Recipes 8 & 9

[neadods]

Not so much recipes from books as "what can I make with what's lying around?"

Recipe 8: Spinach and Chicken Garlic Pasta

Simple enough: steam a couple of chicken thighs while boiling pasta. Toss pasta in 2 tablespoons of butter melted with 5 minced cloves of garlic. Rip up some spinach. Blend all. Dust with parmesan.

Anything with that amount of butter and garlic should be perfect but it needed... something. Not sure what.


Recipe 9: Fruited Curry

Another one of those steamer-and-crockpot combos; I set rice in the steamer triggered to go on as I got home, while the crock pot was filled with:

2 frozen chicken thighs
1 chopped apple
handful chopped dried dates
2 handfuls dried cranberries
1/2 a bottle of Korma sauce
large dollop of ricotta cheese and a splash of milk (my go-to fake white sauce/thickening agent)

When I got home, I poked around with a fork to shred the meat and picked the bones out.

This gets sweet and meat right. There's a recipe I didn't claim, even though I tried it twice: meat in a chicken broth/orange juice/ketchup blend that was just too sweet. The curry counterbalances this.

I need to learn how to make my own Korma sauce, though. The premade stuff is awfully expensive, but every time I google I get recipes *with* korma sauce, not *for* korma sauce.

Comments

[tempestsarekind.livejournal.com]

Anything with that amount of butter and garlic should be perfect but it needed... something. Not sure what.

Parsley? Basil? I find a little bit of fresh herb goes a long way toward brightening up pasta. And fresh parsley keeps fairly well, wrapped up in a paper towel in the fridge.

[neadods.livejournal.com]

I've got a box of frozen parsley - not quite as good as fresh (esp. fresh-picked) but keeps forever. Hmmmm...

[tempestsarekind.livejournal.com]

It might be worth a try. When I don't have fresh parsley, I tend to go for dried basil, but every once in a great while I remember to freeze fresh parsley, and that works well enough.

[lagilman]

or, maybe when you're cooking the garlic and butter, throw in some fresh rosemary? tastes great, and perfumes the entire kitchen like an Italian summer afternoon...

[neadods.livejournal.com]

Hmmm, and I've got that bush right by the corner too...

(I need to get myself some parsley at the plant store, get it growing. That and dill.)

recipes for Korma sauce

[gem225.livejournal.com]

http://recipegal.com/indian/KORMA-SAUCE.htm
http://www.stillwatersgroup.com/recipes/korma_sauce.htm

I like the sound of the first one myself, but I thought that I'd give you a choice. :-)

Re: recipes for Korma sauce

[neadods.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

ETA: Good golly, now that I've read what goes into it, I may be better off with the expensive bottle!

Re: recipes for Korma sauce

[wendymr.livejournal.com]

An aunt of mine used to make all her own curry sauces. They were lovely, too, but it took her two evenings to make one curry meal. Then the ready-made sauces (especially Patak's) came out. She never made a single sauce herself again - the good commercial ones were every bit as good, so time-saving and also cheaper by the time she factored in all the ingredients, including ensuring her spices were always fresh.

I do have a colleague from northern India who makes her own sauces, but that's so inculcated with her that she wouldn't dream of buying something in a jar. But, if it counts for anything, my local Indo-Asian shop, heavily frequented by people from that region, stocks lots of the commercially-made sauces and pastes... again mostly Patak's.

Re: recipes for Korma sauce

[neadods.livejournal.com]

the good commercial ones were every bit as good, so time-saving and also cheaper

The cheaper is coming to mind. I keep buying ingredients from the salad bar because they're already pre-chopped & washed... and for the small amounts I want, it's cheaper to buy exactly what I need from the bar rather than pay more and then have more than I need.

[lagilman]

BTW, just made a throw-together turkey chili that was really good. Ping me if you want the recipe.

[neadods.livejournal.com]

How spicy?

[lagilman]

I used 1 tsp of my chili powder, and no fresh peppers, so it's easy to adjust up/down. A mild ancho powder would give the tang without the heat...

(note to self: buy more spices as soon as kitchen's done)

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

We invented a version of the Fruited Curry for dinner tonight, and it came out quite well. I say "invented" because (1) it was made in a wok, not a crockpot, and (2) we substituted shit right and left to make it work with what we had on hand. We both noted that the korma sauce was a bit bland to start with, but the addition of dried cranberries and dried cherries really zinged it up a lot. And we have about 3 meals' worth of leftovers in the freezer, which is nice.

[neadods.livejournal.com]

we substituted shit right and left to make it work with what we had on hand

That's the whole point of a curry, IMO. Also a stir-fry or a cassarole.

Korma + cranberries = win.

[patsyrant.livejournal.com]

Anything with that amount of butter and garlic should be perfect but it needed... something. Not sure what.

A dash of white wine is always good. Throw it into the melted butter and it'll also stop the garlic burning. Either that, or a spritz of lemon. It sounds like it needs some acidity.
Really a korma is a very mild curry, with almonds and cream (either cocnut or otherwise) so you can use a very mild paste and toss in said cream and some either ground or blanched sliced almonds..

[neadods.livejournal.com]

Throw it into the melted butter and it'll also stop the garlic burning.

I did not know this!

I gotta go get me some May wine. May wine would be amazing with this.

Also, no spinach. Too bitter. Perhaps some corn and peas, or thoroughly sauteed spinach.