Thai Green Curry Paste

Our trip to Thailand last year is one of my all time favourite holidays; the sun, the sea, the spectacular under water world we discovered Scuba Diving, the warm happy people and most memorable of all was the lip smacking food.

I fell in love, which is a little obvious because Thai food is famous for its heat and I am a self confessed slave of spicy food,but the delights of the Thai cuisine are so much greater than that. Fresh ingredients, simple procedures and a gorgeous balance between sweet, sour and spicy. I will always remember my first dish in Thailand, a chicken Massaman curry in Koh Samui; if I go back to Thailand I am definitely going back here again! We spent most of our trip scuba diving on a small island called Koh Tao so the food we ate at each meal was fuss free, simple food, quite often put together right before our eyes. I knew that I had to be able to do this at home and I brought back some essentials from Bangkok to help me out, dried galangal, kaffir lime leaves.







One of the things I ate repeatedly was the Thai Green Curry, with prawns, chicken, vegetarian, I devoured it and it is also the easiest  dishe to make. Being Indian we are quite used to the concept of freshly grinding our masala pastes for curries and so making this is easy peasy for us.  So here's what you do;

What you need:

• 1 tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 3 tbsp finely chopped fresh lemongrass
• 2 tbsp finely chopped fresh galangal
• 10 fresh green chilies
• 10 garlic cloves
• 1/2 cup roughly chopped onions
• 1/2 cup of fresh coriander leaves and stalks
• 2 tsp chopped kaffir lime leaves (since I use dry, reduce to half if you are using fresh) 
• ¼ cup of sweet basil leaves
• 1 tbsp shrimp paste or soy sauce if you want it vegetarian.

How:

• All you really need to do is grind all the ingredients together. This quantity gives me enough for a curry for six people, so tweak the proportions as you need. You can also store it in the refrigerator and it will stay good and fragrant for upto a week.

Thai green curry post coming up as soon as I get a better picture of it.

Incredible Banana Bread

Let me begin by saying I dont particularly like bananas, but have taken to eating them early every morning as a post workout boost of energy! However, having skipped my morning banana for a few days, I had a few bananas on their very last legs, begging to be rescued. 

I have made many banana breads/cakes before in an effort to consume the very healthy fruit, but have had minimal success; with a result that was cloyingly banana flavoured, dense and something I dislike as much as the bananas themselves. But this recipe from my beloved Nigella Lawson is out of the world awesome, its light, moist, has just the right amount of banana for my taste, coupled with nuts and when someone says you may want to add chocolate, I add chocolate and dark chocolate.

So I tweaked Nigella's recipe a wee bit out of my previous experiences with this cake. If you want the original, here it is; Nigella Lawson's Banana Bread

 And here is my version with a few tweaks

What you need:

• 100 grams raisins
• 75 ml dark rum (I used my favourite Old Monk)
• 175 grams plain flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• ½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 125 grams salted butter (melted, I always use Amul butter and skip any added salt)
• 150 grams caster sugar
• 3 eggs (increased this from the 2 large eggs in the original, because my eggs are not large and I wanted it to be more airy)
• 4 small very ripe bananas (mashed)
• 60 grams chopped lightly toasted almonds
• 1 teaspoon dark rum
• 100 grams dark chocolate chopped into chunks

How:

1. Put the raisins and rum in a smallish saucepan and bring to the boil.
2. Remove from the heat, cover and leave for an hour if you can, or until the sultanas have absorbed most of the liquid, then drain.
3. Preheat the oven to 170ºC//325ºF and get started on the rest. Put the flour, baking powder, bicarb in a medium-sized bowl and, using your hands or a wooden spoon, combine well.
4. In a large bowl, mix the melted butter and sugar and beat until blended. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then the mashed bananas. Then, with your wooden spoon, stir in the roasted almonds, drained sultanas and vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture, a third at a time, stirring well after each bit. 
5. Scrape into a loaf tin (23 x 13 x 7cm / 9 x 5 x 3 inches) and bake in the middle of the oven for 1-1¼ hours. When it's ready, an inserted toothpick or fine skewer should come out cleanish
6. My cake rose rapidly in the first 15 minutes scaring me that it may overflow from my tin, but it held steady for the rest of the baking time and was wonderfully light when done.

Leave in the tin on a rack to cool, and eat thickly sliced to get in all the nutty, chocolatey goodness of this cake in one bite. I personally like it cold better than hot, and is the perfect accompaniment to my peppermint tea!

My favourite part about this cake is the combination of the dark rum and banana, such a match made in heaven. 

Terrace Garden

Cross posted from my Wordpress blog here

Our apartment in Ahmedabad has this huge terrace that immediately inspired a terrace garden and a home composting unit, I wrote about here.
In the last three years cultivating this terrace garden, I have grown, potatoes, lemons, tomatoes, chillies, aubergines, bitter gourd, okra and of course herbs, mint, coriander, curry leaves, and lemon grass all nourished with home made compost. It is so satisfying cooking vegetables you grew yourself. :)

It is amazing how easy tomatoes, lemons, chillies, potatoes and bitter gourd are to grow. They are really the easiest. I currently have about a dozen tomato plants and I easily get half a kilo every two days. I almost never have to buy tomatoes and lemons since the last 2 months, except when I need a lot at once. Of course lemon grass just grows and grows, you don’t have to do a thing. Okra and aubergine are a bit complex. You have to pick them at the right time otherwise they get too hard and then they are only good for their seeds. But I encourage you to try tomatoes, even if you grow it on a balcony or a window sill, when you see the first fruit, it will be uncomparable joy. And if you have children, it is so much more amazing. I show my plants to all the kids who come to my house and they are always fascinated to see an aubergine or a tomato not yet ripe, still on the plant – a first experience for many of them.

Here is some of my most successful ‘crop’:

Italian Tray Bake

There are just some crazy days when I wish there was a way that I could just dream up a dinner and it would materialize in my kitchen! This recipe is just one step away from it. It takes about five minutes to put together and an hour in the oven later it is a flavorful, wholesome dinner ready to be devoured. Im  eternally grateful to Nigella Lawson for opening up the world of tray bakes for me. There are no real rules to making this dish and I tweak the recipe based on what I have in my fridge.

I have got here a basic structure that you can play with as you please.

What you need:
3 large potatoes unpeeled, cut into 1″ chunks
8 chicken thighs (bone in, skin on)
8 Italian sausages or any sausage you have on hand.

My tray going into the oven

6-7 sprigs rosemary
zest and juice of one lemon (washed)
6-8 large cloves garlic, peeled and cut into chunks
1 teaspoon kosher salt (or 1/2 teaspoon table salt)
lots of ground pepper
1/4 cup olive oil

How:

• Preheat oven to 200 degrees celsius. Place prepared potatoes, garlic, chicken and sausages in large mixing bowl.
• Strip all but two or three of the sprigs of rosemary and mince the leaves finely, to get about two teaspoons’ worth of chopped rosemary. Combine rosemary leaves with the lemon zest and juice, olive oil, salt and pepper, and pour over potato/meat mixture in bowl. Toss gently to coat everything with the dressing.
• Spoon this mixture (in a single layer) onto a large, shallow roasting pan (you don’t want it too deep, or it won’t brown nicely). Once you have the chicken (skin up) and sausages evenly nestled in the pan with the potatoes and garlic, tuck the two remaining sprigs of rosemary in. Using the spoon to get the last of the lemony olive oil dressing out of the mixing bowl, drizzle the chicken and sausages with the last drops.
•  Bake for 50 minutes or so, until the chicken and sausages are golden and the potatoes are cooked through.

Ready to eat with a side of a fresh salad!

I have also used mushrooms, onions, carrots, sweet potatoes, peppers, basically anything I had on hand to add to the tray and watched the flavours come alive after being roasted.

Andhra Mutton Curry!

As big a change as being married is, its been bigger for me being coupled with the move to a new city; Pune. I have always expressed myself through food and having my own house and my own kitchen has been such a lot of fun. Coming from a family that is vegetarian, I don't have much experience with cooking meat and so I have been reading many blogs to cook up some delicious dishes that we can enjoy. Being away from Hyderabad I miss the spicy, fragrant meat dishes that come from here and on this fine Sunday I took my first shot at an Andhra Mutton Curry.

 

I used the recipe from Kurry Leaves and it was a huge success even if I say so myself. We polished it off and licked our fingers delightfully. The best part for me was that it demystified for me the art of cooking mutton till its nice and tender. So here you are, read and try it out.

 

What you need:-

 Mutton -1/2 kg

Cumin seeds- 1/4 tsp

Turmeric powder- 2tsp

Onion finely chopped - 2

Coconut grated- 1/4 cup

Coriander leaves-1/2 cup

Coriander powder-1 tbsp

Ginger garlic paste-1 1/2 tbsp

Tomato finely chopped- 2

Turmeric powder- 1 tsp

Curry leaves- 2 sprigs

Salt to taste

Water

To roast and grind ( I actually just used 2 teaspoons of MTR Meat Masala, which worked really well)

• Cloves- 3 
• Cinnamon-1" piece
• Bay leaves- 1
• Cardamom-3
• Cumin seeds-1/2 tsp
• Fennel seeds-1/2 tsp
• Whole black pepper-1/2 tbsp
• Whole red chilies- 4 to 5

How:

• Pressure cook mutton with cumin seeds, turmeric powder, salt to taste and enough water. Cook till tender. This is really the key step in this recipe I feel. The meat was so tender, just falling off the bone.
• Heat a pan and dry roast all the ingredients for roasting and grind to form fine powder .Keep it aside. If you are using the meat masala you can skip this step.
• Heat oil in a pan and add 1 chopped onion and saute till it turns translucent. Take it off the flame. Grind the cooked onion along with the above mentioned ground spice powder (or meat masala), grated coconut, coriander leaves and coriander powder to form a smooth paste.
• Heat oil in a pan and saute the remaining onion till it turns translucent.
• Now add the ginger garlic paste and cook for few minutes, till it becomes fragrant
• Add the cooked mutton pieces(without the stock) and fry for 3 to 4 minutes.
• Add  chopped tomato, curry leaves, turmeric powder and salt to taste. Cook for 3 to 4 minutes over low flame.
• Now add the ground masala paste and cook for 10 to 12 minutes
• Garnish with chopped coriander leaves.

We completed this meal with pongal and some roasted jeera aaloo. Was a delightul Sunday lunch and I hardly made any effort to put this up.

 

Chocolate Chip Cinnamon Biscuits

When you find yourself with a book called Chocolate Bible written by the chefs of Le Cordon Bleu,you are left with no option other than making your way through it slowly and steadily. The book presents a dizzying array of recipes and techniques. I started with a simple one, that brings together two of my favourite flavours; Chocolate and Cinnamon.

I have made various different chocolate chip cookies in the past, but none as delicate and well balanced as this one. Within a short time I have made these many times, often for goodie bags for friends and relatives and it is always a huge hit! 

A tad bit time consuming to make, but definitely worth the wait!!

What you need:

• 2 egg yolks
• 1tsp vanilla extract
• 2 tbsp water
• 150g unsalted butter
• 100 g icing sugar
• 300g flour, sifted
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 large pinch of salt
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 120 g  chocolate chips

How:

1. Combine the egg yolks, vanilla extract and water. 
2. In a separate bowl, beat the soft unsalted butter and icing sugar until creamy.
3. Add the  egg-yolk mixture a little at a time, beating after each addition.
4. Blend in the sifted flour and baking powder, salt and cinnamon.
5. Fold in the chocolate chips. Because of the heat in Hyderabad, I keep my chocolate chips in the fridge till I need to put them into the dough.
6. Divide the dough into two even portion. Roll each one into a cylinder based on the size of cookie you want. Mine were tiny, about 3 cm in diameter
7. Roll the cylinders in icing sugar and wrap in cling film. Roll again to ensure they are even and refrigerate for atleast an hour
8. Pre-heat the oven to 160 deg C. Line tray with a buttered baking sheet.
9. Remove, discard cling film and cut the dough into thin slices. 
10. Place on the baking sheet and bake for about 15 minutes. (the recipe said 10, but I found mine were not done by then)

I couldn't keep my hands off them for long enough to let them cool.

Cranberry and Pistachio Biscotti

I have always thought there was something very fancy and un-achievable about Biscotti. Along came Nigella Lawson and showed me otherwise. How I love her!!!

This recipe for Cranberry and Pistachio Biscotti is an absolute breeze to make and it tastes just as fancy and exotic as I imagined it would. Further, Nigella says you can substitute the cranberry and  nuts for anything you have at home; cashew nuts, almonds,hazelnuts, raisins, as long as you match the weight. That makes this the perfect store cupboard treat to whip up to satisfy a craving.

I had so much fun making it and everybody who ate it absolutely loved it!

This recipe is exactly as printed in Nigellissima, I am however tempted to try it with almonds and raisins now.

What you need:

• 1 large egg
• 75g caster sugar
• 2 tsp finely grated orange zest
• 125g plain flour, plus extra for rolling
• ½ tsp baking powder
• nutmeg, for grating
• 75g pistachio nuts
• 50g dried cranberries

Makes about 25

How:

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Line a baking sheet with baking paper.
2. Whisk the egg and sugar together until pale and moussy: the mixture should leave a ribbon-like trail when you lift the beater.
3. Beat in the orange zest, then slowly fold in the flour, baking powder and a good grating of nutmeg.
4. Fold in the whole pistachios and dried cranberries, then flour your work surface well. You may find it helpful to dust your hands lightly with flour, too, as the dough is quite sticky.
5. Form the dough into a flattish, oval ciabatta-like loaf, about 25 x 5cm, tapering the ends slightly.
6. Lay the biscotti dough on to the lined baking sheet and cook for 25-30 minutes, or until it’s a pale brown colour. It may help to rotate the baking sheet halfway through. This reduces the risk of the base scorching at one end.
7. Transfer to a wire rack and leave for 5 minutes to harden slightly.
8. Using a bread knife, cut the baked loaf diagonally into fingers about 1cm thick.
9. Put these back on to the lined baking sheet and cook again for another 10 minutes, then turn over the biscotti and cook for 5 minutes more.
10. Leave the golden-brown biscotti to cool on a rack. They store well in an airtight container.