

To serve

Mound the rice into a bowl or plate, and spoon the dal over it. I like to have enough dal to sauce the rice but still be dry enough to eat with the hands, which you do by holding your fingertips together to form a beak, pulling your thumb back toward the palm. With a twist-and-scoop motion, pick up a bite with the fingertips, the rice resting now on your upturned fingers, and use your thumb to push it into your mouth. Some people can do this with utmost grace. I usually resort to a spoon halfway through dinner.

And then, sometimes the mistakes can turn intentional. A few years ago, in a fit of mid-’90s nostalgia, I busted out a few hits from the “Dean and DeLuca Cookbook,” including a great tomato sauce for pasta with the soothing warmth of ginger. There was a charming and lovely woman, there was conversation, and soon there was a pot of overcooked tomato sauce.

But my lady friend, the daughter of Indian immigrants, kindhearted and open-minded, gave it a taste all the same. She grinned. “That tastes like something my mother makes,” she said. “She just always called it tomato chutney.” We put away the pasta, and found some Indian breads. We scooped up the stuff, bite by bite, tasting the tomatoes’ rich depth, glowing with ginger. “Is this how they do it in Sindh?” I asked.

“Sure. Why not?” she said.

Tomato-ginger chutney

Makes about 1.5 cups

1/3 cup vegetable oil
1  22-ounce can of good-quality diced tomatoes in juice
1 knob of ginger, ¾-inch, peeled with the side of a spoon (It takes off the skin with hardly any waste) and minced
3 cloves garlic, lightly crushed with the side of your knife
1 medium onion, cut in ½-inch dice
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Get a heavy-bottomed saucepan warm over medium to medium-low heat and add the oil. Swirl it around the pan. When the oil moves around the pan as easily as water, add the garlic, flipping it every few moments so that it cooks without too much browning. The longer it cooks without browning, the smoother and cleaner the flavor will be. When the garlic is softened and maybe a little blistered, add the ginger and cook, stirring, for a minute or two, until you can smell it.
2. Add the onions, stirring them constantly. Don’t let them brown either. Watch how they change, from opaque to translucent. You’re softening them, releasing the juices and sugars without caramelizing them. I know everyone loves caramelizing things, how bold and complex those flavors become, but by keeping those flavors in line here, the ginger and tomato can shine. Taste a piece. When it’s soft — hardly any snap left — give the pan a pinch of salt and pepper.
3. Add the tomatoes and stir to mix well. Add another couple of pinches of salt and pepper, until it tastes OK, but a little under-seasoned. Turn up the flame to get it all boiling, then turn it back down, until the tomato is bubbling gently. Partially cover the pan, and go have charming conversation. It’s best if you can come back to check on the pan every once in a while, to give it a stir and check on the heat level.
4. Let it ride in the pan until the liquid has cooked off and you’re left with a tight, almost pasty chutney, maybe 30 minutes total. Give it a taste. Does it need more salt? Give it another taste, and notice how the ginger flavor plays a little hide-and-seek with the tomato, a lovely little trick.

What to do with this stuff

Well, as they do it (or not) in Sindh, I love to just scoop this up with parathas or naan, if you can get to a South Asian grocery. Or maybe slather it all over one of those breads and tuck some pan-fried paneer cheese into it, a grilled cheese for the ages. But the chutney is so versatile you can just smear it all over a regular grilled cheese, instead of ketchup. Or make a batch of it the day before Thanksgiving and use it the day after on turkey sandwiches to give them a tart, warming kick. Or, in a pinch, loosen it back up with some water and put it on pasta, and everything will be as it was meant to be. 

* Anyone want to get to work on a secret decoder wheel that says, “If you screwed ______ up by ________ , you can call it _____.”? Let’s talk: food@salon.com 

Hot Buttered Celery

Serves four to six as a side

This takes ranch dressing’s water slide and turns that relationship inside out a little, softening the textures and marrying, rather than contrasting, celery’s floral, vegetal flavors with rich fat.

1 bunch celery
1 tablespoon stock (chicken, vegetable, whatever floats your boat) or water
2 tablespoons butter, cut into four pieces, chilled
Salt and pepper, to taste
Parmesan cheese, to taste

1. Set a big pot of water to boil over high heat, and salt it. How much salt? Too little and the water will taste flat and metallic, and too much will make it taste painful. So somewhere in between.
2. Cut off the bottom from the bunch of celery, right about where the stalks start to narrow, and then strip the leaves. If you want the final dish to look uniform and pretty, go ahead and take those spindly stalks off the top, too.
3. Using your peeler, strip the stalks from top to bottom. Take a look at those long, stringy fibers. They’re kind of beautiful, aren’t they? Coils of green curls. But they’re also 75 percent of why people don’t take celery seriously. I mean, who wants to eat a mouthful of dental floss? So be ruthless; if you have to, go over it twice with the peeler to get all the fibers, and don’t forget to turn it over and go down the edge, too. (But you don’t have to waste the trim. Save it to add to stock or soup for flavor.) You could do it like this dude. Check out the tunes!
4. Now cut the celery stalks into ¼-inch thick slices. If you’re fancy, do it diagonally on the bias, making elongated U-shapes.
5. Is your water at full boil? OK, drop your celery in. After 2 or 3 minutes, taste a piece. When it’s tender and slippery but with just a touch of snap left in its heart, drain it thoroughly, shaking the colander to get the excess water off.
6. In a separate pan, or back in the empty blanching pot, heat the stock or water over medium-low heat until some steam comes off. Now here’s a funny little technique: Tilt the pan so that all the liquid creates a puddle where the side and bottom of the pan meet. With a small whisk or a fork, quickly whisk in the butter, one chunk at a time. The butter will melt but emulsify, giving you a thick, creamy-looking sauce. When all the butter is incorporated, add the celery and, off heat, stir to coat it thoroughly. How does it taste? Season with salt and pepper until it tastes good. Shave cheese on top and serve immediately.

Lemon-Braised Celery

Serves four to six as a side

If the peeling and cooking, above, took some of the edge off celery, this recipe really mellows it out. The long, slow stewing pulls a veil over its flavor and melts the stalks into smooth, luscious bites. Whoever thought you could describe celery as smooth and luscious? Well, I just did. But that didn’t stop me from putting some crunch back in with almonds and bread crumbs.

1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (from about ½ to 1 whole lemon; if you need more lemons than that, shame your grocer and buy them somewhere else)
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1½ tablespoons honey
1 bunch celery, peeled mercilessly (see above recipe), cut into 2-inch pieces
1/3 cup raisins
1/4 cup chopped, toasted almonds
2 tablespoons toasted bread crumbs

1. Find a pot about wide enough for all the celery to fit on the bottom. (Don’t sweat it if it doesn’t; you’ll just have to stir a little more often.) In it, heat the water, lemon juice, oil and honey, stirring until dissolved. Stir in enough salt so that the liquid crosses from sweet to savory.
2. Add celery to the pot, and give it a few stirs to coat it with the liquid. Simmer on low or medium-low heat — what you’re looking for is a lazily bubbling liquid. Cover tightly and simmer.
3. Give it a stir every 10 minutes or so, making sure it’s still bubbling lazily. After 30 minutes, add the raisins. After 40 minutes, take a piece out and taste it. I know it’s not a pretty color. Sorry. But is it smooth and luscious? Maybe a little bit like a potato, a little bit like velvet? If it’s still got too much crunch, just let it keep cooking, up to an hour total. (Add a little water if necessary to keep it simmering.)
4. When it is smooth and luscious, uncover it and turn up the heat to evaporate the water, until the juices form something like a glaze. Give it a taste, add a touch of salt if it needs it, and you’re done. Top it with the almonds and bread crumbs right before serving, or let your guests top it themselves to keep it crunchy, and show celery a little love!

Modified from Melissa Roberts’ recipe for Sweet and Sour Celery in the April 2009 issue of Gourmet.