Fish curry

For mother's day my cousin and me invited our mothers over for lunch, together with our brothers and sister.

My cousin made a mozzarella and tomato salad which I forgot to photograph. She made a delicious sauce to go with it: she fried pine nuts in olive oil and added soy sauce in the end.

I made a fish curry, from a simple recipe that someone gave me years ago. You can get most of the ingredients in an oriental supermarket. Taste the dish to adjust the quantities.


Serves 4

1 can of coconut milk (400 ml)
same amount of water
800 g fish fillet, cut in pieces (I used haddock)
lime/bergamot leaves
fish sauce
thai basil leaves
fresh coriander, washed and chopped
thai aubergines
1,5 tbsp cane sugar
juice of 1-2 limes
1 tbsp green curry paste
2 onions, chopped
sunflower oil or butter

Fry onion in curry paste in sunflower oil or butter.
Add everything else, bring to the boil and let the dish simmer for 15 min.
Taste and adjust the seasoning if necessary.

I served this with (Tilda) basmati rice.

My mother brought beautiful flowers from her garden.


For dessert we had strawberries of course

with vanilla ice cream


and tiramisu. My mother made it and my cousin B. grated the chocolate on top. As you can see, he got fed up in the end ;-)

Beef curry

My aunt gave me this recipe for a delicious beef curry.


1 kg beef (the kind for stewing, cut into pieces)
2 tsp salt
4 tsp black pepper
400 ml coconut milk
1 tbsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp turmeric
2 onions, chopped
3 garlic cloves, chopped
2 tsp fresh ginger, chopped or grated
3 red chilli peppers
1 tbsp madras curry powder
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 pieces of lemon rind
1 piece of lemon grass
1 tsp ground fennel seed
1 tsp ground cumin

Mix pepper and salt thoroughly with meat.
Heat coconut milk on medium heat and add everything except meat, fennel and cumin.
Boil for 1-2 min., add meat, bring to the boil and then simmer for 2-3 hrs in a covered pan.
Roast fennel and cumin and add it at the end.

Note:
I only used 2 chillies and removed them after 1 hour.
I omitted lemon rind and lemon grass because I didn't have any.
I used normal fennel seed, not ground.
I also added a little water to the coconut milk.
After 2,5 hours I added some chopped potatoes and let the dish simmer until they were cooked.

Chicken in coconut sauce

Yesterday my cousin who lives in Tanzania told me she prepares this dish very often there. It's a recipe by Claudia Roden, also called macalcal or masala chicken. I still had one pumpkin left that my other cousin gave me, so I decided to add this.

Serves 6

4 onions, chopped

4 tbsp sunflower or sesame seed oil

6 garlic cloves

7 cm ginger root, crushed or ground

1 tsp turmeric

6 pieces of chicken (e.g. breasts)

salt

a lot of white pepper

500 g potatoes

500 g pumpkin

1 can coconut milk or 75 g santen (creamed coconut)

1 tsp sugar

100 g cashew nuts or almonds

2 tbsp raisins

Fry the onions on low heat in the oil until they are soft and golden.

Add garlic and fry for a few more minutes.

Add ginger and turmeric and stir this.

Add the pieces of chicken and pepper and salt. Fry this a bit and turn the chicken around.

After 5 min, add the potatoes, pumpkin and coconut milk. Add hot water until everything is just covered.

Let the dish simmer for 30-45 min until everything is cooked.

Add cashew nuts or almonds and raisins and heat for a few min.

Spicy lamb and coconut stew

This delicious stew is an Indian recipe from Claudia Roden's 'The book of Jewish food'. It just has a hint of coconut flavour, very delicate.


Serves 4

500 g onions
3-4 tbsp oil (e.g. sunflower)
1 kg lamb
3-5 garlic cloves, crushed
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1,5 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground cloves (or 2 whole cloves)
3-5 small dried chilli peppers
750 g small potatoes, peeled or washed and cut in big pieces
50 g santen (creamed coconut) or 125 g coconut milk
1,5 tbsp tamarind paste or lemon juice
1,5 tbsp sugar

Cut the onions in rings and halve these. Fry them on low heat in 1-2 tbsp oil until they are soft and golden. Cover the pan and stir regularly to prevent them from burning. This can take 15-20 min.
Clean the meat: cut the skin off and big pieces of fat. Cut the meat in pieces of 4 cm. Fry it on high heat in 1-2 tbsp oil until it's brown on all sides.
Add crushed garlic, cumin and coriander to the onions and cook for a few minutes while stirring. Add the meat to the onions and add hot water until everything is covered. Let this boil.
Skim off the foam and add cinnamon, cloves and chilli peppers.
Cook this on very low heat in a covered pan for 1,5-2 hrs. Remove the chilli peppers.
Add potatoes, santen (cut into pieces) or coconut milk, tamarind and sugar. If necessary add more hot water until everything is just covered. Cook for another 30-40 min. until the potatoes are done. There should be plenty of sauce left.
Serve with rice, chapati's or bread.

Rice flour pudding with coconut

I love puddings with rice flour. Usually I make Claudia Roden's mulhallabeya, with milk, or kheer, with coconut milk.
Today I tried a recipe from Weldon's 'THAILAND The Beautiful Cookbook', called ta-go, from southern Thailand.



Serves 8

Pudding
125 g rice flour
185 g sugar
5,5 dl jasmin water (water with jasmin essence)

Covering
45 g rice flour
5 dl coconut cream
2 tbsp sugar
pinch of salt

Mix rice flour and sugar with the water and let it stand for 15 min.
Bring this to the boil and cook it on low heat for 15 min. while stirring continuously.
Divide the mixture in 8-12 small bowls (with a volume of around 1 dl); fill only half of each bowl.
Mix the ingredients for the covering and bring them to the boil. Cook this on low heat for 15-20 min. while stirring continuously. Pour this on top of the first mixture in the bowls and let it cool.
The texture of the top layer should be much thinner than the one on the bottom.

Notes
I didn't find jasmin essence so I used rose water in stead. I added it at the end of the cooking to the first mixture.
For coconut cream you dissolve creamed coconut (santen) in hot water. I wasn't sure about the proportions so I used 100 g creamed coconut in 5 dl water. Afterwards I checked Claudia Roden's instructions and she advises to use 100 g santen with 2,5 dl water to obtain 3 dl. This means I should have used more santen: 170 g in 4,2 dl water.
I was afraid this dessert would be too sweet, so I made it with less sugar. But when I tasted it, it could use more sugar, so it's best to stay with the amount mentioned.
The recipe states these quantities serve 4, but it's very rich so it's better to serve small portions, for up to 8 people.

Before this I had a lamb couscous with a hot sauce and an onion and raisin sauce (confit d'oignon et de raisins secs), from Claudia Roden's 'The book of Jewish food'. Don't think I will blog it though; the cooking in itself was enough work ;-)

Thai pumpkin and coconut dessert

A long time ago, an Indonesian roommate taught me how to cook this simple dessert, which she called kolak.
I also found a recipe in 'THAILAND The Beautiful Cookbook' by Kevin Weldon.
I used palm sugar (gula djawa) which I found in an oriental supermarket but you can use any type of sugar.

Serves 4

5 dl coconut milk
60g sugar
300g pumpkin, chopped (weight without skin or seeds)

Heat the coconut milk with the sugar. When it boils, add the pumpkin and let it simmer for 15 min. until soft. Serve cold.

This is the version from the book. My roommate boiled the pumpkin in water and added a glass of coconut milk in the end.

Bolo de abóbora delicioso - Delicious pumpkin cake

I found this recipe on a Brazilian blog, Pecado da Gula. It reminded me of the carrot cakes (bolo de cenoura) which I had in Brazil. I made it for brunch with my cousins.


80g unsalted butter at room temperature
1,5 cup sugar (240g)
3 eggs
200g pumpkin (weight without skin and seeds)
0,5 cup grated coconut
1,5 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
0,5 cup coconut milk
pinch of salt

1 cup = 200 ml

Chop the pumpkin, cook it until soft with a little water, and at the end let the remaining water evaporate. Mash it and let it cool.
Mix sugar and butter with a wooden spoon until it has a creamy texture. Add egg yolks one by one and keep stirring. Add the mashed pumpkin and stir again.
Add grated coconut and coconut milk.
Mix the flour with baking powder and salt and then add all of this to the mixture.
Beat the egg whites and incorporate them carefully into the mixture.
Grease a cake tin and add the mixture.
Bake it for around 30 min. at 180° C.