Madras Chicken Curry

This was tonight's dinner. It started with a tic I had to try my new slow cooker. I tried looking up slow cooked Indian chicken recipes...all seeming like too much work. Then I remembered I had a new spice that I have never tried: Madras Curry Powder. Rather than let it roll for 5 hours in the slow cooker, I thought I'd try the Madras Curry Powder in my standard chicken curry recipe, and wow did it come out good.

Reading up on Wiki about Madras Curry Powder, it doesn't seem like there is anything special about it that makes it uniquely South Indian. The one I have is Nirav brand, and takes on the same color and smell as the West Indian yellow curry powder you find in regular or gourmet grocery stores. That's why I was curious about it frankly...I thought, I like West Indian curry, but it's really different from regular Indian curry..I wonder how it would taste if I used it in my chicken curry. The result was REALLY good, I have to say.

I didn't do anything different with the usual spices I add--though I omitted the garam masala. Didn't want to over-spice.

Ingredients:

1. Canola Oil

2. 1 tbsp. cumin seeds

3. 1 tbsp. black mustard seeds

4. 10 curry leaves

5. 1 red onion - finely chopped

6. 6-7 cloves of garlic - finely chopped

7. 1-2 inches of ginger root - finely chopped

8. 3-4 green chilis - chopped

9. 1/2 tsp turmeric

10. 1 tsp. red chili powder

11. 1 cup of dry, unsweetened shredded coconut

12. 2 tbsp. madras curry powder (Nirav brand)

13. 2 tbsp. coriander powder

14. 3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

15. salt and pepper to taste

16. 2 tomatoes, pureed

Preparation:

Total cooking time is about 1-1.5 hours

Chop the onions, garlic, ginger, and green chilis. Set aside. It's even better if you can puree the garlic/ginger. I threw everything into an electric chopper and got finely diced.

In a big pot, heat the oil until very hot. Add the mustard and cumin seeds. Once the cumin is toasted brown, add curry leaves. Let them sizzle.

Add the onions. Let them sweat and cook until translucent. Toss them around and let them cook. Then put in the garlic, ginger and green chilis. Let these cook for a minute too. Then start adding spices. Make sure the heat is at medium when you start cooking the spices. Add the turmeric, red chili powder, curry powder and coconut. Let them mix around for a bit. If you're not a fan of the texture of dry coconut, that's not going to go away at the end of cooking. In lieu of shredded coconut, you can use lite coconut milk--about half a can--to be added close to the end of cooking, before simmering. DO NOT add both coconut milk AND shredded coconut. You can add a little more oil also at this point, if all the garlic/onion have absorbed all the oil.

Once you've got your masala mixture going, chop the chicken into 1-inch cubes and toss them into the pot. Add salt and pepper at this juncture. You can even season the meat before adding it into the pot with salt/pepper. That will cause the seasonings to stick to the meat through the cooking. Once the chicken is added, toss the whole mixture around. Let it cook for 4-5 minutes, while frequently tossing.

Once the chicken looks white, add the pureed tomatoes. Let this new mixture now cook for about 1-2 minutes. Once the tomatoes are warm and well-incorporated into the masala, then add about a 1/2 cup of water and bring to a boil. Make sure the water is also well-incorporated into the masala.

Once you've brought the pot to a boil, turn heat down to Low and cover. Let the chicken simmer for 15 minutes covered. After 15 min, stir it around and make sure it's not drying out. If it's drying out, add a little more water--about 1/2 cup, just so it doesn't dry out again. Simmering generally brings up water, so you should not have to add too much water. If you see it drying out, it means your heat is probably too high.

After you've stirred it around, cover it again, and simmer it for another 20-30 minutes. After that, the chicken should be fully cooked and tender. You can garnish with cilantro for a fresh finish.

The Comeback Dish: Seggsy Margherita Shakshouka

Ok, well it's been a while since I last posted...I had a backlog of dishes that never made the blog--partially due to culinary frustrations, lack of space in my micro-kitchen, some element of cooker's block, etc. But of course, now I need to get back in the swing. Let me know your food curiosities--Indian or general--and I will research and post!

So this dish is inspired by Italian and Middle-Eastern cuisines. The word "Shakshouka" is of Tunisian origin--it's basically a dish of egg and tomato with spices. The spices are fried with tomato and eggs are cracked on top and left to cook in unbroken, "sunny side up" form.

I added my own stuff to it, like roasted garlic and eggplant, and made it more Italian, to resemble a Margherita pizza, but with no crust and with eggs. I also didn't add spices, except for salt and pepper. My flavors came from the vegetables and basil. This is odd for me, since Indian food is so spice-heavy, but sometimes it's nice to taste what you're eating. After I made this, I was like, I need to stop being so spice-obsessed.

And it's sooo prettttyyyy...!

Ingredients:

1. 1/2 a large eggplant, or 2 Japanese eggplants
2. Olive oil - eyeball it, but you shouldn't need more than 1 cup
3. 2 cloves garlic
4. 1 small onion (I prefer red onions these days - SOO much more flavor), chopped
5. 1 can diced tomatoes
6. 4-7 basil leaves
7. salt, pepper
8. 3-4 eggs
9. 2-3 slices fresh mozzarella cheese
10. Optional - red pepper flakes
11. Optional - other "toppings"/vegetables: olives, artichoke hearts, mushrooms - you would not need to roast these veggies, but just cook them down and season before adding the tomatoes and eggs.

Preparation:

This is SO EASY, a frat boy could do it. First, pre-heat your oven to about 375 F. Once oven is ready, chop the eggplant into fairly large pieces and sprinkle salt on the fleshy parts (not skin, because it doesn't absorb salt). After salting, rub enough olive oil over the eggplant pieces to cover them. Pop them in the oven for about 30 minutes or until well-roasted. Check on it every 15 min to see how well-done it is, because ovens vary, so you don't want to burn them.

Once your eggplants are roasted, start heating some olive oil in your skillet. Make sure you use a big enough skillet that it feels like the size of a small to medium pizza--maybe 12". Once hot, add the whole garlic cloves. This flavors the oil, without creating an overly strong garlic flavor. The other ingredients are mild, so you don't want to overpower with garlic, unlike in Indian food, where you can mask the garlic in spices.

Keep turning the garlic so it doesn't burn. Burnt garlic is nasty and strong, so keep it movin. Once the oil is hot and garlic roasted, add the chopped onions and eggplant. If you're adding red pepper flakes, add those with the garlic, before you add anything else if possible. Get the onions and eggplant going until the onions are sweatin' brown. The eggplant should be cooked at this point. You may want to add a little more olive oil, if all the oil has been absorbed by the onion and eggplant. Season with salt and pepper.

Then, mix in the diced tomatoes. Taste what you have to see if it needs additional seasoning. Add seasoning (salt and pepper) as necessary. Don't stir it around too much--just enough to mix the veggies through with tomatoes. You want a caramelization on the sides of the pan of tomato, once all the water has cooked off. You may need two 14 oz. cans of tomatoes depending on how big your pan is and how many eggs you plan to add. You want a nice bed of tomato, so add another can if you feel you don't have enough with 1 can, or if you decide you want more vegetables. The tomatoes have to cover your vegetables in the pan.

Once the tomatoes are caramelizing on the sides of the pan, it's time to add some eggs! Crack the eggs open, yolks in tact, into the pan (or into a bowl so as to remove any shell that breaks off before pouring it into the pan). Crack about 3-4 eggs into the pan according to how much space you have in the pan. Let the eggs cook about 30 seconds with the cover on the pan. Then, lay your fresh mozzarella slices onto the pan too and cover again. The above picture is the cheese-less version, but I made a cheese version the other day, and it's FAB. Once the eggs are cooked (poached, not fully cooked through to yoke), turn off the heat. Now lay the basil leaves artfully over the pan.


Beauty in a pan. You'll want to take toasted french bread or olive bread and just eat it out of the pan.