Red curry with fish and bamboo shoots

I have been meaning to make this for a few weeks - since I visited Ms Red in Bunbury. I hastily scribbled down the recipe from one of her cookbooks, only to find that FSIL's partner has the same cookbook, noticed while he was recommending another fish curry recipe to me.


I'm not usually a big fan of Thai coconut milk curries, but this one may have won me over. It was tasty, and not overly rich or creamy, which is what usually turns me off this style of curry.

Red Curry with Fish & Bamboo Shoots
from the food of thailand: a journey for food lovers
serves 4

• 60ml coconut cream
• 2tbs red curry paste
• 440ml coconut milk
• 1.5-2tbs palm sugar
• 3tbs fish sauce
• 350g firm white fish fillets (skinless)
• 275g tin bamboo shoots, drained & cut into matchsticks
• 50g galangal (or ginger), finely sliced
• 5 kaffir lime leaves, torn
• Thai sweet basil and sliced chilli, for garnish

ingredients ready to go...

Put the coconut cream in a wok and simmer for about 5 minutes, or until it separates and a layer of oil forms on the surface. Stir if it starts to brown around the edges. Add the curry paste, stir to combine, and cook until fragrant.


Stir in the coconut milk, and add the palm sugar and fish sauce and cook for 2-3 minutes, or until the palm sugar has dissolved. add the fish and bamboo shoots, and simmer for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the fish is cooked.

Add the galangal (or ginger) and kaffir lime leaves. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary. Serve with steamed rice and sprinkle with Thai basil and chilli.

NOTE: I used a 400ml can of coconut cream, and made up the rest of the liquid with water - we didn't have coconut milk, but even if we did, I wouldn't have been too keen to open two cans for one recipe.

-Alphie

PS. Exciting cooking related news - FSIL bought me a book on macarons!! So, there will be another post on macarons in the near future - stay tuned!

Pizza oven curry fest

A few weeks before I moved in, FSIL and partner built a wood fired oven in their backyard. It's had a few outings as a pizza oven, and another run for bread and a lamb roast. I returned from Kalgoorlie on Friday to find out that a curry night, using the pizza oven, had been planned for Saturday.

After a tour of North Perth and surrounds chasing ingredients and equipment, we returned home, and FSIL's partner started cooking up a storm. We started with chicken skewers, kinda tandoori, kinda not (I think he just made it up on the fly...)

chicken skewers

Moving on to the main feature... the curry. FSIL's partner (I really need a psuedonym for him, this is getting ridiculous!) made a lamb rogan josh, palak paneer, and a fish curry (not sure what it was called....), and of course, naan. Because no curry-fest is complete without it.

lamb rogan josh and palak paneer

naan

It was all delicious, and we're still eating the leftovers, but that's ok by me, curry is one of those things that improves with time. Hopefully I can snaffle some of the remaining fish curry before FSIL's partner takes it to work tomorrow!

-Alphie

Chicken tikka masala

Well, my blog reform lasted all of two days! I tried, I promise, but I was sent off to Kalgoorlie for work for the rest of the week. Determined not to let that stop me, I packed my personal laptop and my USB modem, only to find that the modem has no service in Kalgoorlie :(.

So, here's a post I've been saving up for a rainy day to tide you all (!) over while I put a post together on last nights pizza oven shenanigans.

On the way back from our impromtu lunch at Bills, I asked FH Alphie what he felt like for dinner (yes, I am one of those people who starts thinking about the next meal before I have digested the first...). Strangely, he requested butter chicken. I don't think he's ever even mentioned butter chicken before, I have never cooked it before, and I have never been a particular fan. So, I suggested a mild chicken curry instead.

I thought I would use this as an opportunity to try out one of the curry paste recipes from Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food. I figured, if he was suggesting them to people who have never cooked before, it can't be that hard, and curry pastes have always scared me a bit (see previous post here).

Flicking through the curry section, the chicken tikka masala looked similar to most of the butter chickens I have seen before, so the decision was made. I made a double batch of the curry paste, hoping that it would freeze well.

As for the actual curry, I disregarded Jamie's recipe. For two reasons, I had underestimated the amount of coriander we would need, and we had run out, and FH Alphie was getting concerned about the number of chillis I was using.

FH Alphie rated it: 8/10

Chicken tikka masala
adapted from Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food, pg 82 & 99

Tikka masala curry paste

• 1tsp cumin seeds, toasted
• 1tsp coriander seeds, toasted
• 2 cloves of garlic
• thumb sized piece of fresh ginger
• 1tsp cayenne pepper
• 1tbs smoked paprika
• 2tsp garam masala
• 1/2tsp salt
• 1tbs dessicated coconut
• 2tbs ground almonds (I used whole almonds, because that's all we had, and it was fine)
• 2tbs vegetable oil (as always, I used rice bran oil)
• 2tbs tomato paste
• 2 fresh red chillis
• small bunch fresh coriander

Peel the ginger and garlic, and, this is the hard part, throw everything into a food processor and whiz until you get a smooth paste.

The curry
serves 4

• 2tbs vegetable (rice bran) oil
• a knob of butter (Jamie's term)
• 2 medium onions, finely sliced
• 1/2 cup tikka masala curry paste
• 4 chicken thighs, trimmed and diced
• 400g can chopped tomatoes
• 4ooml coconut milk

In a large pot or frypan, cook the onions in the butter and oil for about 10 minutes, until soft and beginning to colour. add the curry paste, stir until fragrant. Stir in the chicken.

Add the tomatoes and coconut milk and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 30 minutes with the lid on. Stirring every now and then. You may need to add some more liquid if it looks too dry, so just keep an eye on it.

Serve with rice and pappadaums. And maybe some cooling yoghurt!

-Alphie

Curried lamb pasties

These were a bit of a mission to make. I started dicing the lamb shoulder just after lunch, and we didn't start eating until 8.30 or 9.00! Admittedly it was a late lunch, but I did not expect these to take that long. The recipe is one I ripped out of a SMH Good Living about 2 years ago, and has been languishing in my 'green folder' ever since (much like the Moroccan lamb meatballs). Now that I have such great lamb to work with, I thought it was time I gave it a try.

Just a few hints, so that maybe it wont take quite so long... Use a non stick pan - I made a 'shocking mess' of the pot I used, which wasn't non stick, and I haven't attempted to clean it yet (I made these yesterday)... Cooling the lamb mix will take a couple of hours (unless, like me, you are in a total rush, and are crazy enough to cool it in an ice bath...), so I would suggest you start this either the day before, or at least 8 hours before you want to eat them... And lastly, don't try to put too much filling in the pasties, they wont seal well, and will probably burst open during cooking.

FH Alphie rated them: 8.5/10

Curried lamb and winter veg pasties
from SMH Good Living, 8 July 2008.
makes 6

• 600g diced lamb shoulder
• 1/2 cup plain flour
• salt
• pepper
• olive oil
• 1 large onion, diced
• 1 stick celery, diced
• 1 large carrot, diced
• 4 garlic cloves, sliced
• 3tbs curry powder
• 2 birds eye chillis
• 500ml beef or chicken stock
• 200g pumpkin, diced
• 200g parsnip, diced
• 200g celeriac, diced (swede also works well if you can't find celeriac)
• 6 sheets/600-700g shortcrust pastry
• 1 egg, lightly beaten

Toss lamb through the seasoned flour. Heat oil in a large, preferably non stick, pan and brown the lamb in batches.

Then add the onion, celery, carrot, garlic, curry powder and chillis and cook until soft (about 10 minutes). Return the lamb to the pan, and add the stock. Simmer, stirring often (another reason I made such a mess of the pan...) for 90 minutes, or until the lamb is soft and the sauce is thick.


Preheat the oven to 200 degrees. Combine the pumpkin, parsnip and celeriac/swede on a baking tray, drizzle with olive oil, season, and bake for 15 minutes. Stir into the lamb mix, and cool completely.


Cut pastry into six, 20cm circles, brush with egg and spoon mix (about 3/4 cup) into the centre. Bring sides together at the top, and pinch sides together to seal all the way around. Place on a baking tray, and brush with more of the egg. Bake for 10 minutes at 200 degrees, then 20 minutes at 170 degrees.

Enjoy! But be careful, they will be hot.

-Alphie

Curry Powder

We had something I pulled from the depths of our freezer for dinner tonight, so I don't really have a recipe to share today. I thought I'd share my recipe for the curry powder that was the base of the pumpkin, lentil & spinach curry I rescued from said freezer.


In general I try not to buy anything pre-made. I prefer to have the pantry (and fridge & freezer) stocked with enough base ingredients that I can make anything we want/need - even if it means a bit more work. Plus, the food tastes a lot better, I know exactly what is in everything, and we can avoid the dreaded preservative 282, and palm oil products. One of the few things I do buy pre-made are Thai and Indian curry pastes, and 'it's not ideal' (to quote Claire from MC), but I have no idea where to start without them.

So when FMIL passed me this recipe for and Indian-style curry powder, that could be made with ingredients I already had in the spice cupboard (except fenugreek - I have NEVER known what you were supposed to do with it, so I have consciously avoided buying it... but FMIL provided that too :) ), I jumped at the chance.

It's not a spicy curry powder, so if you prefer it hotter, I would add chilli flakes (to taste) with the other ingredients.

I used 3-4 tbs, cooked off in approx. 2 tbs vegetable oil (I use rice bran oil), for 2/3 smallish pumpkin and 1 (or was it 1 1/2?) cup of lentils. I'm sure you could also use it in similar ratios for chicken, but I'm not so sure about beef - I don't think it would be robust enough.

Alphie's FMILs Indian-style curry powder

makes just over 1 cup

• 1/4 cup coriander seeds
• 2 tbs caraway seeds
• 2 tbs turmeric
• 1 1/2 tbs cumin seeds
• 1 1/2 tbs black peppercorns
• 1 tbs cinnamon
• 2 tbs ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp whole cloves
• 1/2 tsp fenugreek
• 1/2 tsp cardamom
• pinch nutmeg
• 1 tsp chilli flakes (optional)

Now, this is the hard bit... put everything in a food processor and process until well ground. Then store in an airtight container.

It is actually harder than it sounds, I used my stick mixer, and the bowl attachment that came with it, and it did a pretty poor job. Next time I'll use the proper food processor, with its 'dual blade technology'. I am tempted to use the coffee grinder, but FH Alphie had a fit when I mentioned it, so it looks like its the food processor or the mortar and pestle (if I'm feeling active!) next time.

-Alphie