I have finally greeted my new grandson after what seemed like a very long wait, however, the waiting time was not lost as I was able to immerse myself in recipe books and retreat to the kitchen.
Of course, one of the bonuses of staying in Whangarei for a while is a visit to the Farmers’ Market. It’s a real case of the early bird catches the worm but this is a market worth getting up early for. So, last Saturday morning I was up with the larks and with shopping bags in hand I was off to explore. The Whangarei Farmers’ Market is the oldest in Australasia, opening in 1997 – long before we all thought about farmers’ markets. So it’s well established, well patronised and a serious foodies delight.
Huge bunches of fresh herbs for a dollar. Enormous heads of broccoli for two dollars. I could go on and on, but home I went with roasted macadamia nuts, pohutukawa honey, coriander, basil, rocket, bunches of baby beetroot, aged Gouda, fresh flowers, olive oil, oranges and avocados and a small box of perfectly ripe fresh sweet figs.
I hardly needed much inspiration to turn that into a celebratory lunch for friends on Sunday, however, that’s when I remembered Mike’s Chicken Terrine – the perfect accompaniment to my purchases.
It’s important sometimes to think back and remember some of the ‘oldie but goodie’ recipes that lurk in the depths of our recipe folders often scribbled on scraps of paper and fading with time! I must remember to reorganise my recipes next time I have a minute!
Mike was a friend and former employee who sadly passed away last year but his chicken terrine was a real winner and will always be Mike’s Terrine from now on.
All that was left for me to do was make a couple of loaves of my easy no knead ciabatta but that’s another story! Cook it & Love it.
MIKE'S CHICKE TERRINE
Makes 1 terrine
200g sliced belly bacon
1/2 onion, diced
10g butter
250g chicken breast, skin on
500g chicken mince
100g dried apricots, chopped
50g pitted prunes, chopped
50g pistachio nuts
1/2 teaspoon each of salt and freshly ground black pepper
50g diced belly bacon, extra
Preheat oven to 180ºC.
Line 1 terrine tin or loaf tin with bacon slices. Melt butter in a saucepan and sauté onions until transparent. Remove skins from chicken breasts and reserve. Roughly chop chicken into large chunks. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients except chicken skin and diced bacon and combine thoroughly. Pack into lined tin and cover with bacon followed by reserved chicken skin.
Bake at 180ºC for 1- 1½hours or until juices run clear. Remove from oven and cool. Drain off excess liquid and remove and discard chicken skin. Weight down with something heavy and refrigerate until chilled or overnight.
Remove from tin and wrap in foil. Serve sliced with pickles and salad.
Friday, March 26, 2010
Sunday, March 7, 2010
SPICE IS THE VARIETY OF LIFE - Vipin's chicken curry
I am at times an impatient woman so sitting as I am in Whangarei waiting for the birth of my second grandchild is hard work on my nerves. You can imagine how my daughter feels perched on the edge of the couch already over her due date. Mowing the lawns didn’t help so now we turn to curry every night....
Whether or not curry actually works to bring on labour remains open to debate, I’m not sure if any great research has been done on the subject. It does however give us great cause here on the farm in Whangarei, for a curry week. My daughter is an avid fan of South East Asian cuisine, turning her Spirit House cookbook into her kitchen bible. She loves to cook with chilli, lime, coriander and palm sugar. Fish sauce is the new Wattie’s Tomato Sauce in this house and her 18 month old son has been raised on her homemade steamed dumplings.
It was quite a different story for me growing up in New Zealand in the 60s - it didn’t especially lend itself to international cuisine. I made up for it in spades however when I first went overseas. My sister and I travelled to London together and found board with an Indian woman, not long in the UK herself. For the girls from Weedons, Canterbury the complexity of Maya Shahaney’s cooking was phenomenal.
The first thing Maya ever made me was an omelette full of chopped fresh green chilli. I’d never eaten chilli in my life, which was obvious at the time with the water streaming from my eyes. But it was the beginning of a great love affair. Maya taught me how to make chapatti, how to cook basmati rice (she used the absorption method after washing the rice over and over again until the water was clear). Maya cooked religiously with garlic and chilli which I’m sure was the reason I was never once sick while living with her, despite the London winter. She always made her own garam masala, the pungent spice mix at the base of all her curries. Garam masala differs regionally but is usually a blend of spices such as chilli, cumin, turmeric, coriander, cardamom and so on.
We all have a great reliable Indian takeaway down the road but the understanding of spice, the use of them in different regions and the sheer complexity of the cuisine make it a must for foodies to get a handle on. Little is more gratifying than balancing an array of spices to create one perfectly rounded dish.
So, here I am in Whangarei working on a garam (hot) masala (mixture) to coax my grandchild into the world. One of our White Tie chefs, Vipin, who is our resident curry and spice expert has graciously agreed to share one of his recipes. Raised in Bombay and cooking his way around the world, Vipin’s curries are a staff lunch favourite and are sure to become a favourite of yours. His tip for this recipe; you must have patience. Vipin says each sequence is equally important in Indian cuisine, each ingredient must be cooked properly before the next layer of flavour is added, all the aromas must be released. And that’s when you get a curry so good, it brings on labour! Cook it & Love it.
VIPIN’S CHICKEN CURRY
Serves 3 - 4
CHICKEN MARINADE
250g boneless chicken
20ml lemon juice
2 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp turmeric
½ tsp chilli powder
2 T oil
½ tsp mixed spice
PASTE
Oil
50g ginger
60g garlic
4 green chillies, chopped (with seeds for hot curry)
3 red onions, sliced
5 tomatoes
SPICES
Oil
10g cumin seeds
4 cardamom pods
2 cinnamon sticks, broken
2 star anise
Chicken stock
Extra lemon juice
Dice the chicken and toss with oil, lemon juice and spices and refrigerate overnight if possible.
Heat oil in a pan and add ginger, garlic and chilli and cook until the raw flavour of the garlic is completely gone. Add the sliced red onion and cook well until caramelised. Finally, add the chopped tomatoes and fry until very tender. Allow mixture to cool before blending in a food processor to make a smooth silky paste.
Heat oil in a pan and add cumin, cardamom, cinnamon and star anise, allowing the spices to crackle in the heat until they release the aromatic oils. Add the paste and fry together well, until the paste leaves the sides of the pan.
Add the marinated boneless chicken cubes and fry them along with the spices and paste. Add a little chicken stock and bring the curry to the boil before simmering for 20 minutes.
Spoon over basmati rice and finish with finely chopped coriander leaves, a sprinkle of garam masala and a squeeze of fresh lemon juice.
Whether or not curry actually works to bring on labour remains open to debate, I’m not sure if any great research has been done on the subject. It does however give us great cause here on the farm in Whangarei, for a curry week. My daughter is an avid fan of South East Asian cuisine, turning her Spirit House cookbook into her kitchen bible. She loves to cook with chilli, lime, coriander and palm sugar. Fish sauce is the new Wattie’s Tomato Sauce in this house and her 18 month old son has been raised on her homemade steamed dumplings.
It was quite a different story for me growing up in New Zealand in the 60s - it didn’t especially lend itself to international cuisine. I made up for it in spades however when I first went overseas. My sister and I travelled to London together and found board with an Indian woman, not long in the UK herself. For the girls from Weedons, Canterbury the complexity of Maya Shahaney’s cooking was phenomenal.
The first thing Maya ever made me was an omelette full of chopped fresh green chilli. I’d never eaten chilli in my life, which was obvious at the time with the water streaming from my eyes. But it was the beginning of a great love affair. Maya taught me how to make chapatti, how to cook basmati rice (she used the absorption method after washing the rice over and over again until the water was clear). Maya cooked religiously with garlic and chilli which I’m sure was the reason I was never once sick while living with her, despite the London winter. She always made her own garam masala, the pungent spice mix at the base of all her curries. Garam masala differs regionally but is usually a blend of spices such as chilli, cumin, turmeric, coriander, cardamom and so on.
We all have a great reliable Indian takeaway down the road but the understanding of spice, the use of them in different regions and the sheer complexity of the cuisine make it a must for foodies to get a handle on. Little is more gratifying than balancing an array of spices to create one perfectly rounded dish.
So, here I am in Whangarei working on a garam (hot) masala (mixture) to coax my grandchild into the world. One of our White Tie chefs, Vipin, who is our resident curry and spice expert has graciously agreed to share one of his recipes. Raised in Bombay and cooking his way around the world, Vipin’s curries are a staff lunch favourite and are sure to become a favourite of yours. His tip for this recipe; you must have patience. Vipin says each sequence is equally important in Indian cuisine, each ingredient must be cooked properly before the next layer of flavour is added, all the aromas must be released. And that’s when you get a curry so good, it brings on labour! Cook it & Love it.
VIPIN’S CHICKEN CURRY
Serves 3 - 4
CHICKEN MARINADE
250g boneless chicken
20ml lemon juice
2 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp turmeric
½ tsp chilli powder
2 T oil
½ tsp mixed spice
PASTE
Oil
50g ginger
60g garlic
4 green chillies, chopped (with seeds for hot curry)
3 red onions, sliced
5 tomatoes
SPICES
Oil
10g cumin seeds
4 cardamom pods
2 cinnamon sticks, broken
2 star anise
Chicken stock
Extra lemon juice
Dice the chicken and toss with oil, lemon juice and spices and refrigerate overnight if possible.
Heat oil in a pan and add ginger, garlic and chilli and cook until the raw flavour of the garlic is completely gone. Add the sliced red onion and cook well until caramelised. Finally, add the chopped tomatoes and fry until very tender. Allow mixture to cool before blending in a food processor to make a smooth silky paste.
Heat oil in a pan and add cumin, cardamom, cinnamon and star anise, allowing the spices to crackle in the heat until they release the aromatic oils. Add the paste and fry together well, until the paste leaves the sides of the pan.
Add the marinated boneless chicken cubes and fry them along with the spices and paste. Add a little chicken stock and bring the curry to the boil before simmering for 20 minutes.
Spoon over basmati rice and finish with finely chopped coriander leaves, a sprinkle of garam masala and a squeeze of fresh lemon juice.
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