Showing posts with label curry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label curry. Show all posts

Friday, October 21, 2016

Coconut Curry Shrimp Noodles #FishFridayFoodies

When you have a craving for curry laksa noodles but don’t have the time, this quick spicy coconut curry shrimp pasta hits the perfect spot.


Last year around this time, my husband and I took off for a long weekend in the Seychelles. We booked a place online that looked idyllic, and indeed it proved to be. Set on a lush green hillside overlooking a gorgeous blue-green bay of the Indian Ocean, it was a one-bedroom chalet with a huge porch and a small, but well-equipped kitchen.

One of my favorite adventures in a new place is to explore the local markets and cook with local ingredients. To save from needing to buy essentials in a place where much is imported, I had done a little research to discover what we could bring safely and packed a cooler and a small suitcase with things like pasta and coffee.  The Seychelles is an archipelago of 115 islands so I felt fairly certain seafood would be abundantly available. I had in mind a fish curry for dinner one of our nights, so I brought Thai red curry paste and a packet of coconut milk powder.


The view from our porch

We found local markets without a problem, even a couple that were roadside stands attached to farms, where we bought produce and fresh eggs mere steps from where they were produced. Score! Despite the Indian Ocean all the way around the island of Mahé where we were staying, fish and seafood were hard to find! We didn't know if they were exporting it all or if no one could be bothered to fish for a living but we eventually found a bag of frozen shrimp in a little supermarket to make the seafood curry. You’ll never guess where it came from. Yep, the United Arab Emirates. I should have just brought it from home in my cooler. It would have been way cheaper.

We did manage, finally, to eat local seafood at a seaside restaurant one evening so perhaps they know some fishermen personally. Also, we arrived at the central market in Victoria late one afternoon and there seemed to be a fish counter there, although it was empty, save a few leftover fish from that morning, clearly past their best. I can only hope it's better stocked first thing in the morning.

The mostly-missing seafood mystery aside, I can highly recommend the Seychelles for a holiday. The beaches are gorgeous, colorful fragrant flowers fill the roadsides and forests, the local dishes are tasty, the beer is great and the people are very friendly. We rented a car and explored the island, finding gorgeous little coves to swim in where we felt like we were the only people on the island. Idyllic indeed.



Anyhoo, that’s a long story for a dish that takes mere minutes to make. Since that night in the Seychelles when we dined on UAE shrimp and sipped on chilled Seybrew lager, I’ve made this dish many times, most recently just two nights ago. It’s become a firm family favorite.

Ingredients
3 tablespoons olive oil
2-3 tablespoons red curry paste (I use 3 heaped spoons – we like things spicy.)
1 medium onion, chopped finely
1 1/2 lb or 675g shrimp, already peeled and cleaned
8 oz or 225g thin noodles
Fine sea salt
1 14 oz or 400ml can coconut cream
Good handful cilantro, chopped

Method
Sauté the onion with olive oil and curry paste in a pan that’s going to be big enough to hold all of the ingredients later.



Once the onion has softened, add 1 1/2 cup or 360ml water with a teaspoon of salt and the noodles. Cook over a low flame with lid on for five minutes, stirring occasionally.



Add the shrimp with another sprinkle of salt.



Cover again and cook until shrimp are pink and the noodles are done. Give the whole thing a stir.



Pour in the coconut cream and stir to combine.

Cook at little longer, until the dish is heated through again. Try not to let it come to a boil though.

Stir and taste for salt, adding more if needed. Stir some of the cilantro into the dish then garnish with the rest.



Enjoy!

As the nights turn chillier in many places, my Fish Friday Foodie friends are sharing seafood pasta dishes that should help you warm up. Many thanks to our host this month, Caroline of Caroline’s Cooking! Check out all our creative pasta dishes.



Pin it! 

 .

Sunday, May 29, 2016

Coronation Chicken Deviled Eggs

These coronation chicken deviled eggs combine the British classic coronation chicken salad with the American classic deviled eggs for a cross-cultural potluck dish that is sure to please on both sides of the Atlantic.

Not familiar with Coronation Chicken? Read my post all about it here.

A number of weeks ago we were invited to a Champagne tasting at a friend’s home. He holds them about once a year, quite casual evenings with good food and good friends. We taste and rate the various Champagnes – the theme this time was rosé - first with appetizers and then we drink the balance of the many bottles with our meal. Of course, my first question is always, “What can I bring?” When the response came back “appetizers,” I knew I wanted to make deviled eggs but not plain Jane ones. Something unusual but still delicious. Where I come from we put eggs in both our chicken salad and tuna salad so adding eggs to coronation chicken seemed like a fine idea. And making it all into something handheld like deviled eggs was ideal for appetizers.

This week my Sunday Supper family are sharing our best recipes for a potluck so those coronation chicken deviled eggs came to mind. Like all deviled eggs, they are the perfect dish to bring along to share with friends and family. Make sure you scroll down to the bottom to see our wonderful link list of all of our best potluck recipes. Many thanks to our host today, T.R. of Gluten-free Crumbley!

Ingredients
For the deviled eggs:
10 eggs
1/2 cup or 70g chopped, cooked chicken
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
2 teaspoons curry powder, plus a little to sprinkle for garnish
3-4 tablespoons mayonnaise
2-3 tablespoons plain Greek yogurt
1 tablespoon spicy chutney
1/2 tart apple
Good squeeze lemon juice (to keep the apple from browning)
2 tablespoons pomegranate arils, plus extra for garnish

For garnish:
Curry powder
A little chopped parsley
Extra pomegranate arils

Method
In a pan where they can sit in in one layer, cover the eggs with cool water and bring to the boil over medium heat. Cover the pan, remove it from the stove and set a timer for 10 minutes.

Drain and cover the eggs with more cool water.

When they are cool enough to handle, peel the eggs. Cut them in half and put the yolks in a mixing bowl. Cover the whites with cling film so they don’t dry out, and refrigerate them.

Use a fork to mash the egg yolks until they are a fine crumble.



Add the chicken, salt and curry powder to the egg yolks and mix well.



Add three tablespoons of mayonnaise, two tablespoons of Greek yogurt and one of spicy chutney to the egg mixture. Mix well again.


If the mixture seems dry, add the final tablespoons of mayo and yogurt. Mix again.


This looks about right!

Squeeze some lemon juice into a small bowl. Peel and dice your half apple, pushing the pieces off the cutting board and into the lemon juice as you cut so they don’t turn brown.



Add your apple and pomegranate to the mixture and, you guessed it, mix well.



Lay your egg whites out in a serving dish.

Spoon the egg mixture into the egg whites or put it into a Ziploc bag and cut off the corner so you can squeeze the filling into the whites.



Decorate them with a sprinkling more of curry powder, some pomegranate arils and some chopped parsley.



Enjoy!

How many invitations do you have for potluck get-togethers this summer? I hope you didn't answer too many, because we've got you today covered with 47 recipes perfect for potlucks.

Appetizers
Sides and Salads
The Main
Desserts


.

Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Coronation Chicken Filled Croissant Horns #FoodieExtravaganza


Curry powder and fruit chutney spice up the creamy sauce for coronation chicken, classic British picnic fare. Serve it stuffed in croissants for a pretty party dish.

I was sitting, nay, lounging (because it was New Year’s Day and there was Champagne!) in the Emirates Airlines lounge in London Gatwick airport just a few days ago, when I decided to check out the cold buffet. If you’ve ever had the pleasure of being in an Emirates lounge, you know that the dishes on offer are always tasty as well as presented in a most beautiful manner. But for once, I was disappointed. Oh, the coronation chicken was beautiful, spooned as it was onto a crispy green lettuce leaf, surrounded by fanned out slices of fresh apple and mango. But it was missing the zip of curry and chutney I’ve come to expect with this dish, which is one of my favorites. All in all, it was rather bland. When I expressed my dismay, my husband smiled, “Now you’ll have to make your own, right?” That man does know me.

So here I am with my coronation chicken, a recipe compiled from several found in my cookbooks and on the internet. The unifying theme of each seems to be the sauce, made with varying proportions of cream or mayonnaise and yogurt or even just mayo, with the addition of curry powder and chutney, usually with some lime or lemon juice. Some had apples, some celery. Tomato paste and no tomato paste. Others added blueberries, mango, dried apricots or sultanas to the mix. Some started with roast chicken, pulled off the bones; others with chopped poached breasts and yet others didn’t specify how the chicken should be cooked. Only that it should be. SO MANY RECIPES.

I’m sharing it today stuffed into disemboweled croissants. Yes, I just used disemboweled on a food blog. It’s one of those lovely English words that sounds exactly as it should, don’t you think? This month’s Foodie Extravaganza theme is croissants so I briefly considered making some puff pastry horns in which to serve my coronation chicken. I even own the little metal forms around which to bake the pastry. But it’s been a busy week and, frankly, it’s way easier for all of us to hollow out some fresh croissants from a nearby bakery and fill them.

And don’t they look pretty? Best part of all, of course, is the spicy coronation chicken inside.



With many thanks to Rosemary Hume, the original creator of the recipe for the 1953 coronation of Queen Elizabeth II plus Delia Smith, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Nigella Lawson, Jamie Oliver and all the other innovators who have come along since, this is my rendition.

Ingredients
For the sauce:
3/4 cup or 170g mayonnaise
1/2 cup or 125g plain thick Greek yoghurt
1 tablespoon hot curry powder, or to taste
2 tablespoons spicy fruity chutney (I used my own habanero nectarine kumquat chutney.)
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
Optional but recommended: 1/4-1/2 teaspoon cayenne
1/2 teaspoon sea salt, plus more to taste
Freshly ground black pepper

For the salad:
1.1 lbs or 500g chicken breasts (Just two large breasts in my packet.)
1/4 cup or 45g pomegranate arils, plus extra to garnish, if desired
1/2 medium-sized tart apple (I used a Jazz weighing about 170g whole.)
Generous squeeze lemon juice (to keep the apple from browning)

To serve:
7-8 fresh croissants
Optional: some small lettuce leaves (They keep your plate clean, if that even matters to you. Otherwise, give your guests a fork as well.)

Method
Slice the chicken breasts in half lengthwise through their middles so they will cook faster.

Poach them in lightly salted water to cover, until just cooked through. This shouldn't take more than about 10-12 minutes, depending on the thickness.

Still slightly pink in the middle. 
Drain and set aside to cool. You can pop them into the refrigerator to speed up the process.

Mix all of your sauce ingredients in a large bowl, big enough to hold your chicken and other ingredients later, with room for stirring.



Add a good squeeze of lemon juice to a small bowl. Peel, core and dice your apple, sliding the pieces off of the chopping board and into the lemon juice, stirring to mix the apple with the lemon juice, as you go.



Once the chicken is cool, chop it into small pieces. Tip it into the sauce with the pomegranate arils and chopped apple.


Stir well. Taste the mixture and add more salt if necessary. This can be used immediately but will taste better if allowed to hang out in the refrigerator for a few hours, covered with cling film.

When you are ready to serve, cut your croissants in half and use a sharp knife to cut all around the inside to remove the middle. Once you’ve gotten as much as you can out, use your index finger to press around inside the half croissant to expand the space.

I was surprised to find that my croissants had herbs inside. But it was a pleasant surprise. 


Fill the croissant horn with coronation chicken, pushing it right to the bottom with a small spoon. Lay the horn on a leaf of lettuce, if using, or straight on a serving plate, if not.


Garnish with a few pomegranate arils for color.



Enjoy!

Many thanks to this month's Foodie Extravaganza host, Kathleen from Fearlessly Creative Mammas. Check out all the great croissant and crescent roll recipes we've got for you!


Foodie Extravaganza celebrates obscure food holidays or shares recipes with the same ingredient or theme every month.

Posting day is always the first Wednesday of each month. If you are a blogger and would like to join our group and blog along with us, come join our Facebook group Foodie Extravaganza. We would love to have you!

If you're a reader looking for delicious recipes, check out our Foodie Extravaganza Pinterest Board! Looking for our previous parties? Check them out here.

.

Tuesday, August 5, 2014

Keema (Spicy Lamb Stuffed) Naan

Keema Naan - spicy lamb cooked with peas and carrots stuffed into soft dough and cooked in a non-stick pan - makes a wonderful starter or can even star in a meal rounded out by a crunchy side salad or cucumber raita.

Food Lust People Love: Keema Naan - spicy lamb cooked with peas and carrots stuffed into soft dough and cooked in a non-stick pan - makes a wonderful starter or can even star in a meal rounded out by a crunchy side salad or cucumber raita.


This month’s Twelve Loaves challenge was to create a bread with herbs but I decided to take that one step farther along the herbaceous road and use cilantro in my dough AND in a stuffing, making a savory keema naan with ground lamb and curry spices. This is perfect summer food, cut into wedges as a starter for a party, or to take along for a picnic. I don’t have a tandoor – nor would I want to hover over one in this heat – but, though far from traditional, a non-stick pan with a tight-fitting lid works beautifully.

Many thanks to our host this month, the delightful Sherron of Simply Gourmet. If you haven’t met her yet, you need to stop on by. I love her honest life storytelling as much as I enjoy her beautiful recipes.

Note: I’ve given approximate weights for some of the ingredients in the filling, just to give you an idea of the size of my tomato, for example. Don’t dwell on this too much. A little more or a little less will not make a difference. It’s all going to cook down anyway.

Keema (Spicy Lamb Stuffed) Naan


Most folks are familiar with naan, a soft yeast dough traditionally brushed with butter or ghee and baked to brown-spotted perfection in a tandoor or cylindrical oven. A few charred bits are considered essential. Just as traditional but less well known in the western world are variations like keema naan, which is stuffed with seasoned ground meat, or Kashmiri naan, stuffed with nuts and raisins.

Ingredients
For the dough:
1 cup or 240ml tepid water
1 1/2 teaspoon sugar
2 level teaspoons or one 7g sachet dried yeast
1/2 cup or 125g active natural yoghurt at room temperature
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup or 125g strong bread flour
3 cups or 375g plain white flour
Small bunch cilantro or fresh coriander (about 3/4 oz or 20g)

For the filling:
Olive oil
7 oz or 200g ground (minced) lamb (Beef can be substituted.)
1 thumb-sized knob of fresh ginger (about 1 oz or 30g)
6 garlic cloves
1 fresh hot red chili pepper
1 medium-sized tomato (about 3 1/2 oz or 100g)
1 small carrot (about 2 oz or 55g)
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 cup or 70g frozen peas, thawed
3/4 or 1 teaspoon salt or to taste
Small bunch cilantro or fresh coriander (about 3/4 oz or 20g)

To cook the keema naan:
4 tablespoons melted unsalted butter or ghee (clarified butter)

Method
Add the sugar and warm water into a big mixing bowl with the yeast and allow it to sit for a few minutes until it gets foamy. If it doesn’t get foamy, you need to start again with new yeast.

Cut the hard stems off of your cilantro and chop the leaves and tender stems finely.

When the yeast water is all foamy, add in the bread flour and stir well.



Add in the yogurt and salt and mix well again.


Now add in the chopped cilantro. And you know the drill: Mix well.



Add the rest of the flour, a little at a time until you have a nice medium firm dough. You should be able to poke a finger in like the Pillsbury Dough Boy commercial and it'll slowly puff back out. You may not use all of the regular flour.


Knead the dough for several minutes, either by hand or with a dough hook, until it is smooth and elastic. Set aside to rest for 30 minutes in a covered bowl, somewhere warm.



Meanwhile, peel and mince your garlic and ginger. Mince your red chili pepper. Dice your carrot into tiny cubes and chop your tomato. If your peas are still frozen, go ahead and take them out of the freezer to thaw.



As before, cut the hard stems off of your cilantro and chop the leaves and tender stems finely.



To make the filling, drizzle a little olive oil in the your pan and add the lamb. Cook it over a medium heat, breaking the lamb into tiny crumbly bits. If the pieces are too large, they will try to break through your naan when we get to the rolling out stage. Keep cooking the lamb until it is nicely browned and kind of crispy in places.

Add in the garlic, ginger and chili pepper. Cook until these soften, stirring often.

I kept mashing the meat, even at this stage, so the bits were smaller by the time this finished cooking.


Now add in the carrot and tomato, plus the cayenne and curry powder.



Cook for a few minutes and then add about a half a cup or 120ml water. Cover the pan and simmer this mixture for about 20-25 minutes. Stir the pan occasionally.

After the time is up, remove the lid and add the peas. Cook for a little while longer, until the peas are hot and all the moisture has evaporated.

Add in the salt and stir.

Mine seemed a little greasy so I drained the mixture on some paper towels. If your lamb wasn’t very fatty, you might not need this step.

Add the chopped cilantro to the mixture and stir well. I tipped mine off the paper towel and into a bowl to stir. Allow the mixture time to cool a little.



Your dough should be a nice puffy ball now! Knead it again and then divide it into four reasonably equal balls.

On a floured surface, flatten one of the balls and then roll it out into a circle of about five inches or 12cm across.

Spoon one quarter of the filling into the middle. Draw each side up to connect at the top, trying hard not to trap any air inside. Pinch the sides together and then set the ball aside, pinched side down, to rest.



Continue until all four balls are stuffed and resting. Sprinkle them with flour and cover with a tea cloth. Set your timer for 30 minutes and let them continue to rest.

When the time is up, melt your butter and start heating a non-stick skillet over a medium heat on the stove.

Gently roll out each ball to about 7 inches or 18cm in diameter. Brush lightly with the melted butter.


Place butter side down in the heated pan. Cook for just a couple of minutes until you see browning happen when you check the bottom side, then cover with a lid for a further few minutes.

Remove the lid and wipe the condensation dry with a towel.  Brush the top of the naan with melted butter. It should be puffy from the yeast dough rising in the heat.

Food Lust People Love: Keema Naan - spicy lamb cooked with peas and carrots stuffed into soft dough and cooked in a non-stick pan - makes a wonderful starter or can even star in a meal rounded out by a crunchy side salad or cucumber raita.


Now turn the naan over. Cook uncovered for a few minutes or until you see that the bottom is browning again.

Food Lust People Love: Keema Naan - spicy lamb cooked with peas and carrots stuffed into soft dough and cooked in a non-stick pan - makes a wonderful starter or can even star in a meal rounded out by a crunchy side salad or cucumber raita.
This was the first side down.
Pop the dry lid on and cook for a few more minutes until the naan is cooked through and golden on both sides. You can flip it back and forth if you need to. Keep drying the condensation off the inside of the lid so that the naan stays crispy on the outside. We want dry heat, not steaming, to go on in that pan.

Food Lust People Love: Keema Naan - spicy lamb cooked with peas and carrots stuffed into soft dough and cooked in a non-stick pan - makes a wonderful starter or can even star in a meal rounded out by a crunchy side salad or cucumber raita.
This was the second side down.


Repeat the process for the other three balls. You can keep the finished naan warm in a slow oven until they are all done, but these are great at room temperature as well. In fact, I ate leftovers cold the next day, straight from the refrigerator. Divine.

Cut the keema naan into wedges for serving. Serve this with some cucumber raita. That would be a very good thing.

Food Lust People Love: Keema Naan - spicy lamb cooked with peas and carrots stuffed into soft dough and cooked in a non-stick pan - makes a wonderful starter or can even star in a meal rounded out by a crunchy side salad or cucumber raita.


Enjoy!

If your garden is growing herbs like weeds this season, you’ll want to make a few of our wonderful herby breads! We have a great selection for you this month.


Pin it! 

Food Lust People Love: Keema Naan - spicy lamb cooked with peas and carrots stuffed into soft dough and cooked in a non-stick pan - makes a wonderful starter or can even star in a meal rounded out by a crunchy side salad or cucumber raita.




Friday, March 14, 2014

Curried Cauliflower Chicken Pilaf

Curry powder, cardamom and cinnamon, with a kick of cayenne, make this fragrant curried cauliflower chicken pilaf a delicious and easy one-bowl meal for the many busy days when you are short on time.



This recipe is adapted from Patricia Well’s Vegetable Harvest. Amazon affiliate link>




My husband travels a lot on business so friends often ask me if I cook when he’s gone. Absolutely! Since I love to be in the kitchen creating, and I deserved to eat well, even alone, I do cook. I tend to make simple meals, like pan-fried salmon with salad or pasta and broccoli with crispy prawn chilli paste stirred through, which I adore. I buy the paste in Kuala Lumpur when I am there and have it stockpiled; enough to last me till the next visit. This is my favorite brand, but I am sure there must be others, perhaps even where you live.


The dish I'm sharing today fulfills so many of my needs. It’s full of flavor but easy. Served in just one bowl and nothing to cut so I can eat it with a spoon and read my book at the same time. And when it’s just me eating, it is great, dare I say even better, the next day as leftovers.

Ingredients
3 boneless chicken breasts (Approximate weight 4-6 oz or 115-170g each.)
Sea salt
Black pepper
Olive oil
8 ounces or about 225g cauliflower
12 whole cardamom seeds
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
1/2 teaspoon cayenne
1 teaspoon curry powder
1 stick cinnamon
1 1/2 cups or 300g long grain rice
2 cups or 480ml chicken stock
Fresh cilantro or coriander leaves or parsley for garnish

Method
Slice your chicken breasts into bite-sized pieces and sprinkle lightly with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.


Cut your cauliflower up into florets.



Measure out your spices and have them ready in a small bowl. Seriously. Just do it.



Drizzle a little olive oil in a skillet and pan fry the chicken until it is browned and caramelized. Remove it from the pan and set aside.




In a large pot with a tight fitting lid, mix the rice with a couple of tablespoons of olive oil. Cook over a medium heat for just a few minutes and stir so that the rice is well coated with the oil.



Add in the chicken stock and bring to a boil. If your stock is homemade and unsalted, add in a teaspoon of salt. I had made mine from stock cubes, which are notoriously high in sodium already, so I didn’t add any extra salt.



Add in your measured spices and the cinnamon stick and give it a quick stir.



Add the cauliflower to the pot, along with the chicken. Cover the pot and reduce the heat to simmer.




Simmer, covered, for 20 minutes and then turn the fire off. Leave the pot covered for at least 10 more minutes or until you are ready to serve.

Discard the cinnamon and fluff the rice with a fork, mixing in the cauliflower and chicken.

Warn your family or guests to avoid chewing on a cardamom seed. (Or you can pick these out too, but I didn’t bother.)

Garnish with cilantro or parsley, if desired.



Enjoy!


***This post contains an affiliate link.***