Rose Harissa Dal

Exam results are supposed to come out today but no one seems to know when so I thought I'd distract myself with a new post. Other than that, my week has gone well. I've finally put pen to paper on my dissertation (a comparison of French and English food magazines) and am looking forward to seeing where it goes. I went to an amazing pizza place in Manchester last week, Rudy's, which I cannot recommend enough. I'm beginning to visit the last places on my "to review for the top 10 piece" list that I've been working on since 2013! I plan on uploading it before I graduate (which is scarily soon; I only have 15 weeks until my time in Manchester is over) and then I can start one for London in my new Moleskine travel guide.

Comfort For All Seasons

We recently changed our internet provider and I’m afraid it’s been rather out of the frying pan and into the fire, so you’ll have to excuse the strange timings of posts - I might go to a cafe and schedule a few posts for the upcoming weeks, just until the internet settles down and behaves.

The weather has been weird. A few days ago it was so muggy I thought I was in a colder version of Singapore, and today it’s been drizzling for all it’s worth. I know Glastonbury weekend means rain but this is June, not October. Make your mind up, weather! I’m struggling to know what to cook - something hearty to guard against against the chill or a light meal to keep the heat at bay? Fortunately I stumbled upon a solution by way of Anna Jones’ cookbook A Modern Way To Eat. It’s a red lentil and spinach dal, topped with roasted sweet potatoes. Thee result is filling enough for the wettest, coldest day but still light and palatable in warmer climes (perfect for the Indian weather then, really). 

A Long Awaited Recipe!

* Argh! This was supposed to go up at the start of this week! I'm so sorry it's late. I've just finished my last exam and I'm packing for a trip to London and then home for mum's birthday. I hope you enjoy this recipe and forgive me for the delay.

I only have one exam left! Whooooo! Unfortunately it's also the longest/hardest but we'll skip that for now.* Today I am going to share with you a recipe for Thai Green Curry so that you can finally put that curry paste recipe from last month to good use. I don't know why it's taken me so long to post this - I think I just always thought I already had, as it's one of my favourite meals. It's really easy to make and if you don't want to make your own paste then I'd probably recommend Mae Ploy as the paste to use - you can buy it from Tesco and Asian supermarkets as well as probably others. It's a large pot and will last for ages but once you've made your own curry pastes then I can promise that you won't go back. 

Don't Say Never Trust A Skinny Cook: Thai Red Curry

I've been wanting to make red curry for a while but have never gotten round to it as I wasn't sure what to put in the dish other than not wanting duck. Recently I got the Hairy Bikers diet book as it was part of a deal on Amazon and I couldn't spot another book I wanted in a hurry (it was 3 for £10). Well, I'm so glad I got it - the recipes are amazing and food that I'd want to eat regardless of the fact that it's healthy and good for me. They counted calories to lose weight so that's the only nutritional info given but you can see just by glancing through the ingredients that there's nothing bad in it. They say that this recipe is 286 calories without rice (50g of uncooked basmati rice is 176 calories so the total calories in the dish is 462), which is nothing short of miraculous for a thai curry. What's even more miraculous is the fact that it tastes incredible and very similar to regular thai curries, I might have to give my green curry the same treatment next time. For once, I don't think I've made any changes to the recipe, it's pretty much perfect just the way it is. Actually, i've changed the cornflour to water ratio as it's like concrete - whatever you do don't leave it alone before it goes in the curry or your spoon will be stuck!

Massaman Gai With Recipe

I learnt to cook this curry at a cookery course at the Rayavadee Hotel in Krabi, Thailand. It's a potato and chicken (or tofu if you're vegetarian) coconut curry from Thailand with Indian influences. I find it very hard to describe the taste but it's a basic red curry paste with cinnamon, ginger and, I think, star anise.  The way I make it it is a very mellow tasting curry without spice, but in Thai cooking it can be incredibly spicy as they use one tablespoon where I would use one teaspoon! Gai means chicken in Thai.

You can make your own curry pastes but I must confess to using shop-bought ones for ease. The brand I use is Mae Ploy and you can buy it from asian supermarkets or some regular supermarkets, including Tesco. It was recommended to me by a friend in Singapore and it's great, I tend to use their Thai Green Curry paste and I will use their Massaman paste once my pack from the Rayavadee runs out. If you use a different brand of paste then use a little at a time - remember you can always add more!

Palm sugar is a key ingredient in a lot of Asian cooking as it perfectly counterbalances the fish sauce used to achieve the sweet/salty fusion that the cuisine is known for. It tastes very sweet and almost like mango. Amazon sell Taste Thai palm sugar online, which is a thick liquid and can be used directly in the recipe, otherwise you can cheaply buy dried cakes of palm sugar in Asian supermarkets. Just put a couple of teaspoons of hot water into a small, clean jam jar with one or two of the cakes and stir until it forms a thick, grainy liquid/paste, adding more water if necessary. You can then store the leftovers in the fridge until you next need it.

The sauce of this curry is supposed to be fairly thick and almost gloopy in consistency, and to this end half as much coconut milk is used as in a Thai Green Curry recipe.  If it thickens too much then put a lid over the wok whilst you simmer it for 15 minutes.

Massaman Gai Recipe

Serves 2 hungry people

Cook it in a wok if you have one, otherwise a large saucepan will work

Serve with rice; thai, jasmine or sticky/glutinous rice is best

Ingredients

2 diced chicken breasts (tofu if you want, maybe 300g?)

4 medium parboiled potatoes, cut into chunks the same size as the chicken (about 1 inch cubed)

Diced onion

1tsp massaman paste - after you taste the sauce you can always add more if you want a stronger flavour

200ml coconut milk (you can use light coconut milk like I used to to make it healthier until my flatmate said he preferred the full-fat version; so now I just eat less sauce and use the regular stuff)

1 handful of unsalted peanuts

1tbsp fish sauce

1tbsp palm sugar if you can get it, otherwise brown sugar

1½ tbsp tamarind puree (Tesco sell it)

Method

Parboil the diced potatoes

Heat the massaman paste and a tablespoon of coconut in the wok for 3 minutes and then add the onion and chicken, tossing to coat them in the paste.

Add the potatoes, peanuts and the rest of the coconut milk and stir it all together.

Season the sauce with the fish sauce, palm sugar and tamarind puree.

Leave the curry to simmer on a medium heat for 15 minutes, covering with a lid if needed, and then taste it, adjust the seasonings if they're not in balance (although I normally find they're fine as is, but if you're using brown sugar you're more likely to need to tweak them). If you want it to be more spicy, or you find that the sauce tastes too much of coconut, then add half a teaspoon more paste and leave for a few minutes before tasting again and repeating if still more spice is required.

Leave for another 5 minutes and then serve with rice.