Week 19: Sri Lankan Chicken Curry

The full title of this recipe is “Really simple Sri Lankan chicken curry with coconut milk & cashew nut rice” which is far too long to fit in a tweet…

I’ve heard warnings that you shouldn’t try new recipes out on guests, but it worked fine when I made the Curry in a Hurry for a visitor (https://newrecipenight.wordpress.com/2013/11/21/week-8-curry-in-a-hurry/) I was maybe a bit bullish this time.  Silly boy.  This time I was cooking for two guests, and if truth be told I was secretly grateful that they got a bit drunk on the train.

Lorraine Pascale’s recipe uses cashew nuts, basmati rice, frozen peas and curry powder for the rice; and curry powder, garam masala,  cinnamon, ginger, chilli powder, vegetable oil, coconut milk, spring onions, garlic, coriander, and chicken breasts to cook the curry.  Because I was catering for guests I even bought the coriander.

It was all a bit of a panic making this, the first four steps were fine (even when one of my guests shouted “do I smell burning?” which she slightly could) but then the instructions turned over the page and I got pretty flustered.  For example, I completely missed Lorraine telling me to put oil into the pan after the spices had toasted which made the chicken get really really coated in the pretty burned spices and it looked really black.

The curry seemed to take forever to simmer down, and while I was waiting for it the rice over-cooked:

It was a lot pinker than has shown up on the picture, maybe Lorraine’s curry powder is yellower than mine?

Anyway, I plated the rice up while the chicken was finishing off and divvied the curry up between the four of us.  It didn’t look much like the picture in the book:

I think the darker yellow smudges are the curry sauce.  I reckon if I’d put the oil in when I should have (ever) the curry would be the pleasing brown in the book, even if the rice looks egg fried from the takeaway.  It’s not quite one of those “nailed it” meme’s, but not far off haha.

Taste-wise it was good, but it wasn’t well cooked.  I lucked out though, my guests and my lover kept drinking while I was cooking and said it was delicious.

Shortly after one of my guests ate a dog biscuit and fell asleep.  Later in bed my lover said “that beef was really nice, but don’t do the rice again”

 

Fast Fresh and Easy Food by Lorraine Pascale (Harper Collins 2012 ISBN: 978-0-00-793482-9)

Week 17: Lamb Lollipops

I did it again, I reached for the 15 Minute Meals book.  Like last time there was a lot of mess, a massive panic, and the need to scrub my entire kitchen.

I’ve had my eye on this recipe since I got the book, and it took a bit of work gathering all the ingredients, but I finally got everything together.  To feed four the recipe calls for: 300g basmati rice, 8 cloves, 40g red lentils, 300g peas, 8 lamb cutlets, 1 tbsp garam masala, 4 spring onions, a red chilli, a thumb sized bit of ginger, 4 jarred red peppers, 1 tsp runny honey, splash balsamic vinegar, 1 tin coconut milk, and 2 tbsp Patak’s korma paste.

I feel just like a Blue Peter presenter when I spread all the ingredients out, but I found with the Lamb Meatballs (Week 11 https://newrecipenight.wordpress.com/2013/12/16/week-11-lamb-meatballs-chop-salad-harissa-yoghurt/ ) that for the timings to work, everything needs to be ready to throw in.  Of course, what I should have done was made sure the chilli, ginger, peppers and spring onions were chopped before I started – and so should you 😉

Firstly, put two frying pans on the heat and then put the rice in a saucepan with two mugs full of boiling water and the cloves.  Add a pinch of salt and put the lid on the pan.  Rub the shanks with salt, pepper, and the garam masala, bash them flat and put them in one of the frying pans with a tablespoon of olive oil.

In the other frying pan stir together the coconut milk, korma paste and the juice of half a lemon (pre-juice the lemon or you’ll read that and panic like I did) bring to the boil and then simmer for 5 minutes.

Mix the lentils in with the rice then two or three minutes later (the time that Jamie thinks you can chop up the spring onions, chilli, ginger and peppers) toss the spring onions, chilli, ginger and peppers in with the lamb, then stir the peas into the rice.

By this time it should all be pretty much cooked… having said that I had managed to pretty much boil the rice onto the pan because I’m a slow chopper.  Fluff up the rice and – depending on how you want to serve it – plate it up or put it in a serving bowl, the same goes for the curry sauce.

Toss the lamb with the honey and a splash of balsamic and serve.  Jamie recommended serving with a scatter of coriander leaves, scrunched up poppadoms and natural fat free yoghurt… but I ignored him.

The rice was delicious, I’ve never used a lentil without glitter and glue before, but I think they really added to the flavour – I’ll make the rice again with other meals.

The bit I would change is the cut of meat used.  Cutlets are really tricky to eat, there was a lot of rice on the floor by the time I’d finished and I ended up eating loads of the fat and still ended up leaving loads stuck to be bones.  Also, my lover hates meat on the bone and eating fat, so maybe cutlets wasn’t the best choice for dinner!

I would definitely make it again, just not with cutlets.

 

Jamie’s 15 Minute Meals by Jamie Oliver (Penguin 2012 ISBN: 978-0-718-15780-7)

 

Week 15a: Thai Chickpea Curry

Those darn waxy potatoes taunting me again!

After the vegetable cutlets debacle (http://wp.me/p42Dr4-X) I went online to find out which potatoes were waxy and which weren’t – I was surprised to learn that there are so many!  Unfortunately, I was looking on the run up to Christmas, and the already limited choice of potatoes in Hammersmith was distinctly floury.

Then, I chanced upon a pack of Maris Peer potatoes in M&S Foodhall.  I pounced on them, and then bought them to avoid the angry stares of security.  Not wanting to try feeding my lover the cutlets again I remembered a different recipe in the Cupboard Love book:  Thai Chickpea Curry!

This curry uses garlic, fresh ginger, black pepper, vegetable oil, a medium sized waxy potato, madras curry powder, coconut milk, a tin of chickpeas, tomatoes, soy sauce, salt and sugar.  For once, I had most of the ingredients in, and the others weren’t hard to find.

Then I hit my only hurdle.  The recipe asked me to pound or blitz the ginger, pepper and ginger into a paste.  I didn’t have  pounder or a blitzer, but the waxy potatoes were mocking me, so I had to improvise:

My rolling pin and tin foil blitz-pounding-extravaganza!  It didn’t turn very paste-like, more like lumpy dust actually, but I had to improvise…

Like all wok-cooked curries, everything else gets lobbed in pretty quickly, and then it boils and simmers down, from this:

To this:

The tomatoes get put in for the last few minutes.  The recipe said to put in basil or coriander, but I didn’t have either (and it was the night before I escaped north for Christmas so I wasn’t going to get any in specially) so I left it out.

I have to say, it turned out delicious.

I’ve made it three times now, and its turned out slightly differently every time.  The only problem I have with this curry is that what my body does to cheap eggs is nothing compared to what it can do to half a can of chickpeas.

I canvassed my friends and the various suggestions for making chickpeas less gassy included peeling the chickpeas (which I don’t fancy doing for a whole tin of them) adding parsley (which either stops the gas or makes it smell like parsley…?) or either cooking the chickpeas for longer or shorter (but my friend couldn’t remember which)

If anyone knows how to make chickpeas less ‘trumpy’ or knows a substitute that’s as tasty and comes in a handy 400g tin, please do not hesitate to post a comment below (No, seriously, please do – I can’t open my bedroom windows, I need a solution before I make it again)

But to end on a nicer note, I bought myself a little present before I cracked open the tinfoil to make it a third time:

My kitchen’s becoming high-tech!

(I meant to post this Christmas week, and I completely forgot – and now its the end of January… So Slack!)

Cupboard Love by Tom Norrington-Davies (Hodder & Stoughton 2005 ISBN 0 340 83525 5)

Week 13: Lozza’s Lamb Biryani

Oof… Happy New Year Y’all!

Welcome to the first weekly installment of New Recipe Night – from now on, every Friday!

It also marks the first recipe made from the first cookery book I’ve bought in six months – only because it was on offer when I bought my mum one for Christmas.  It was rude not to buy it really.  The book is Lorraine Pascale’s Fast Fresh and Easy food:

To serve four, the recipe uses Vegetable Oil, 5 Cardamom Pods, 2 tsp Garam Masala, 2 tsp Ground Tumeric, 1tsp Ground Cumin, 1 tsp Chilli Powder, a bunch of Spring Onions, 500g Lamb Chump Steak, 350g Basmati Rice, a tin of Coconut Milk, 100g Sundried Tomatoes, 50g Raisins and 25g Toasted Flaked Almonds.

I halved the quantities to make it for two people.  Splitting it worked really well, with the added bonus that I can make it the day after Nigella’s Curry in a Hurry (see week 8: https://newrecipenight.wordpress.com/2013/11/21/week-8-curry-in-a-hurry/) using the left-over coconut milk.  However, this is one recipe I wouldn’t make then freeze – just because I’m a bit gun-shy about freezing rice, but it’s really quick to make so it’s OK.

Unfortunately, with it being the last Saturday before Christmas when I made it, the butcher didn’t have lamb so I used beef instead.

It went together really easily and I was surprised just how straight forward the recipe was, especially after the Jamie Oliver recipe last week!

To start, heat a bit of oil in a pan, slam the cardamom pods open and put them in a pan with all the spices for 3 or 4 minutes.  While this is cooks finely slice the spring onions, and cut the lamb into bite-size pieces (although my lovely butcher did this for me)

Turn the heat up and lob in the lamb and onions, with a little more oil, and brown the meat for 2 or 3 minutes.

Add the rice, coconut milk and 100ml of water.  Fit the lid, bring it up to the boil and then turn it down to a very gentle simmer and leave it for the amount of time the rice takes to cook (it says it on the packet)

When its done, you take off the lid and it should look like this (preferably better than this) and it will be just like Christmas!

While its cooking cut up the sundried tomatoes, some coriander (or mint) and stir them into the biryani when the rice is done, along with the raisins, and heat for a couple of minutes.

Season it with some salt and pepper, maybe stir in a knob of butter if you want your biryani to be extra creamy (I didn’t) and plate it up.  Artfully sprinke some more coriander/mint and the toasted flaked almonds over it and serve it to admiring diners (who will shower you with compliments and maybe wash up)

The only thing I would change if I used beef again would be the cut of beef.  When I told the butcher I was doing biryani he selected a cut of stewing beef, and as this recipe is really quick to cook the beef was pretty chewy.  Delicious, but chewy.

Lorraine Pascale’s instructions are much clearer than mine, so I reckon this book is a must have for your kitchen (and its always really cheap in Smiths’)

Fast Fresh and Easy Food by Lorraine Pascale (Harper Collins 2012 ISBN: 978-0-00-793482-9)

Available here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lorraine-Pascales-Fast-Fresh-Easy/dp/0007489668/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1388749392&sr=1-1&keywords=lorraine+pascale+fast+fresh+and+easy+food or on 2 for £10/3 for £12.50 at WHSmith.

Week 8: (Chicken) Curry in a Hurry

At last!  I plucked up the courage to delve into Nigella.  So to speak.

I’ve had the book for ages, and I remember it being on TV a couple of years’ ago, and we joked how we never had any stale croissants left in the cupboard, and should we try to caramelise them after a night out we’d probably burn the house down (Caramel Croissant Pudding, page 23) – and all these years later, I probably still would.

I’d made a tuna-beany salad from it years’ ago, and it was really nice; but never made anything hot.

Until now.

I’ll admit, it was a bit of a special occasion – my friend was coming to stay and she says I can’t cook… so like a mature adult (that I am), I used Nigella as a weapon.  Biff, take that for can’t cook!

I think I was always put off making the hot recipes by the received horror of tracking down the ingredients for a Nigella recipe.  I’ve sat through many a boxing day dinner listening to a family friend’s story about getting the last star anise in the whole of Nottinghamshire, dishing out black eyes in the process – especially to do something festive with it on Nigella’s say so.  I must say, it wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be.  I’m lucky there is a good Thai Supermarket down the street, and the butcher is a whizz with chicken; however I had a bit of trouble with the soya beans.

I wasn’t sure what a soya bean was, and I wasn’t entirely sure where to get them from – so I went to a health food shop.  They had dried ones, which I would have to boil and simmer for hours but no fresh.  Then I went to Whole Foods in Kensington, and they had the dried ones, but the shopboy said they had no fresh or frozen.  They had frozen edamame beans (which google said were the same thing), but only in massive bags.

Yay for Brook Green Tesco’s though, they sold frozen soya beans in bags small enough for my tiny little ice compartment, my Nigella ingredients finding mission over for this week.  I reckon you can get hold of Green Thai Curry Paste and Nam Pla fish sauce in most larger supermarkets, but if you live near an ‘oriental supermarket’ you’d be better off going there.

I “accidentally” went to the pub and got a little ginny before making this the first time, and I had to substitute a beef stock cube for the required chicken one, but it was lovely.  Genuinely lovely.  There was an awkward moment where it looked like a pan full of sick, but the water boiled down to a nice thick sauce and we didn’t have to order pizza.

I have made this a few times now, but still not made it with the quantities below – I have found that half quantities will serve 4 easily, and it freezes well .

To serve 6 you will need: wok oil, 3 tablespoons finely chopped spring onions (although I usually leave them pretty chunky out of laziness) 3 or 4 tablespoons of Green Thai Curry Paste, 1 kg chicken thigh fillets (When I make half the quantity I use two breasts) 1 can of coconut milk, chicken stock (250ml of boiling water with enough stock for 500ml), 1 tablespoon fish sauce (nam pla), 185g frozen peas, 200g frozen soya beans, 150g frozen fine beans (I use fresh ones) and 3 tablespoons of fresh chopped coriander, which I always forget.

Heat the 2tbs of wok oil in a large lidded saucepan (although I’ve made this a load of times and can’t work out which bit I’m supposed to put the lid on for) and throw in the spring onions, cook them for a couple of minutes and add the curry paste.

Put the chicken in with the onions, and cook for about 2 minutes stirring continuously.  Then add the coconut milk, stock, fish sauce, frozen peas and soya beans.  Simmer for 10 minutes then add the frozen fine beans.  If you use fresh ones like me add them after about 5 minutes so they’re not tough.  It will look just like this:

Cook for another 3 to 5 minutes and serve.  Nigella recommends serving with rice or noodles – I’ve not tried with noodles but its delicious on a baked potato.

Bravo Nigella – I’m not scared anymore!

Nigella Express, by Nigella Lawson (Chatto & Windus 2007 ISBN 9780701181840)