Dum aloo - easy potato curry

This curry was quite popular with my mum when I was growing up, but it is rather greasy so I decided to make a lighter version of it. The recipe calls for the potatoes to be deep fried, I roast them instead.

Cut potatoes to a size of you like. Heat a pan in the oven with oil, drop the potatoes in when the oil is hot but not smoking toss them around the pan and ensure they are well coated in oil. Half way through the cooking, add a clove or two of garlic and roughly chopped onions. Roast till golden. The garlic should soften and become easy to mash.

To prepare the curry base, heat oil in a pan, add chopped onions and sauté until translucent. I usually add a bit of the spice mixture in at this point, here are the spices, all quantities are according to taste:

Salt, chilli powder, turmeric powder, coriander powder, cumin powder, mango powder, nigella seeds, garam masala, a pinch of sugar, a little dried basil.

Add tomato paste or puree to the onions in the pan, mix well, add the rest of the spices and sauté. I added a little yogurt to reduce the sourness, if you are vegan skip this.  Add another  pinch of  garam masala and cook for a minute or two. Add the roast potatoes, mix well ,garnish with coriander and serve.

Feel free to add ingredients and make variations of this recipe.

Photographs below-

Sauté onions till translucent

Add tomato paste. You can use fresh tomatoes or puree 

Mix well

Add spices I usually add a pinch of sugar to make the tomatoes less tart

Let this cook for a minute or two

This mixture started to bubble a bit 

As it was getting a bit dry I added a little water and let it simmer

The oil and tomatoes should separate and start bubbling in the pot.

Add yogurt and stir well 

 Add the roasted potatoes at this point and mix well. 

This is my meal in a lovely plate with mango lassi, chapatis and butter 

Christmas roast potatoes

This is a recipe I tried a few weeks ago. It is a standard recipe for making roast potatoes but I have taken a few liberties with it.

Ingredients
Potatoes
Garlic cloves
Oil
Salt
Nutmeg powder
Black pepper
Cinnamon powder
Fresh rosemary

Chop potatoes in a uniform size and dunk them in a pot of boiling water with a little salt and a twig of fresh rosemary. Boil till potatoes are tender.

 Drain and cool. It is important the potatoes are dry.

Heat oil in a baking dish dunk the potatoes in with the spices and garlic. Turn occasionally, and bake till golden brown. These are best eaten hot and fresh but if you need them for another day cook till only slightly brown then heat them when you need them. 

Garnish with fresh chopped rosemary

Christmas lights to add a little festive sprit to the dish. I like these with cheese or sour cream but feel free to eat them with a topping of your choice.

Vegetarian Udon Noodle Soup

This recipe is vegan and has no oil at all. It is very filling and one portion can feed about two people or one very hungry person.

Ingredients

A packet of Udon noodles
A small slice of ginger
A clove of garlic
Edamame beans - I have found bags of this stuff in the frozen section shelled and ready to be boiled.
Spring onions chopped fine
A few pieces of bell peppers
thinly sliced mushrooms

These are the vegetables I have if I had them I would add carrots, sliced onion, bean sprouts and broccoli. I didn't have any tofu either which I bake (see previous post).

Miso paste
Soy sauce
Since I was craving a spicy soup I added a little gochujang to the recipe

I chopped the ginger and garlic finely and added them to the pan with some soy sauce and a few table spoons of water and let this boil for two minutes i added more water and let this boil for 5 minutes before I added the rest of the vegetables, leave a few spring onions for garnishing. I don't like overcooking my vegetables so I cooked them for 3 minutes. Boil the udon noodles for 2 minutes in hot water or dunk them in a dish of hot water and cover. Rinse them in cold water to make them chewy.

To serve get a deep bowl with the miso paste at the bottom put the noodles on top pour the soup over this and sprinkle with the remaining chopped spring onions

Potato and tofu roast in gochujang

I had a lovely dish of noodles and dumpling with fried potatoes at a Korean restaurant sometime back. This is my take on the dish with a slight British influence....... well it's Sunday so I had to do the roast potatoes.

You will need
Potatoes for roasting
Firm tofu
Spring onions
Oil
Sesame seeds
Gochujang- Korean hot pepper paste.

Give the potatoes a boil in hot boiling water with a pinch of salt they need a few minutes till they get a slightly tender. Drain and let them cool. Cut the tofu in bite size pieces and dry them a bit.

Heat oil in a baking dish and pop in the potatoes and tofu. Bake till crisp , tofu might cook faster than the potatoes so take it out and set aside. Once it is all done throw a spoon of gochujang on the warm potatoes and tofu, mix well. Garnish with toasted sesame seeds and spring onions.

Tofu is very versatile so it can be baked, fried, boiled steamed...... you get the point.

St. Denys Pancakes

I made these pancakes the other day for the feast of St. Denys patron saint of Manchester Cathedral. Here is what you will need (accompanied by pictures):

Gram flour

Salt

Chilli powder

Turmeric powder

Mango powder (amchur)

Crushed black pepper

Fennel seeds

Cumin powder

Chart masala (optional)

Finely julianed carrots

Finely sliced onions

A few mint leaves (I usually use coriander but since I have none today I used mint)

Yoghurt - I use the low fat type as it blends easily, but Greek yoghurt would work just as well

Blend all the ingredients together until the batter is of pouring consistency. Lightly grease a non-stick frying pan and pour in the batter. I use three tablespoons for each pancake but you could vary this to your taste. Fry lightly on both sides until cooked golden brown, flipping occasionally.

Cooking tip - the onions are crucial but you can vary the spices and vegetables according to your taste. I have some cabbage Kimchi in the fridge which I will use next time I make these pancakes.

I had a few onions leftover so I roasted them on the pan and put some chilli flakes on them  for garnishing the pancakes

And here is what the final product looks like. I left it on that contraption to cool,  however these are best served straight from the pan with a drizzle of lemon or lime juice, a chutney of your choice and or yogurt.

Here is a link to the video click here

St Denys was a 3rd century martyr and bishop of Paris. Publicly beheaded he is said to have picked up his head and walked six miles with it in his hands 

Chemistry and the mundane

I heard someone remark how they thought science could contribute to how food was made. I am sure we have heard these wide eyed comments before and not just on this subject. That someone would suggest such a thing amuses me. Food is the basis of chemistry, biochemistry and the application of physics. While it is mundane it is most vital, it is probably how we learnt some of most vital aspects of dealing with chemicals. A friend of mine has always eaten cake with fascination and why not, cake she claims is the invention of a very clever chemist. Cooking is magical if you think about it, combing flavours in different way with different temperatures is very scientific, and yet we take this fro granted.

I spent this weekend making kimchi (Korean pickled cabbage). It was fascinating to think how someone came  up with the idea in the first place. The careful process of draining excess water out of cabbage, adding various spices and vegetables to the mixture all to have vegetables during a cold winter. Cheese is just as fascinating. At what moment in time did we decide to drink another animals milk and when did we realise we could cook this milk to make something completely different out of it? The first cooks probably felt a sense of adventure to create different tastes and textures, preserving food, making it more palatable, heating or cooling it. Even now when you see a good cook you get the feeling that they know something innate about combing ingredients and dishing out something tasty.

It also brings me to my next question- have we lost our most basic understanding of how things are created? As a child I was fascinated by basic experiments, it made my world come alive, boiling water bubbling away on a hot stove, a magnifying glass enlarging small objects. The very basic of these activities are some of the most profound. We live in a world where we are surrounded by very complex technology however the most basic of these is what started it all. Everything around us is technology from the humble door latch to a touch screen computer.  It is not the complex that informs the basic but the other way around.