Neelu's Journal: October 2011

Few days earlier I had shared a recipe for Homemade Pizza Dough. That day I didn't feel like making the tomato sauce myself and cheated by using Pomi Strained Crushed Tomatoes. ;)

But for yesterday's brunch I wanted to make quality stuff. I decided to make Chai, Non Alcholic Sangria for drinks. For main I wanted to make atleast four different pizzas with baked potato wedges for sides. Couple of my guests had informed me that they would bring a dessert and a pasta salad. Thankfully, I didn't have to worry about that! I did try making pistachio macaroons... Didn't work out. :( Will try making them again in a couple of days...

Coming back to the tomato sauce... I know buying a jar of pizza sauce was an easier option. I didn't want to. There's something about the smell of store bought pizza sauce that puts me off. Moreover, making your own sauce isn't that difficult. You would have most of the ingredients in your pantry. Yes, you will have to spent about an hour in the kitchen unless you want your sauce burnt! That's the only downside. But then, is it really?

I've tried couple of recipes for tomato sauce and so far this is the best! I don't think I will ever try another recipe again. You may think that I'am exaggerating when I say that this sauce instantly reminded me of the sphagettis and pizzas I had in Italy when on vacation. Trust me, I'am not! I was immediately taken back to Italy and the thought that crossed my mind was 'Oh, so this is how they make tomato sauce in Italy!'

Fresh Tomato Sauce (Recipe Courtsey: Smitten Kitchen)

Ingredients

Yield: About 4 cups sauce

4 pounds sad, unloved tomatoes

1/4 cup olive oil

Small onion

2 to 3 small cloves of garlic

1/2 medium carrot

1/2 stalk of celery

1/2 teaspoon salt plus more to taste

Slivers of fresh basil, to finish (I didn't have any basil, so skipped them)

Method

Peel your tomatoes: Bring a pot of water to boil. Cut a small X at the bottom of each tomato. Blanche the tomatoes in the boiling water for 10 to 30 seconds, then either rinse under cold water or shock in an ice water bath. Peeling the tomatoes should now be a cinch. If one gives you trouble, toss it back in the boiling water for another 10 seconds until the skin loosens up. Discard the skins (or get creative with them).

Finish preparing your tomatoes: If using plum tomatoes, halve each lengthwise. If using beefsteak or another round variety, quarter them. Squeeze the seeds out over a strainer over a bowl and reserve the juices. Either coarsely chop you tomatoes on a cutting board or use a potato masher to do so in your pot, as you cook them in a bit.

Prepare your vegetables: Finely chop onion and mince carrot, celery and garlic. Or pulse all four on the food processor to form a paste. All of these methods work.

Cook your sauce: Heat olive oil in a large pot over meduim. Cook onions, carrots, celery and garlic, until they just start to take on a little color, about 10 minutes. Add tomatoes and bring to a simmer, lowering the heat to medium-low to keep it at a gentle simmer. If you haven’t chopped them yet, use a potato masher to break them up as you cook them. Simmer your sauce, stirring occasionally. At 30 minutes, you’ll have a fine pot of tomato sauce, but at 45 minutes, you might just find tomato sauce nirvana: more caramelized flavors, more harmonized texture.

If your sauce seems to be getting thicker than you want it to be, add back the reserved tomato juice as need. If your sauce is too lumpy for your taste, use an immersion blender to break it down to your desired texture. (This is what I did)

Season with 1/2 teaspoon salt and more to taste. Scatter fresh basil over the pot before serving. Taste once more

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My sauce was a bit dry. I guess the tomatoes I used weren't juicy enough. Next time I will look for more juicy tomatoes. :)

I made the sauce a day earlier and stored it in my fridge. It was just as tasty the next day and I received many compliments on the flavour. ;) So give it a try and let me know!

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Another favourite cookbook of mine is Madhur Jaffrey's An Invitation to Indian Cooking. This is the best cookbook for those who are new to Indian Cooking and are finding it hard around some of our ingredients. Though this book has no pictures, I would still recommend this book to anyone as it has loads of notes on Indian spices and flavourings, sample menus - veg and non veg, tips on kitchen utensils and other equipments etc.

A short blurb from the back cover - This seminal book, originally published in 1973, introduced the richly fascinating cuisine of India to America - and changed the face of American cooking. Now, as Indian food enjoys and upsurge of popularity in the United States, a whole new generation of readers and cooks will find all they need to know about Indian cooking in Madhur Jaffrey's wonderful book.

Oh, by the way, she also happens to be an award winning actress. ;)

So is a simple recipe for an appetizer from the same cookbook- Jumbo shrimps on toothipicks. I will upload some photos here in a couple of days, Insha Allah.

Ingredients

5 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

A piece of fresh ginger, about 1-inch cube, peeled and chopped

11/2 pounds (680grms) jumbo shrimp, peeled and deveined

3 tbsp vegetable oil

3 tbsp tomato paste

1/2 tsp ground turmeric

1 tbsp lemon juice

3/4 tsp salt

1/8-1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

Method

Put the garlic and ginger in the container of an electric blender along with 3tbsp water. Blend at high speed until you have a smooth paste.

Wash shrimp well and pat them dry. Cut each shrimp into three sections. Set aside.

Heat oil in 10-12 inch skillet over medium flame. When hot, pour in the paste from blender and fry, stirring constantly, for 2 minutes. Add tomato paste and turmeric. Fry and stir another 2 minutes. Add 4tbsp water, the lemon juice, salt, and cayenne pepper. Cover and simmer gently for 2-3 minutes. (This much can be done in advance).

Five minutes before serving time, lift off cover, put in the shrimp and turn heat to high. Stir and fry the shrimp for about 5 minutes or until they just turn opaque.

To serve: Place on platter and stick toothpicks into each shrimp piece. Serve hot.

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You read that right! I've a guest post from none other than Shab's Cuisine! Cool ha? If you have been following my blog for a while you would know that Shab's Cuisine keeps popping up in my posts. Yes, I love this food blog to bits. I love Shabeena's drool worthy photos even more! Go check her blog out - trust me, her photos and detailed recipes will blow you away!

Without further adieu, here is the post: -

Even though, officially winter starts in December, I feel it is already at the doorstep. Freezing breeze and chilly mornings, early sunset and late sunrise, bright blue sky to grey cloudy sky all ring a bell about onset of winter. It’s been really sunny and warm couple of weeks back and within a week it dropped from 21 degrees to 6 degrees Celsius! Ahh! After all, that is what UK is notorious for- its unsettled and unpredictable weather. Hence, that wasn’t a surprise, in fact, very much expected. Here we get to feel and see all the four seasons, with all the obvious seasonal changes. We also get different varieties of seasonal fruits and veggies, at low cost when they are in season. Although I don’t really make use of the seasonal fruit and veggies in cooking and baking, I try to eat them raw. It is autumn now with beautiful colours of fall foliage around, yet the chilly weather just keeps u wrapped up in the comfort of home.

I am a beef lover and I prefer it to chicken. Or am I getting too bored of taking chicken all the time? I don’t really know. Even though beef is my favourite, I don’t prepare it on regular basis as my men are not great fans of it and its high cholesterol content. But nothing would taste better than some spicy, hot meal or a soup during these cold days. Snug yourself on the sofa, covered up in a blanket, with a plate of these beef fry with some chappatis or rice is a means of simple pleasure for me. That’s what I did the next afternoon I cooked this! So delicious!

A bit of cooking, little bit of photography and a lot more of chit-chat; that’s pretty much all I do these days apart from taking some initiative on my career side. As my little one started his school full time, I got lot more of spare time in hand. But my blogging is still creeping slower than ever. Anyways, this is a very simple recipe that requires just less than 45 minutes to prepare, really! This preparation of beef is one of my favourites. You can serve them along with rice, chappatis, pooris, parattas etc.

Spicy Beef Masala

Serves 4

Ingredients:

½ a kilo beef, cut into 1 inch cubes

Marinade:

2 teaspoon red chilli powder (Mild)

1 ½ teaspoons Coriander powder

½ teaspoon turmeric powder

5 large cloves of garlic, minced

1 inch piece of fresh ginger, minced

Salt - as required

Others:

110g, 1 large tomato,

230g, 1 large onion

A handful of curry leaves

½ teaspoon pepper powder

¼ teaspoon garam masala

3 tablespoon coconut oil

Salt, as required

1-4 green chillies slit (Add as per your preference. If you like it mild, add them whole without slitting. )

¼ cup water or more if required.

Preparation

1. Wash and drain the meat in a colander. Once drained, marinate with all the ingredients under marinade and leave it in fridge for a couple of hours of longer if you have time. You may cook it instantly if you are out of time.

2. Heat a pressure cooker, add meat along with chopped tomato and water and cook on low-medium heat until beef is 3/4th cooked with the pressure lid on.

3. Take off the lid and cook the meat slowly until the water is all evaporated and the meat is smothered in spices.

4. Heat another pan, add oil. Throw in sliced onions, slit green chillies and curry leaves and sauté till onion becomes golden.

5. Add meat along with the spices and cook slowly until it is dry and brown. Add pepper powder and garam masala and cook for 3-4 minutes.

The longer you cook, the darker the colour you get. Slow cooking usually brings darker coloured gravy. You can also cook this without pressure cooker which takes real long time, but always taste better than the pressure cooked one.

If you prefer, you can also throw in a handful of sliced coconut along with onions.

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So, do you like it?? Try and let me know. :)

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This '31 days of Simple Recipes' series will not be complete without a recipe for pizza right? So here is an easy to make pizza dough. I found this recipe on Smitten Kitchen and oh boy, is this easy?!! I've tried various versions of pizza dough recipes and this is the best and the easiest so far.

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups flour (can replace up to half of this with whole wheat flour)
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon active dry yeast
1/2 cup lukewarm water (may need up to 1 or 2 tablespoons more)
1 tablespoon olive oil

Method

Stir dry ingredients, including yeast, in a large bowl. Add water and olive oil, stirring mixture into as close to a ball as you can. Dump all clumps and floury bits onto a lightly floured surface and knead everything into a homogeneous ball.

If you are finding this step difficult, one of the best tricks is to simply pause. Leave the dough in a lightly-floured spot, put the empty bowl upside-down on top of it and come back in 2 to 5 minutes, at which point you will find the dough a lot more lovable.

Knead it for just a minute or two. Lightly oil the bowl (a spritz of cooking spray perfectly does the trick) where you had mixed it — one-bowl recipe! — dump the dough in, turn it over so all sides are coated, cover it in plastic wrap and leave it undisturbed for an hour or two, until it has doubled in size.

Dump it back on the floured counter (yup, I leave mine messy), and gently press the air out of the dough with the palm of your hands. Fold the piece into an approximate ball shape, and let it sit under that plastic wrap for 20 more minutes.

Sprinkle a pizza stone or baking sheet with cornmeal and preheat your oven to its top temperature.
Roll out the pizza, toss on whatever topping and seasonings you like.

Bake it for about 10 minutes until it’s lightly blistered and impossible to resist

Inspired by her (Smitten Kitchen's) grilled eggplant and olive pizza, I made a grilled eggplant and jalapenos pizza (I didn't have any olives left in my fridge). I also tried out a marrow and tomatoes pizza - sliced thin circles of tomatoes and marrow and sprinkled jalapenos and shredded mozarella. In both cases I used the garlic oil found in the above mentioned recipe. It's absolutely amazing!!

Do read her other pizza related artciles - 10 paths to painless pizza-making; pizza, updated.

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One of the reasons why I try to make dishes belonging to cuisines other than Indian is to make sure that my kids get a taste of all types of food - be it Italian, Chinese or in today's case Moroccan. I really don't want my kids to be picky when it comes to food and would love them to have a good palette. I'am trying really hard and hope it will show some results when they grow up.

I was introduced to couscous and lamb tagine by a bookclub buddy of mine. After seeing her cook a hearty and healthy couscous dish for us, I knew I wanted to try and make one myself. Following is the first ever couscous dish I made. And now it has become a household recipe.

It's a really simple dish. You just have to put together few ingredients and then get back to whatever you were doing. A great dish for brunch or when having family or friends over for lunch or dinner. This recipe never fails to deliver!

Recipe from Best of Morocco Cookbook

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

75g of cooked chickpeas

675g of lean lamb - bite size pieces (I use lamb pieces with bone)

2 red onions - sliced

pinch of saffron

1/4 tsp of ground or crushed ginger

1/2 tsp ground turmeric

1 tsp freshly ground black pepper

450g carrots, cut into bite size pieces

675g pumpkin, peeled, seeded and cut into good size chunks

75g raisins (I always skip them - it's too sweet for J's taste)

500g white or brown couscous

Salt

Fresh parsley or coriander to garnish

Method

Place chickpeas in cold water. Remove skin with your fingers. Discard skin and drain.

Place the lamb, onions, saffron, ginger, turmeric, pepper, salt and 1.2litres/5cups of water in a couscousier or a deep bottomed saucepan. Slowly bring to boil, then cover and simmer for about an hour, until the meat is tender.

Stir the carrots, pumpkin and raisins into the meat mixture, cover and simmer for a further 30-35 minutes, until the vegetables and meat are completely tender.

Prepare couscous according to the instructions on the packet. I usually use hot chicken/vegetable stock instead of salted water. Spoon on to a serving plate, making a well in the centre.

Spoon the stew and gravy into the centre of the couscous, arranging some carrots down the sides, or alternatively stir the stew into the couscous. Pour extra gravy into a jug. Garnish with parsley or coriander with some chilli flakes and serve.

Enjoy!

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