Foodie Friday

Fiona Uncategorized

(Image Credit: Glasgow of Curry)

It’s a chilly-ish, damp late afternoon in Melbourne. Yesterday afternoon’s pulse and vegetable stew has been decanted and labelled, and is now in the fridge.

I’ve spent the past hour putting together a traditional British curry, not unlike the one above, though using leftover roast lamb rather than leftover chicken. The kitchen – indeed, the entire house – smells wonderful. (I don’t make sweet curries often, but OH adores them, so – as the lamb needed to be used – I thought I’d be kind.)

I, however, will be dining elegantly on

(Image Credit: Tesco Real Food)

Anyway, I thought a virtual progressive dinner might be a good idea this evening. Please share your favourite dishes, beverages, music etc.

The evening’s entertainment will, as always, include a raffle superbly conducted by the Maestro of the Friday Raffle, Mr CK Watt.

Off now to have a glass of Chateau Cardboard with me mum, but moi will be backson.

Ciao, baby!

(Image Credit: 45cat)

289 thoughts on “Foodie Friday”

  1. Puffy

    Meoldema just served up curried chicken and rice with peas. yummy

    On a similar theme I’m having Chicken Laksa

  2. Puffy & Jason,

    Edge-matching, we had vegetable (potato, pumpkin, carrot, onion, tomato and spinach) and chickpea curry with rice. The curry sauce was the remains of some massaman paste, plus coconut milk.

    I might, just might, pep the rather large quantity remaining in the stockpot with some biryani paste before I decant it tomorrow morning. An excursion to the supermarket to acquire more storage containers will probably be necessary, too.

  3. L2

    Checking after reading the A Elder article and the eejit that is WA’s treasurer a huge Good Grief !! reading this from his wiki entry……….

    Nahan arrived in Western Australia in July 1982. He joined the Institute of Public Affairs, a right-wing think tank, as a policy director. Between 1995 and 2005 was Executive Director of the IPA.

    After listening to him recently I can only conclude that entry to the IPA is predicated on having an IQ less than room temperature.

  4. Fiona
    I can almost taste it from here! I’d prep some more always good on a cold wet winter night or any night for that matter
    Enjoy

  5. I regularly read Andrew Elder’s blog, but I only noticed today that he has an election countdown on the page. Is this a recent thing? Or a difference between reading his blog on a the screen of my desktop computer compared to my smartphone?
    Either way, it looks to be only another 1 2/3rd years (510 days) till the next election … I can’t work out if I’m shocked that its so far ahead, or so soon because this waiting for the next clanger to drop is very wearing on the nerves *sighs*

  6. Jason,

    I’ve just added a tablespoon or so of biryani paste (use by sometime in 2011, but so what?) and the result is pleasing to the taste.

    Five minutes of simmering (having first brought it just to the boil).

    Why did it take me 25 years to discover the delights of curry?

    Me mum, especially after her time in Malaysia and Christmas Island, was really good at curries – even ground her own spices.

    Moi, however, is lazy.

  7. It must have been the night for chicken……

    I thought I might try chicken schnitzel tonight, but because i’m not allowed breadcrumbs any more I tried almond meal instead. Very successful, cooked in butter and olive oil (all other oils and fats, except coconut oil and duck fat are banned too) even though I couldn’t be bothered doing the full egg and crumb thing and just rolled the sliced breast pieces in almond meal. Next time I’ll try adding some secret herbs and spices.

    What a shame it took me so long to realise how versatile almond meal is, I wasted all those years just using it in baking.

  9. Leone,

    What a good idea – and I will confess I use olive oil all the time, even in Asian cooking.

    What flours are you allowed to use?

  10. Fiona,
    There are a lot of good pastes around these days a favourite brand of mine is Ferns for Indian curry http://www.fernspickles.com/ and if you are “lazy” as the hard work is done pretty much just add to it like you are doing now.
    Some of the more “upmarket” Asian shops now have the ingredients for the pastes “pre prepared” in it’s raw state you take home and cook from scratch.

  11. Fiona
    I’ve experimented with coconut flour and buckwheat flour (makes nice pancakes). Anything with wheat is absolutely no go. If I eat bread, and that’s not often, it has to be low GI bread, which is usually rye based.

    The butter with the olive oil stops the oil burning – something scientific to do with different oils burning at different temperatures. I don’t care about the science, it just tastes good.

  12. Jason,

    I haven’t seen Ferns around – will have a look next time I’m at the supermarket.

    We are lucky that we live quite near Swinburne Uni, which has a large Asian studentship, so there are several good Asian stores in the area – even though I mostly get what I want at our “upmarket” supermarket, which is seriously good.

    Sometimes I do like to start from scratch, but not when I’m doing a cooking marathon, which is what’s going on at the moment.

  14. Leone,

    Yes, the butter and olive oil thing is really good.

    As to your restrictions with flour, I’m reminded of my daughter’s first birthday party – the one all the kids came to.

    Among the guests were one lactose-intolerant child, one egg-intolerant child, and one gluten-intolerant child.

    What to do about the birthday cake?

    Easy peasy!

    Nursing Mothers’ Association of Australia’s foolproof coconut cake:

    1 cup dessicated coconut
    1 cup flour of your choice (I used rye)
    1 cup sugar (raw, of course)
    1 cup milk (soy milk)

    Method:

    Tip everything into a mixing bowl. Stir with wooden spoon. Put mixture into greased (with olive oil) and papered loaf tin. Cook for 45 minutes at 190C.

    That was the first thing DD ever cooked – aged 3.5 years. Of course, I did the oven thing for her.

  16. leonetwo
    Gluten free pretzels placed in a food processor and done to your liking also make a good substitute

  17. Jason,

    Do you have what Simone Beck would have called a truc when it comes to chopping baby spinach?

  19. Jason
    Gluten isn’t the problem, wheat is the issue. So unless the pretzels are made with something other than wheat flour they will be a no-no.

  20. Jason,

    It was late, I was tired, I just tossed a few handfuls into the curry, stirred madly, waited until it was up to the appropriate heat, and served.

    No problems at all eating it.

  21. Leone,
    I’ll look into it for you! One of my former lecturers from pastry school does a lot baking for the coeliac society here in SA. I’m sure she’ll have some other hints for you

  22. Fiona
    I’ve made some coconut bread that is a bit like that recipe, but with some eggs added.

    The different food needs of the little guests at that party reminded me of Christmas here a few years ago. One son is a vegetarian, at that stage he didn’t eat eggs either. Daughter is allergic to shellfish. Her then partner was allergic to nuts. Trying to organise a lovely Christmas lunch that would suit everyone and still include all our traditional family favourites was a nightmare. Now I get to have them here at different times over Christmas, never all at the same meal and No 2 son now eats eggs, so the catering is a lot easier.

  23. Leone,

    Allergies must be respected.

    “Lifestyle choices”, however . . . I have no problems with vegetarians, but get a bit pissed off with vegans – especially those who are more than happy to consume bread, beer and/or wine and/or spirits. Don’t they give any thought to those dear little yeasts who have died to produce their bread and/or drink of choice?

    Especially if they are quite happy to wear leather shoes, belts, etc.

  25. Jason
    Thanks. Any ideas are very welcome. The issue is insulin resistance, which is different to coeliac needs, but there is a lot over-lap in what i’m supposed to eat or not eat. I’m supposed to try to avoid gluten, but eating it is not as serious as it would be for someone with coeliac problems.

  26. Fiona.

    Anthony Bourdain agrees with you lol!

    Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, and an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food. The body, these waterheads imagine, is a temple that should not be polluted by animal protein. It’s healthier, they insist, though every vegetarian waiter I’ve worked with is brought down by any rumor of a cold. Oh, I’ll accommodate them, I’ll rummage around for something to feed them, for a ‘vegetarian plate’, if called on to do so. Fourteen dollars for a few slices of grilled eggplant and zucchini suits my food cost fine.

  27. HaveAchat,

    Oy, that looks like halal to moi.

    Waddya think you’re doing, polluting good Aussie cuisine like that?

    Not to mention funding the terrorists!

  28. Fiona
    Exactly.

    My son took to being vegie because he was into yoga in a big way and decided to go for the full yoga lifestyle, and I admire that. He’s a bit more relaxed about it now.

  29. Leone,

    I know a few young women who have had immense difficulty conceiving because their iron count was too low.

    Humans have been omnivores for a very very long time. I’m all for proper sourcing of food, but to deny the sources of protein – and fat (dairy and eggs) – to which our bodies have long been adapted is really silly.

  31. A vegetarian diet is just so hard to get right, too many people assume you just open a can of nut meat or whatever and serve up some vegies with it. It’s very complex, combining the right foods to get all the nutrition you need.

    Never, ever get my daughter started on this topic, you will get a very long lecture on the evils of eating all that processed, canned Sanitarium stuff and all the bad things soy products do to your body.

  32. Jaeger
    Banana’s hat was a worry, and so very weird. I was trying to work out what it reminded me of. Thanks, you have solved that problem’

  34. This household also stopped buying Weetbix about 35 years ago – we felt no need to support Sanitarium.

    OH, however, insists on having his Vitabrits.

    Though I think I might wean him onto rolled oats.

  36. To counteract all the commercial exploitation of Anzac Day – from John Schumann, a tribute to our indigenous soldiers, written at the request of Lieutenant General David Morrison (who was a far better Chief of Army than Angus Campbell could ever dream of being).

    One invading mob’s too many .

    The story behind the song.
    http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/music/i-was-only-19-songwriter-john-schumann-pens-tribute-to-indigenous-soldiers-on-every-anzac-day/story-e6frfn09-1227309384231

  37. Leone,

    Not to mention that suck, Air Chief Marshal Mark Binskin, AC, Chief of the Defence Force.

    David Morrison is a seriously good man.

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