Kari Ayam - Malay chicken curry.

It snowed all Friday night and Saturday during the day.  Couldn't go out anywhere and was craving Roti Canai from Merlion - a local restaurant specializing in Singapore/Malay food. We're not that bad at cooking and we have the world at our fingertips!  Decided to look-up a recipe for Roti Canai curry. See my previous rant blog on trying to find a recipe.  Finally found something called Kari Ayam which seemed to fit the bill.  I took the recipe and adapted it to my kitchen - and decided to document the recipe with more detail.    I don't know why recipe's use measurements in grams - WTF - am I supposed to have a weight measure in my kitchen?  I use cups, spoons...etc.  I don't have a laboratory with a milligram weighting scale!

Results:
A good tasting curry - not quite what is served in Merlion :(
Something is missing or too much. My hypothesis is that the shrimp paste is essential and I went overboard on the corriander seeds.

Am going to now eat this with some Malay roti (bought frozen from store) and stare out the dining room window at the snow.
... After eating - Holy Yum!  Pretty good - will make again.

Ingredients:
Curry paste ingredients-
2 cloves
2 peppercorns
8 dried chilis - seeds removed
1/2 tbsp corriender seeds
1 teasp fennel seeds
1 teasp cumin
bottom of stock of lemon grass (2 in piece) chopped in small pieces
1 1/2 cup onion
1/2 teasp ground turmeric powder
1 teasp galangal minced

oil saute ingredients -
2 cloves
2 pepper corns
1/2 cinamon stick
1 star anise
12 curry leaves
2-3 in piece of lemon grass chopped finely

1/4 teasp anchovy paste - I didn't have dry shrimp paste
1 teasp fish sauce - again I don't have shrimp paste

Other ingredients -
3/4th tbsp salt
1 teasp brown sugar
1 teasp regular sugar

Process:

Put chilis in 1 cup of water and soak - 20 min - don't throw away water use later.
Start sauteeing onions - 20 min
Roast cumin, corriender, lemongrass in pan - once fragrance grind in coffee grinder with peper corns, cloves and turmeric powder

Put sauteed onions, teasp of galangal, soaked chilis and 1 teasp of spice powder into a blender and grind.

In a pan heat up oil - once heated thrown in cloves, peppercorns, cinamon stick, star anise, and curry leaves
sautee for 5 min

throw in the anchovy paste&fish sauce into the oil sautee - throw in chicken and sautee for 5 min.
Toss in the onion paste and the spice powder

after 5 min add in the the water from the chili seeds
add in 1 can (165ml) coconut milk
add salt & sugar

Simmer till chicken is cooked

Serve with rice or roti paratha (malaysian roti - found in frozen section of indian store)

Aargh... sooo hard to find Malaysian chicken curry recipe

Why soooo hard you ask? every recipe uses 'curry powder' or 'curry paste' - does no one make food from scratch knowing what the ingredients are?  Well it turns out you have to know what you are looking for - can't be looking for Roti Canai - seems that's just the roti and it is served with many many different types of curries.  If you search for Roti Canai Curry or Malaysian curry you get all the recipes with 'curry paste'.
Finally I found one of the curries names 'Kari Ayam' and found the curry paste recipe!!
Going to try this out tomorrow: Nonya Food - Kari Ayam
Perfect recipe when its snowed outside and am stuck at home - going to eat a nice spicy chicken curry with flaky roti paratha.  mmm.

Avani’s Mexican Tortilla Soup with bitter chocolate and chipotle peppers

I saw Rachel Ray make this recipe on her show. But since I never write things down, I didn’t note down this one. Today I am making my own version with some bitter chocolate. We made some chicken stock last night and am using that for this soup.


Chicken stock: Got a rotisserie chicken breast last night to make some sandwiches. We shredded up the meat and used the bone and skin to make the stock. In a cold pot (I think this is important), put the chicken bones, skin, carrots, bay leaf, peppercorns and a couple cloves of garlic. Pour about 6 cups of water and let it simmer on slow heat. I happened to have carrots on hand but celery, onion etc will be wonderful. Let the stock simmer for a couple of hours, let it cool, strain and its ready to use.

The soup

2 small shallots or a quarter of a red onion

1 jalapeno pepper, deseeded

2 small or 1 large chipotle peppers

2 large cloves of garlic

Olive oil

1 cup black beans

1 cup corn

1 cup shredded chicken

½ cup mushrooms

½ cup green peppers

Chicken stock

Bitter chocolate

Brown sugar

Cumin powder

Tomato paste

Fresh avocado


In a saucepan, take about 2 cups of stock, and add 1 tablespoon of finely chopped bitter chocolate, same amount of brown sugar and pieces of deseeded chipotle pepper. Let it simmer for about 15 minutes while we make the soup base. We will later strain this into the soup.

In a soup pan, heat some olive oil and add finely chopped garlic, jalapeno pepper and onion. Let the onions sauté, add 1 teaspoon of cumin powder as the onions turn brown. Stir in the mushrooms and peppers, after they have softened a bit, add the beans and corn. Stir for a couple of minutes followed by the shredded chicken. Follow the chicken with 1 heaping tablespoon and no more of tomato paste. We don’t want the tomato to overcome the “mole” taste from the chipotle and bitter chocolate. By this time, things will be sticking to the bottom of the pan….thats a good thing . Now, strain the simmering stock with chocolate and peppers in. Add 3 more cups of chicken stock. Season with salt and let it boil one last time so all the flavors come together.

Meanwhile cut the tortillas in thin strips, drizzle some olive oil and crisp up in the oven for a few minutes at 350C. In a serving bowl, put the crisp tortilla chips, and small cubes of avocado (optional) and top off with the soup.

Chiba's special roll

Special roll made by Chiba at Kanki.

Sent from mobile device.

mmm - Sashimi

One of my favourite things to eat in the world - Salmon sashimi.  My way to eat it is to put some soy/wasabi on it, a piece of ginger, a bit of the japanese mint leaf (see behind the sashimi) - roll it up and enjoy!

At Kanki - Chiba also makes an awesome miso sauce which complements the sashimi very well.
(the miso sauce complements everything very well)

Sent from mobile device.

Ski beech trip

Don't take highway 194 all the way to ski-beech - make sure you take 105 off 421 towards Sugar and then
onto Beech. This is a much easier drive.

Where to wax and get your ski's sharpened - Fred's store right on Beech Mtn Drive - in Beech town.  You can also rent equipment here for a much cheaper rate than at the mountain.  ie. Boots were $5 for a full day. Over at Freds we also got some locally made Jalapeno Jelly - really good.

Where to stay - try the 4-Seasons VCI condos - call them. We stayed at Alpen Inn - too expensive for what they offer. And Top of the Beech in where friends stayed was reasonable but they don't have 1 night stay rooms.

What to eat when at Beech - we drove down into Banner Elk and ate at Banner Elk Lodge/Lodge Cafe - next to Stone Walls. Stone Walls had an interesting menu and was packed but pricy - Lodge Cafe next door had a huge menu but given the large menu and a not so full restaurant it was worrisome so we stuck to the easy to make, can't go wrong things like burgers and chicken sandwiches.

Where to get ski lift tickets - if staying at Alpen inn or Top of the Beech get the lift tickets for full day $12 cheaper than at the mountain.  

Lesson Learned from this trip - don't plan a NC ski trip 2 months ahead - the weather might suck.  Check the weather a week ahead and if it's sunny go for it.  This way you can drive up one morning, ski till 4:30 - rest your body, get up the next day and ski some more.  This weekend Saturday weather was good  - Sunday morning was cloudy and raining so no skiing :(

Another lesson learned: I am getting old - and even thought I thought I was more fit this year than in many years past, I was never this sore after a day of NC skiing. Colorado Yes - NC no-way!

fish in a bag

Woke up on a Saturday with no food plans... hmm what to eat? Wife sent me to Whole foods to buy some ingredients for a party on Sunday, where there I tasted some hummus, and ran into some roasted garlic bread and fresh cod. Idea: middle eastern type fish, with olives, hummus, a good bread, some wine.  Lunch was starting to look good.
Picked up a nice piece of cod, got an assortment of olives, picked up the hummus and a loaf of roasted garlic batard.   Why did middle eastern come to mind?  Am reading Anthony Bourdain's 'Cooks Tour' book and the last chapter was about his travels to Morocco.  Also the hummus was really tasty - local NC made hummus by EPRI foods.

Came home looked on Food Network and came across a recipe for fish baked in parchment by of all people Rachel Ray.  She has good ideas but I find her annoying.  The below is a recipe for Fish in parchment or fish in a bag a'la' Salil.

Accompanying the fish in a bag was a piece of the fresh loaf of roasted garlic bread, hummus, and Jalapeno mashed potatoes (these were made by wife).

Indegredients:
a nice piece of cod - I cut perpendicular to the spine into 2 inch pieces
tsp anise/fennel seeds
pinch of Hungarian smokey paprika
few olives
Some white wine
butter
garlic powder
kosher salt
sugar
fresh ground pepper
Japanese 7 spice powder
Cilantro (I wanted parsley but didn't have any at home)

Procedure:
Cut large piece of parchment paper - enough so you can fold it over and tuck it under itself.
Place few pieces of fish in center, sprinkle them with kosher salt, fresh pepper, garlic powder, few pinches of sugar (yes sugar) and a dash of japanese 7 spice powder, Hungarian smokey paprika, and anise/fennel seeds.
Throw on some chopped cilantro, and plenty of olives (see pic above), and a thin slice of butter on each piece of fish.
Pour on top some good white wine (I used a 2006 Bordeaux - we didn't finish the night before).
fold the parchment from both sides and roll and tuck the opposite sides under and place in a baking pan
Place pan in oven at 400 for 15 min.  (oven was preheated oto 400).
You're done.

Started meal with bread and hummus.  Accompanied the fish with potatoes and a glass of Mondavi private selection wine!  Cheers to a great afternoon of bliss-full eating.

Food pics from the past 2 months

Home made Pho with home made broth - used teriyaki meatballs from the store, some spagetti, home made chicken broth - goodness in a bowl.                             Inspired by Mario Batali's restaurant in NYC we decided to make Shrimp and Cecci at home - for appetizer we had some carrots, apples, and dry fruits accompanied by a Vino. For the main course we had  Fettuccine  with with parsley butter accompanied by the shrimp and cecci.  The shrimp and Cecci might look bla but the shrimp and cecci have been poached in a strong ginger broth, and sprinkled with some chilli pepper seeds - very simple and tasty - make sure to get large fresh shrimp.

My version of a trifle is multiple layers of alcohol and Jello :)   The picture above is what I call an Orange bomb.  The bottom is an Orange Jello with vodka, the middle layer is a nobake (cool whip, cream cheese, orange jello) orange liquor cheese cake and top is a liquored whip cream with sprinkling of nutmeg. mmmm

Mmm pizza - can't go wrong with a home made pizza - toss whatever you desire.  Here we tossed on some olives, red peppers, artichokes, oyster mushrooms and sheep's cheese.

"Aged Parmasean Chesse and Fennel" Meatball soup

Picked up the meatballs at Whole Foods and decided to make soup since it was freezing outside. Wasnt impressed with the soup recipes I found online and wanted to keep the meatballs at the centre of attention, so I built this recipe in my head. Warning to cooks who follow recipes - strong chance that I dont do a good job with the measurements. Am not a person who follows protocols, do enough of that at work, so in the kitch its all eye-balling. And in my opinion, soup is something where anything goes.....to an extent that is!

Vegetable/Chicken stock
Meatballs (Aged Parmasean and Fennel chicken meatballs from Whole Foods)
Red Onion
Olive oil
Garlic
Green Chilly
Bay leaf
Carrots
Fennel seeds
White wine
Tomato Paste
Whole/ Skim Milk
Bow-tie or any short cut pasta


Heat some olive oil in a deep pot and saute a small red onion, 2 big cloves of garlic and one jalapeno pepper cut into 2 big slices. I left the garlic cloves intact. Once the onion was brown, I fished out the garlic and the pieces of chilly to keep the flavor mild. Add 1 teaspoon of fennel seeds, 1 cup finely chopped carrots, one bay leaf and 1/2 cup of frozen white corn kernels. You can also add celery at this stage but am not a big fan and was also worried about the strong celery flavor masking the fennel. Stir and let the carrots cook for about a couple of minutes. Then add 1 tablespoon tomato paste and mix well while stirring occasionally for 5-7 minutes. Once the tomato paste has cooked, add 3/4 cup of white wine to pick up all the flavor and let it simmer for about 3-4 minutes. Next add 5 cups of stock, vegetable or chicken. We had a home made begetable stock made from brocolli and cilantro stems, carrots and asparagus. You can also heat up the stock separately before adding to the soup, that will reduce the cooking time considerably. Once the stock simmers, add 8 meatballs and 3 fistfuls of pasta. The cooking time beyond this point will vary depending on the pasta you have used. As the pasta is cooking, add about a 1/2 to 1 cup of milk. Garnish with parsley and more fennel seeds.

Avani's seafood gratin

Recipe by Avani - she made this during our Christmas holidays, one of the days when we had family over. It turned out great!
The recipe is originally by Ina Garten.

I first saw Ina Garten make this dish on her show and loved it.  This is my version which lacks some of the high-fat ingredients but tastes pretty damn good.  It makes a beautiful entree on any special occasion especially around the holidays if you are in the mood to skip the turkey.  For people who are not very comfortable with cooking seafood, its a great way to start.

The below measurements make about 5 servings.  (Smallish serving size recommended)

1/2 pound shrimp

1/2 pound halibut/ grouper

1/2 pound bay scallops/ lobster

(I used grouper since halibut was out of season and scallops)

1 tablespoon tomato paste

2 cups chicken stock or fish stock

1 cup white wine

4-6 sticks of saffron

1/2 coup heavy cream

1/2 cup whole milk

leeks/ fennel

carrots

parsley

breadcrubs

butter

salt & pepper

In a wide saucepan, mix together the chicken stock, wine, tomato paste, heavy cream and milk and put it on low to heat to eventually simmer.  Add the saffron and stir occassionally till it starts to bubble gently at the sides.  Drop the shrimp into the sauce and fish it out after 2 minutes or when the shrimp turn pink and curl up, whichever is earlier.  The timing is important since we dont want to cook the seafood too much.  Repeat the same with the fish and scallops.  If you are using cooked lobster meat, you can skip this step.  Once you have cooked the seafood, let the sauce gently simmer and reduce almost by half.  Season with salt and pepper.

Meanwhile, heat up some butter in a saute pan and cook long slices of leeks or fennel and carrots lightly for abour 3-4 minutes.  We want the vegetables to retain their crunch.

Next, use 1 stick of butter at room temperature and add about 2 cups of panko bradcrubs, salt, peper and parsley and mix together gently.  This will make the crust of our gratin. 

Spray some olive/oil or use butter to coat a baking dish and add the cooked seafood and vegetables.  Pour the reduced sauce on top and then arrange the breadcrumbs crust.  Since the vegetables and seafood is already cooked, we just need to heat the dish trhough and make a golden brown crust.  Bake in a 350C oven for 10 minutes and broil for about 2 minutes to get a crunchy crust.

I served my gratin with a good french baguette and baby spinach salad.

Special roll

Sent from mobile device.
 Kanki in Chapel Hill

Yuya Chiba special roll @ kanki

Sent from mobile device.

Yuya Chiba, a sushi chef at kanki makes awesome special rolls. The
balance on this roll is perfect - the sweet sushi rice, a thin layer of tuna and rice paper topped with a cheese for the cool,  the Salmon for the fat and Jalapeno for the heat... mmmm

Yummy Sushi by Yuya Chiba

Sent from mobile device.

Eating white tuna @ kanki

Eggplant Parmigiana

This was cooked by my wife as it's a favourite of my dad's.  My god it is yummy! Me an person who hates eggplant can't eat enough of this stuff.   In picture is some Fettuccine with parsley and olive oil, a chicken cutlet and the eggplant parm with some sauce on the side.

Reference for Parmigiana:  wikipedia entry, commonly found in Italian restaurants and amongst the wife's favorite Italian  dishes. 

Ingredients:

 1 big Italian eggplant

Mozzarella cheese

Parmesan cheese

Garlic

Jalapeno peppers

Onion

Parsley

Crushed tomato

Vodka

Heavy cream

All-purpose flour

Eggs

Italian breadcrumbs

Olive oil

Cut the eggplant into quarter inch thick slices, sprinkle salt and pepper and let it rest for a couple of hours, so the the excess water comes off.  Set up three dishes with all-purpose-flour + salt + pepper, beaten egg +salt + pepper and Italian breadcrumbs + Parmesan cheese powder in sequence.  Flour the eggplant slices followed by egg wash and breadcrumbs and shallow-fry in a pan containing moderately hot olive oil.  Repeat the process with all the slices.

Vodka sauce: This is not a typical marinara sauce which seems to accompany a lot of eggplant Parmesan dishes.

Mince or finely chop 4 large cloves of garlic (can use less as per liking) and 1 jalapeno pepper (can remove seeds to reduce heat).  Saute in olive oil for a half to one minute.  Do not let the gralic turn brown, else the flavor will be too strong.  Add one big finely chopped onion and saute for 15-20 minutes till the onion turns light to medium brown.  Follow this with one cup of crushed tomatoes and saute for another 15-20 minutes till the tomatoes lose their raw taste.  To this, add a cup of vodka and stir for a couple of minutes till most of the alcohol evaporates followed by 2/3rd cup of heavy cream.  Season the sauce with salt/pepper and parsley according to taste.

Assembling the dish: I personally do not like to smother my eggplant in too much sauce so the whole thing become a mess.  Instead, I assembled it as a sandwich.  On a slice of eggplant, smear some sauce and a mixture of grated mozzarella and powdered Parmesan cheese and top with another slice of eggplant.  Make a stack of three eggplant slices and top with some more cheese.  Bake the eggplant "sandwiches" in the oven at 400C for 5-7 minutes or broil. Garnish with parsley!

Dinka laddu (Indian candy truffles)

Dinka - what a weird ingredient... I couldn't find a wikipedia entry called 'dinka' but I did find something that i believe is dinka: Wikipedia entry
My mom made this laddu and I've attempted to capture her process below.   Dinka is only used in sweets in India but upon seeing it and tasting it I can definitely see huge potential for this ingredient in savoury dishes.

The below recipe should yield 15 or so small truffles or laddus

Indegredients:
1 pack of Edible Gum (Dinka) (100gm)
1/3 cup almonds
1/3 cup walnuts
8 dry dates (kharik)
1/3rd cup dry coconut
1 tbsp poppy seeds
1 tbsp sesame seeds
1/2 tbsp ghee
1 tbsp brown sugar (or gul - jageree)
2 tbsp honey

1) Toast all nuts and coconuts in a pan - grind in a food processor - no chunks remaining.
2) heat the ghee in a pan put some of the gum in the ghee and sautee till it puffs up (it becomes white and puffy- no longer translucent)- once it's puffy remove into a plate and put aside. Repeat this till you have puffed up all the gum granules.  Only put few crystals of gum in the heated ghee at a time.  It'll take 5-10 turns depending on size of pan...  you'll go through a few spoons of ghee.
3) put ground nut mixture with the puffs and sugar  into a food processor and grind into a paste - do in batches if necessary
4) put honey into the mixture and some ghee if necessary and form into balls (truffles) - if you don't have honey use some other binder like marmalade or jam..
5) if you want coat it with toasted coconut or something other item

Kultha che pitlah (Marathi dish which is a rou of a certain bean - horse gram)

Kulith: Wikipedia entry for Kulith
This is a regional dish from the Kokan region of Maharashtra (State where Mumbai is located) - this is the region encompassing the coast south of Bombay and north of Goa.
I believe this is a poor man's dish - a basic roue of oil and the flour of the kulith bean - you eat it with rice and it's amongst the yummiest comfort foods ever. Warning it has  a very distinctive taste.

Indegredients:
2 tbsp oil
4 cloves of garlic chopped
2 chillis (if using jalapeno or hotter deseed one of the chillis)
3 Kokum petals (again a very regional kokani indegredient): Wikipedia entry for kokum
1/2  teasp mustard seeds
1/2  teasp cumin seeds
pinch asotifeda (hing)
1/4 teasp red chilli powder
1/4 teasp turmeric
2 tbsp yogurt
4 heaping tbsp of kulith flour
for each tbsp of flour use 1/2 cup water
1 tbsp of yogurt

Process
1) Heat oil on medium heat and do a fodni of the mustard, cumin, hing, chilli powder, turmeric, garlic, chillis
(once oil is heated drop in the mustard seeds, cumin seeds, hing, let it sizzle once u smell stuff then add in turmeric, chili powder, garlic and chillis - take off heat so stuff doesn't burn - toss everything in oil for 2-3 min)

2) Add in kulith flour and blend into the oil - keep stirring on medium heat for 5 - 6 min. The kulith will form little balls with the oil.

3) heat up the water in a kettle and slowly add 1/2 cup at a time and blend in the kulith so the balls of flour dissolve into the water.

4) Reduce heat to medium-low,  After you have a homogeneous mixture with no lumps then add the yogurt and the kokum petals

5) Simmer for 10 min on medium-low heat and serve over rice.  Add salt to taste over the rice or in your bowl - Am told that the salt acts as a de-emulsifier and it might take apart our nice consistent soupy pitlah.

Dodka (Ridge Gourd) bhaji (vegetable)

Dodka or (Ridge Gourd)  is a vegetable that is commonly found in India and can be bought at most Indian grocery stores.  To the left is a picture of the  Ridge Gourd.  Make sure when you get it not to get the 'Bitter Gourd' or Karela - similar shape but yuck!


Ingredients:
1 Dodka
Fodni:
1/2 teasp mustard seeds
1/2 teasp cumin
Pinch of Hinga (Asotefida)
Pinch of turmeric
1/2 a chili or whole medium Jalepeno deeseded
Other things:
1 teasp crushed peanuts
2 teasp dry grated coconut (or fresh)
1 teasp brown sugar
1/2 teasp sesame seeds  (roasted if available)
Few leaves of fresh corriander
Salt to taste (2-3 pinches)

Procedure:
1) Peel the dodka so that all skin is taken off - can use this skin to make a yummy chutney with similar ingredients (don't throw away the peel)
2) Cube the dodka
3) heat in pan some ghee on medium-low heat  - till ghee is hot (throw in a mustard seed if it sizzles then ghee is ready)
4) Crush in a mortar the chillis/Jalepenos with the cumin - paste 1.
5) Throw mustard seeds into ghee - let them sizzle for a sec, throw in the hinga - once you start smelling the spices throw in the paste 1 from step above - after a minute throw in the turmeric. - this oil concoction is called a fodni.
6) After a min throw in the cubed dodka - increase heat to medium
7) After 5 min throw in all "other indegredients" - sautee for < 5 min and you are done!

Enjoy with Roti/Chapati.  A vege ready to eat in 10 min.