The Untidy Cook

Pork & Sweet Potato red curry

This is derived from a Madhur Jaffrey recipe - Prawn/Shrimp curry from 'A Taste of the Far East - which I've modified a bit to reduce the fat a bit and make use of what I had in the fridge.

Red curry paste:

1 peeled clove garlic

1 tsp cumin & 1 tsp coriander seeds - toasted in a pan and finely ground

3 dried chillies soaked in 3 tbsp boiling water

3 fresh red chillies cut into three, I included seeds

1 shallot (that's eschalot to you Aussies)

quarter of a white onion

2 tsps curry powder

1 tsp smoked paprika

good squeeze of lemon grass from a tube

- put this lot into a blender, including the water from soaking the dried chillies, and liquidise until turned into a runny paste.

- in the meantime, put some light olive oil in a deep pan that's moderately hot and fry the rest of the finely sliced white onion until its almost all caramelised, browned and a bit crispy.  Then add the curry paste, cook it for 5 to 10 minutes until the liquid evaporates and it browns up.  

1 pork tenderloin, cut into 1/2" slices

1 sweet potato, peeled & cut into 1'' chunks

1 400ml can lower fat Coconut Cream

2 tsps tamarind paste

5 kaffir lime leaves

- Add pork and sweet potato to the paste mix and cook for about 5 minutes. 

- Then stir in the Coconut Cream, about a 1/3 of the can of water plus the tamarind paste and the kaffir lime leaves.  Give it a good stir, set the heat to a gentle boil and leave for about an hour.

Served with greek yoghurt and some brown bread, because I was too idle to cook any rice.  This was nicely spicy and very good indeed.  It made enough for two suppers for two people.

 

Bulgur wheat salad with haloumi

Some haloumi from the late 1900's has been muttering squeakily about how its 'best by' date was impending so it made the ultimate sacrifice for our supper.

I put 2/3 cup of bulgur wheat into a bowl with twice the volume of boiling water and left it to steam for 15 minutes.  

Toasted 1tsp each of cumin, coriander and nigella seeds, then ground them finely and put this into a mixing bowl along with two small chopped, seeded red chillis.  The honey and walnut oil mix I did yesterday was so good I thought I'd use it again, especially as I have a fresh tin of the nut oil that needs to be eaten before it goes stale. Expect lots of walnut oil as it gets used up.  I dipped a fork into some groovy hippy raw honey, that we picked up in Mullumbimby on our recent road trip up there, and stirred it into the spice mix along with about a desertspoon full of the nut oil.   It felt like it needed something to lift the flavour so I added 6 finely chopped dried apricots and 2 tbps of raw cashews, toasted.

Once the wheat was cooked, it went into the spice/nut/ fruit mix and sat quietly until the rest was ready.  

The haloumi was sliced into 4, rubbed with a smidge of oil and then fried in the frying pan at a high-ish heat until it was golden brown.  

At the last minute I decided to use up a very ancient avocado, which I chopped up (missing out the brown bits) and stirred into the wheat mix.  

To serve: heap wheat onto plate; add some salad stuff like chopped cucumber and maybe some herbs, and a gob of greek yoghurt along with the haloumi.  

I was concerned that the wheat would be boring, but it was nutty and rather good.  Next time, I would measure 1/4 cup of wheat each rather than 1/3, it was slightly too much.

Good combination of flavours, spice, sweet and sour.  Yum.

 

Beetroot, goats cheese & quinoa supper

We're on a mission to sharpen up our diet, eat more fruit & veg and generally drop the fat, so suppers are now on my list to make interesting but healthier.

Wrap 4 mid sized raw beetroot, with a bit of the tops and the whole tail still on, in foil with a splash of balsamic or flavoured vinegar and a peeled, bashed garlic clove. I used some spiced beetroot vinegar from Nicolsons www.nicholsonfinefoods.com.au. Cook in the oven at 180c for about 3/4 hour until they are cooked through.

I decided, after many years of mickey-taking of it, to actually cook some quinoa (or should that be keeen-waaaah?).  I used 1/4 cup of quinoa with 1/2 cup of water, brought to the boil and then left at a low, covered simmer for 15 mins.  I turned it off at that point and left it covered until I needed it.

Heat a frying pan and cook a teaspoon of mustard seeds until they pop. Put in a bowl in which you've stirred together 1 tspn honey, a dessertspoon of walnut oil and a splash of the flavoured vinegar. When the beetroot are cooked through, cut off the top n tails, scrape off the skin and cut into small chunks. Put into the dressing bowl along with the cooked quinoa and beetroot.  Give it a jolly good stir.

Serve:  torn up lettuce leaves on plate, scatter beetroot mix over.  Crumble some baked, wholewheat pitta chips over to add some crunch.  Stir together a generous tsp of sour cream and tablespoon of greek yogurt together well, and dot over the salad.  Crumble some goats cheese over the top.

I added some chopped nectarine to mine.  

Next time, rather than quartering the beetroot I will chop into bit sized chunks.  I'd toyed with the idea of added a seared pork cutlet but I think this would have been overkill.

The Loved One declared it to be very good.  The quinoa was the suprise of the piece.  It was nutty and nice, despite sounding immensely pretentious.