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Alivias in Durham

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Shredded chicken with baked tofu and hot peppers

We had this dish at Red Lutus, our favorite chinese restaurant and fell in love instantly. Its hot, its clean, its simple! Broke down the taste and created the formula in my head. Here is my version.

1/2 lb Chicken tenders/ breast (boneless)
6 Jalapenos
1/4 lb Spicy tofu
1 1/2 tbsp Soy Sauce
2 tbsp Vegetable oil
1 tsp Sesame oil
1 tbspn Rice Wine vinegar
Small pinch of brown sugar
Green scallion tops

Cut the chicken and tofu in thin strips about (3-4 cm by 0.5 cm to be precise). Remove seeds from 4 out of the 6 jalapenos, make sure to remove the ribs completely since thats where the heat lives. Halve them lengthwise and cut into thin stripes. Without deseeding, prep the other two jalapenos in the same way. Depending on your heat tolerance, you can change the number of seeded vs deseeded peppers. That takes care of the prep work, now on to the actual cooking.

Heat 2 tbsp vegetable oil in a saute pan, as it heats up, add a tsp of sesame oil. Once the oil is hot, add the jalapeno peppers with seeds intact. Saute for 30 sec and add the chicken. Since the chicken is in thin long pieces, it should cook up fairly quickly - in about 3-4 minutes. Follow it with tofu and the rest of the jalapeno peppers and mix well. After another 4 minutes and making sure that the chicken is completely cooked, add soy sauce, vinegar, brown sugar and green scallion tops and take it off the heat.

Best served with a steaming bowl of plain white or brown rice.
(Post by Avani)

Fish in chili bean sauce

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Sashimi roll

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Course 1

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Kanki tonight

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Long time no post - Wine

Its been a long time since we posted anything. Past few weeks have been great - we've cooked quite a bit, since most of the cooking has been by Avani here haven't been any posts.
To get back into blogging I am going to start by a Wine review.  We had a wine tasting party last weekend - a great time for everyone.  Food flowing out of the kitchen, bottles being uncorked and the conversation getting louder until late in the night when the volume slowly goes down... 
Larry taught me to think about wine similar to the way I think about investments.  If I can get two wine bottles for the same price, I dont want to settle for the good one, I want the great one!
Here's a few of the wines in the recycle bin
1) 2008 Alamos - the wines of Catena, Malbec, Mendoza, Argentina (Harris Teeter) - Review good but not great, tannic, not worth other wines at a similar price.
2) 2007 Pillar Box Red, Blended red, Australia (The Fresh Market) - Review good, will buy again.
3) 2008 Horse Heaven Hills Columbia Crest, Chardonnay, Patterson, Washington State (The Fresh Market) - Review  very good, good white, crisp not-too-sweet, comparable to Robert Mondavi (next).
4) 2008 Robert Mondavi Private selection, Chardonnay, California (Harris Teeter) - Review great! We like it!
5) 2008 Deakin Estate, Shiraz, Australia (Whole Foods) - Review good, not too spicy/ peppery. I like that in a shiraz.
6) 2007 Spanish Sons,  Tempranillo, Vino De La Tierra of Castilla Y Leon, Spain (The Fresh Market) - Review great, among the best of the evening - will definitely buy again.
7) 2008 St Donatus Estate Balatonboglari, Merlot, Hungary (? store) - review very good.
8) 2006 Pine & Post, Cabernet Sauvignon, Washington state - review very good, had most of it the next day and glad that we got so much of this one left over as it was one of the last couple of bottles opened.
9) 2009 Cristalino Metodo Tradicional, Rose Brut, Spain (? store), sparkling wine fermented in the bottle - review good, standard Rose!
10) 2009 Childress Vineyards, Starbound Blueberry Dessert Wine, North Carolina (? store) - Review good.  A sweet ending with a tar heel special!

Pan roasted Salmon & Fennel

Indegredients:
Salmon
Fennel
2 cloves smashed Garlic
Toronto Steak seasoning
Pepper
Salt

Process:
Heat oil at 4 - medium heat, put in 2 smashed cloves of garlic (peel and smash down with knife).
Once garlic has started to brown remove it from pan. 
In this oil put in finely chopped Fennel (take bulb of fennel and slice it into thin rings - remove core.  Then quarter these rings)

Take skin off salmon, sprinkle with kosher salt and fresh cracked pepper. toss on some toronto steak seasoning

After 5 min of sauteeing the fennel toss in the salmon - time for 2 min
Turn over salmon - and sautee other side for 2 min

Pour in a dash of Chablis or good white wine.
done!

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)