Massaman beef curry

Massaman beef curry.

My ongoing project to perfect my favorite restaurant dishes is going along swimmingly!

My third attempt at making massaman curry was quite an improvement over the previous attempts.

I have discovered that fresh spices can make a world of difference.

Left to right: Red curry paste, cinnamon sticks, fresh green cardamon pods.

While I was able to find the green cardamon pods at a teeny tiny Indian market just round the corner, I could not find whole star anise anywhere. Oh, well I can just use the search for star anise as a nice excuse for exploring more local markets:-)

On to to the recipe:

Massaman beef curry 

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1.5 lbs of beef stew meat
1 14oz can of light coconut milk
1 cup of water
2 small shallots, chopped
2 medium potatoes, peeled and quartered
2 carrots, peeled and sliced
1 yellow onion, quartered
1 Tbsp of fish sauce
1 tsp of brown sugar
1/2 Tbsp of tamarind paste
3 Tbsp of massaman curry paste
1/2 tsp of red thai curry paste
2 cinnamon sticks
5 green cardamon pods
5 basil leaves
1 Tbsp of peanut oil

Instructions:

Combine the cubed beef with the 3 Tbsp of massaman curry and set aside.

Add oil to the pan or dutch oven over medium heat. Add in the cardamon pods, cinnamon sticks and red curry paste. Fry for about 2 minutes until the spices become aromatic.

Add in the chopped shallots and onion and allow to cook for another 2 minutes or until the onions are golden brown. 

Toss in the beef and curry mixture and cook for another 5 minutes. Then add in the rest of the ingredients and allow to simmer for 25 - 30 minutes. The curry is done when the potatoes and carrots are fork tender.

Enjoy!


 

Everyone in the pool dumpling soup

This was one of those thrown together soups that came out incredibly tasty!
I put six cups of water in a sauce pan and set it to boil. Then I added in the following ingredients:
1 onion, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
a handful of spinach
broccoli florets
2 Tbsp. of miso paste
1/4 cup of vegetable broth
2 Tbsp. of packaged coleslaw mix
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp. of cumin
1/2 tsp. of garlic powder
1 Tbsp. of nutritional yeast
a pinch of salt
ground black pepper to taste
I let the soup simmer until it was reduced by half then I broke out my favorite dumplings.


Chicken dumplings.



The dumplings made the soup.



Night all!

The calzone experiment

I had these in the fridge and they had been sitting in the veggie bin for a few days - I know I had to use them before they went bad.

I peeled them and sliced them into discs.

Take my word for it - don't cut them into discs. Why? Because they will turn into eggplant chips...

Oh, well, live and learn. Next time I will cut them in half lengthwise and that way I will get the tender, mushy eggplant that I wanted.

So, I rolled with it and chopped them fine.

For the rest of the filling I chopped one onion and cooked them in a skillet until they were translucent.

Then some frozen spinach went into a pan and when it had thawed and wilted that went into the mix.

1 Tbsp. of Tofutti cream cheese, 1 Tbsp. of nutritional yeast, 1 Tbsp. of jarred tomato sauce, 1 cup of cooked and drained spinach, 1/2 cup of cooked onions, 1 cup of cooked eggplant, garlic powder, dried basil, dried oregano and dried parsley.

I used Jenna's pizza dough recipe from Eat,Live,Run.

I spread about 1 1/2 cups of the filling on the bottom half of the dough and added sliced tomato on top.

 Then something awful happened. I was sliding the calzone off the cutting board and onto the sheet pan and it flipped over - NOOOOOOOO!!!(((

I did some minor surgery and patched the little guy up.

He went into the oven at 400 degrees for 20 minutes.

Eggplant and onion calzone with marinara sauce.

And if I hadn't told you about the horrible mishap - you probably wouldn't know anything went wrong because one half turned out very pretty.

The calzone did taste great. 

Oh, and because it is a Monday and you might need a moment of fun - Here is a 'Where's Waldo' shot of Connor.