Cooking Log: 20 Minute Chickpea Curry

I was lazy and didn't take pictures or anything but I still wanted to keep track of this recipe I tried. Brad said it was almost as good as Tandoori Oven, which is a great compliment considering how much we both love that place.

I got the recipe here.

What I changed: I cooked up my own garbanzo beans and reduced the red curry paste to 2 T.

What I'll change next time: Even less curry paste next time. Also, it didn't take very long to make so next time I need to make a side of naan!

Tortilla Heaven

I'm willing to do a lot of inconvenient things to save money, but not everything is worth it. For example, I have absolutely no desire to make pasta from scratch. It's already incredibly cheap to buy dry and I rely on it for busy night meals. Though homemade pasta tastes amazing, it's not good enough for me to take the time--and you need equipment. Bleck.

Tortillas on the other hand...

If you know Brad and I very well at all you know that we love Mexican food. Yes, I realize that the way we eat burritos is not authentic, but I still love it. Last summer when I had "morning" sickness I did not do any cooking. Brad had burritos for lunch and dinner pretty much every day and I had...water... Maybe applesauce on a good day. I'm embarrassed to say how many store-bought burritos we could go through in a week. cough...30...cough.

Well, Squeaky Girl is here and I'm feeling good, so I decided to take our regular burritos up a notch and make tortillas from scratch. I am in love. They were so good. Brad raved and raved about them and has asked me a couple times when I will make them again. I'm still buying tortillas (we eat too many of them for me to keep up with the demand), but for an occasional meal, they are well worth the extra effort.

I got this fantastic recipe from here. I am just going to plagiarize and copy their instructions because I thought they were well-written and easy to understand.

Ingredients:

• 3 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ⅓ cup vegetable oil
• 1 cup warm water

Instructions:

1. Combine flour, salt and baking powder in the bowl of a stand mixer. With the dough hook attached mix dry ingredients until well combined. Add oil and water with mixer running at a medium speed. Mix for 1 minute, stopping several timesto scrape the sides of the bowl. After about 1 minute, or when mixture comes together and begins to form a ball, decrease mixing speed to low. Continue to mix for 1 minute or until dough is smooth.
2. Transfer from mixing bowl to a well-floured work surface. Divide dough in half, then in half again. Continue until you have 16 fairly equal portions. Form each piece into a ball and flatten with the palm of your hand as much as possible. If dough is sticky, use a bit more flour. Cover flattened balls of dough with a clean kitchen towel and allow to rest for 15 minutes before proceeding.
3. After rest period, heat a large pan over medium-high heat. Roll each dough piece into a rough circle, about 6-7 inches in diameter, keep work surface and rolling pin lightly floured. Don’t stack uncooked tortillas on top of each other or they will get soggy.
4. When pan is very hot, place one dough circle into pan and allow to cook about 1 minute or until bottom surface has a few pale brown spots. The uncooked surface will begin to show a few little bubbles. If tortilla is browning too fast, reduced heat a bit. If it’s taking longer than a minute to see a few pale golden brown spots on underside of tortillas, increase heat a bit. Flip to other side and cook for about 30 seconds. You want the tortilla to be soft but have a few small pale golden brown spots on surface. Remove from pan with tongs and stack in a covered container or zippered bag till all tortillas are cooked. This will keep them soft and pliable.
5. Wipe out the pan in between tortillas if flour is started to accumulate.
6. Serve warm or allow to cool for later use. When ready to use, place a slightly damp paper towel in the bottom of a container (with a cover) that will hold the stacked tortillas. Microwave, uncovered for 15-25 seconds (start with 15) or until warm, then cover to hold heat while serving.
7. The tortillas will keep well stored in an airtight container or zippered bag at at room temperature for 24 hours or can be frozen indefinitely. To freeze, separate tortillas with parchment paper or waxed paper and place in a zippered bag before placing in freezer.

What I would change:

I wish that I had made them bigger. Next time I think I will double the recipe and still only break them into 16 pieces. 

Remember to:

Roll them out as thin as you can. They puff up in the pan.

What I wish I could change:

Seriously, how do you make tortillas round? How? How? How? I tried so hard. I rolled it out from the center as carefully as possible and it became an artful blob. I traced a circle on the dough and cut it out, then when I picked it up off the counter it stretched out. 

Thai Peanut Sauce and Naan

Every so often when I get sick of my usual meals I go looking for a random recipe (usually on pinterest) and try it. Occasionally the result is wasted ingredients, empty bellies, and leftovers left to mold in the fridge. Rarely the result is an unabashed success. Mostly, it's pretty good but next time I make it I want to change it a little bit. Unfortunately I have usually completely forgotten what I wanted to change when I make it again and it's another night of pretty good food when it could've been great. Which is why I'm now going to blog about my experiments. So I can remember that really all I wanted was another teaspoon of pepper.

Of course I decided this last week and even took pictures while I was cooking and I was going to write about it! And then I remembered, oh yeah. I have a brand new baby. Her wish is my command. By that I mean I usually end up rocking, reading aloud, and breastfeeding and not working on my own to do list. But finally, she is asleep, at least for five minutes, and I can write about what I cooked.

Which brings us to...

ahem...I was waiting for the drumroll...

The recipe for the peanut sauce I got from here.  The sauce was so good. But warning, it was incredibly spicy. Like "please, pass the tissues because I'm losing my baby weight through nasal drainage" spicy. Like probably shouldn't be eating this spicy and breastfeeding spicy. But, I loved it and baby girl didn't seem to complain more than the usual in the next day. The only change I want to make to the sauce is maybe using yellow curry paste instead of red to tone it down a little bit. I also didn't garnish with any peanuts because I didn't have any and I thought it was fine without them.

The Pan-Fried Turmeric Chicken that was on the same website was a dud, however. To me it just tasted like chicken, the turmeric really didn't come through at all. I think next time I would do something different for chicken altogether.

Anyway, back to the sauce.

It was easy.  Easy enough and fast enough to make in the twenty minute breaks Squeaky-girl bestows upon me.

The recipe:

1/2 cup creamy peanut butter

3/4 cup coconut milk

2 tablespoons Thai red curry paste

2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar

1 tablespoon sugar or to taste

Salt to taste

1. Plop all the ingredients in a pot. Whisk together.
2. Transfer to low heat and whisk until combined.
3. Once the sauce begins to bubble, remove from heat and it's ready to go!

This was good served over some chicken and naan, but I had it for several lunches just with rice and it was great. I really only needed about a tablespoon of it to flavor my rice. I think next time I make it I want to try it with a different color of curry paste to see if it's a more manageable level of spice, but I like it this way as well.

And for the naan:

I got the recipe from my most favorite cookbook . I have never had an absolute failure from this cookbook. It's just basic and reliable.

Ingredients:

3 cups flour
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup milk, slightly warmed
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
Approx. 1/4 cup warm water
2 tablespoons melted butter

1. Sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and baking soda. Mix warm milk and oil and then stir into dry ingredients. Add the water, 2 tablespoons at a time, until the dough forms a fairly stiff ball. If it's a little dry, add a little more water, if a little sticky, add just a little bit of flour.

2. Knead dough for 2-3 minutes, until smooth and workable. Brush dough with melted butter, cover, and leave for 30 minutes.

3. Preheat oven to 450. Place pizza stone in oven to heat. (I wish I had a pizza stone but I just used a cookie sheet.)

4. Divide dough into 4 equal balls. Brush with butter, cover and leave for another 20-30 minutes.

5. Take one piece of dough, roll into 8 inch circular-ish shape, 1/4 inch thick, on lightly floured surface. Repeat with other three pieces of dough.

6. Place dough on hot pizza stone, bake 3-4 minutes (until brown spots form), flip, and bake 7-8 minutes. Remove bread, and brush with butter.

7. Wrap cooked naan in foil to keep warm, cut each piece in half to serve.

My first naan was a little more stiff than I would have liked so I didn't roll it quite as thin and din't cook it quite as long.