Three Bean (or more), Tomato & Spinach Stew

This is a recipe adapted from April 2012 BBC Good Food (India). I cook it very often because it is so deliciously healthy (packed with tonnes of antioxidants and fibre!) and simple to prepare. It's also perfect for PJ's slow carb diet. 

To make this dish, I rely on my stash of canned tomatoes (Italian) and canned beans. I always have a few of these in my cupboard. The beauty of this dish is that you can use any kinds of canned beans that you fancy - cannellini, red kidney, black-eyed, pinto, broad beans, mixed beans, even chick peas.  I personally favour cannellini beans and red kidney beans. 

You can always use dried beans (soaked overnight), but I find it so much more convenient to use canned beans. Canned tomatoes are also very reliable in producing a flavoursome stew.

Serves: 2-3 (as a complete meal)
Cooking time: 25 mins

ingredients
1 large onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 tbsp ground cumin
1/2 tbsp ground coriander
400g canned tomatoes
1 cup water
10 black olives, deseeded and halved
2 x 400g canned beans, rinsed and drained (net weight of drained beans would be between 400-510g)
100g green beans, chopped
100g spinach, roughly chopped
1 tsp salt
Fresh ground black pepper to taste

method
Cook the onion and garlic in the olive oil over medium heat, until softened. Add the cumin and coriander. Cook for 1 min, stirring constantly.

Tip in the tomatoes and water. Simmer for 10 minutes, until thickened.

Add all the beans and cook for 5 minutes, then add the spinach and cook for 5 minutes more. Season with salt and black pepper before serving.

notes
Add the garlic only towards the end of the onion softening. Garlic tends to burn quite easily.
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If you prefer a stronger flavour, replace the ground coriander with ground cumin, making it a total of 1 tbsp of ground cumin.
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You can replace the fresh vegetables according to your taste e.g., green beans with french beans, spinach with cabbage (will need to stew longer) etc.

Chicken in Shrimp Sauce

Some time ago, I wanted to cook chap chye (Chinese mixed vegetable stew) but couldn't find both fermented bean curd or soy bean paste (tau cheo) at the local stores. Instead, I found Lee Kum Kee's Fine Shrimp Sauce (made from fermented shrimp and salt) and thought, "What the heck." The chap chye turned out a wee bit too salty but PJ commented the shrimp sauce went very well with the black fungus. That got me thinking about pairing the two, along with chicken and Chinese mushrooms and voila! I have a chicken in shrimp sauce dish which earned me a 9.5/10 from PJ tonight. :) 

Serves: 2 hungry people
Cooking time: 20 minutes

ingredients 
2 tbsp sesame oil
5 slices peeled ginger
7 medium sized chicken drumsticks (750-800g), with skin
5 garlic cloves, peeled and bruised
6 Chinese mushrooms
1 handful of dried black fungus
320ml of soaking liquid
1 tsp of shrimp sauce (I used Lee Kum Kee Fine Shrimp Sauce)
Dash of light soy sauce (optional)

method
Soak Chinese mushrooms and black fungus in a bowl of hot water. When softened, remove them from the bowl and retain the soaking liquid. Squeeze out the water from mushrooms and slice them into half. Cut black fungus into smaller pieces.

Heat oil in wok or large pan. Stir fry the ginger till fragrant.

Add drumsticks and stir fry for a few minutes, until the exterior is no longer pink.

Add garlic, mushrooms, black fungus, soaking liquid and shrimp sauce. Stir well. Cover with lid and let it simmer for about 15 minutes. Flip the chicken pieces occasionally with a kitchen tongs so that they can absorb the sauce.

(optional) If the sauce is not salty enough, you may wish to drizzle a bit of light soy sauce (I used about 1 tsp) to enhance the flavour.

Lamb with Chickpeas and Lentils (Ghosh vari daar)

Since relocating to Mumbai in May, we hadn't invited any friends over for a meal because 1) we only had 4 chairs at our tiny IKEA dining table; 2) there were only 4 plates, 2 cups, 4 forks and 4 spoons; and 3) I wasn't confident cooking for guests. But due to a recent kind donation of utensils and crockery from a returned Singaporean and a "shameless" self-invitation from a friend (it went like this: "We've been seeing all your food pictures and wonder when you're going to cook for us!") , we finally invited a couple of friends over last night. And this was what I cooked:  

Everyone enjoyed the mutton dish 'cos the meat was so just tender and the gravy flavourful.

This fantastic recipe is from Cooking with My Indian Mother-in-Law  and I've modified it slightly to reduce the heat and to make it slow carb diet friendly. 

Serves: 4
Cooking time: At least 1.5 hours

ingredients
225g/1 cup of channa dal (split chickpeas), well rinsed (I used dried whole chickpeas, soaked overnight) 
2 tbsp moong dal, well rinsed (any type of lentils will be fine actually)
500g mutton (or lamb shoulder or leg, if you can), cubed with bone retained, trimmed of fat and rinsed to remove stray splinters of bone
1.5 tsp salt
3 fat cloves garlic
3cm ginger
2 green chilies
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
2 tbsp peanut/cooking oil
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2.5cm cinnamon stick
3 cardamoms
3 cloves
10 black peppercorns
4 tbsp crushed canned plum tomatoes and juice (I replaced with 1 chopped fresh tomato and 3 tbsp of tomato puree)
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/2 tbsp finely chopped coriander stems
2 medium potatoes, peeled and halved (Omitted because of PJ's slow-carb diet)
Juice of half a lemon (optional)
1/2 tbsp chopped coriander leaves (optional)

method 
Put both types of dal in a small pan with 4 cups/1 litre of water and bring to the boil. Skim off any scum, then partially cover the pan and simmer until the pulses are soft. This should take about 30 minutes - you may need to add more boiling water from time to time. (If you are using whole chickpeas, cook it for 30 minutes first before adding lentils; then cook for another 30 minutes i.e., total 1 hr).

Meanwhile, put the meat in a small pan with 500ml/2 cups of water and 1/2 tsp of salt. Bring to the boil, skim off any scum and cook rapidly for 10 mins. Reduce the heat, cover and simmer for about 45 minutes until tender.

Crush the garlic, ginger, 1 green chili, cumin seeds and 1 tsp of salt to a paste. Set aside.

Heat the oil in a large pan and add the onion, cinnamon, cardamoms, cloves and peppercorns. Cook over moderate heat until the edges of the onion begin to turn brown. Add the garlic-ginger paste and cook for a minute or so, then add the tomatoes, the remaining chili (left whole), turmeric, coriander stems and the potatoes (optional). Stir well and simmer until the oil pools around the masala mixture.

Add the cooked meat and its cooking liquid to the masala and continue to cook over medium heat. Puree the dal and its cooking water using a hand-held blender, or beat with a whisk - it should be fairly think and soupy. Add it to the masala. Simmer gently until the potatoes are tender (if you're not using potatoes, just simmer for another 15-20 minutes).

(optional step) When you're ready to serve, stir in the lemon juice and chopped coriander and check the seasoning, adding more salt if necessary (not really!).

notes
If you prefer more heat, use 4 green chilies - 2 in the paste, and 2 whole with the tomato mixture.

Tom Yum Soup with Prawns & Chicken Meatballs

Ever since a colleague introduced me to Noob Cook, I've been eagerly combing the website to identify suitable Asian recipes that I can cook here in India. Her Tom Kha Talay  is something completely doable and I had meant to cook it today, only to be too lazy to source for good fish fillets. Instead, I decided to tweak the recipe somewhat and popped over to the nearby cold storage (NOT the Cold Storage in Singapore. Cold storage here are shops which sell fresh chicken meat, pork, mutton, eggs and sometimes other frozen meats/seafood etc.) and got some fresh chicken meat to make meatballs. The chicken meatballs turned out pretty fragrant and sweet, and unlike most times, I actually noted down the ingredients that went in (it was pretty much a "I think this should work so let's try lat" first-time effort). So here's the recipe for my tom yum soup with prawns and chicken meatballs. Definitely a slow carb diet friendly meal. 

Serves: 2
Cooking time: 15 minutes

ingredients 

for chicken meatballs
200g chicken breast fillet, chopped into smaller pieces
200g chicken thigh (skinless, boneless), chopped into smaller pieces
4 fat garlic cloves, peeled
2 small shallots, peeled
1 tbsp fresh mint leaves
2 tbsp fresh coriander leaves & stem (around 3-4 small stalks)
1 level tsp salt

the rest
700ml water
40-50g tom yum paste
1 stalk  fresh basil
1 lime
2 kaffir lime leaves (optional)
1 chilli padi
150g french beans, tips removed, cut to 1.5inches pieces
100g fresh button mushrooms, quartered (stems removed if preferred. For me, I removed the stems but throw them into the soup for the flavour and extra crunch)
11-12 medium sized prawns, shelled & deveined (tails left)
Fish sauce
Chilli flakes
Mint leaves
Tobasco sauce (optional/if needed)

method
Mince the 400g of chicken meat together (pulse on and off in a food processor). Scoop out the chicken meat into a mixing bowl. Next, add the garlic, shallots, mint leaves, coriander and salt into the food processor. Blend until ingredients are finely chopped. Scrape the mixture into the chicken mince and stir well to blend. With slightly wet hands, scoop out a generous tablespoon worth of the mixture and gently roll it into balls. Set the meatballs aside on a plate. Mixture should yield around 9-10 servings.

To make the soup base, bring water to boil in a deep saucepan. Add tom yum paste, basil, juice of lime, kaffir lime leaves and chill padi. Let mixture simmer for a while.

Carefully add the chicken meatballs into the soup. After around 7 minutes, the meatballs will float to the surface (a sign that they are cooked). Add mushrooms and french beans and cook for 2 minutes. Add prawns and cook for another minute.

Season with fish sauce, chilli flakes and tobasco sauce (if you need more spice and sourness). Garnish with mint leaves and serve immediately.

Jamie Oliver's Roasted Chicken Breast in Tinfoil Tray

This is the first recipe I'm trying from my first Jamie Oliver's book - Cook with Jamie - My Guide to Making You a Better Cook, and I'm SOLD. PJ loves the flavours, whilst I marvel at the simplicity of the recipe - both in terms of the number of ingredients used, and the ease of making this dish.

Here is the recipe I modified slightly, due to unavailability of certain ingredients. 

Serves: 1 (just double or triple accordingly to number of pax) 

Cooking time: 25-35 mins 

ingredients

1 chicken breast (around 150-200g), with skin (make a few 2cm incisions over the meat for the flavours to seep through) 

8-10 cherry tomatoes, halved 

1 small head of broccoli, broken into florets (the original recipe calls for 8 trimmed sticks of asparagus) 

1 sprigs of fresh rosemary 

Salt 

Fresh ground black pepper 

Olive oil 

Hua Tiao Chiew or Shaoxing wine (the original recipe calls for white wine)

Balsamic Vinegar 

method

Optional step: Rub some salt and freshly ground black pepper over chicken and let it sit in the fridge for 1-2 hours before cooking. 

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C. 

Put chicken breast, broccoli, tomatoes and leaves from 1 sprig of rosemary plus a whole sprig of rosemary into a bowl. Toss everything together with a pinch of salt, freshly ground black pepper and a drizzle of olive oil. 

Put the broccoli and tomatoes into a tinfoil tray (or a baking dish) and place the chicken and rosemary sprig on top. Sprinkle a bit more salt and black pepper for further seasoning. Add some wine and cook in the middle of the oven for 25 to 35 minutes (I did mine in 27 minutes, let it rest for 5 minutes on a plate and the meat was quite tender). 

Serve drizzled with balsamic vinegar (skip if you are on slow carb diet). 

tips: 
Bring chicken to room temperature before popping it into oven. This ensures the meat will cook faster and more evenly. I usually let my chicken sit on the counter for around 30 minutes.

Oven Roasted Mushrooms with Garlic and Chilli

Do you have one of those days where you are feeling crummy but you still need to cook because 1) you have some beautiful fresh produce that you'll really like to use up or 2) you're sick of eating take-outs or 3) you have a hungry (slow carb diet) husband to feed or 4) all of the above? 

Yesterday was one of those days for me (crummy + option 4) and I thought I'll rely on my new best friend in the kitchen - the oven - to help me prepare a simple dinner of roast chicken and mushrooms (along with instant miso soup and pak choy). 

And because I was feeling crummy, I did not take pictures of my food, as I normally would. It was only when PJ and I were almost done with the mushrooms, did he say that the mushrooms were really delicious and I should have taken a picture. 

So here is the afterthought:  

I am normally quite critical of my own cooking - but I have to shamelessly proclaim this pot as really yummy and the stock tasted like spaghetti alle vongole in bianco (without the spaghetti and clams)! That's because mushrooms are really rich in umami (just as clams are) and combined with olive oil, garlic and chilli flakes... yum!

Serves: 2-4 as a side dish
Cooking time: 30 minutes

ingredients
400g fresh mushrooms (I used a mix of white button and baby portobello), sliced
1 scant tsp salt
3-4 fat garlic cloves, minced
1 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 scant tsp red chilli flakes
Generous drizzle of olive oil (around 2-3 tbsp)

method
Preheat oven to 180 degrees C.

Put the mushrooms in an oven proof casserole with lid. Sprinkle the salt, minced garlic, pepper and chilli flakes over the mushrooms. Drizzle the olive oil over and stir to mix well. Put the lid on, place the casserole in the preheated oven and let it do its magic for 30 minutes.

Serve as a side dish to roast chicken or pour it over spaghetti al dente for a vegetarian vongole! :)

Asian Chicken Burger

This chicken burger recipe from Hamlyn's 200 one pot meals does not call for any bread bun - perfect for PJ's diet! The patties turned out quite delicately flavoured, almost under flavoured, so I've upped the amount of herbs in my adapted recipe below.   

By the way, the preparation time given in the book was 20 minutes. But I reckoned it took me at least one hour! If all the ingredients were already washed, pre chopped, trimmed of fats etc., then yes, maybe you could do it in under 20 minutes (or if you are Jamie Oliver). Which brings me to my point - I can't advise on the preparation time for each recipe, because it really depends on the quality of your produce (e.g., I have to rinse every leaf under filtered water in Mumbai) and your own speed and skills in the kitchen. Preparation times given in cook books are often gross estimates; so, good luck if you're blindly following them! :)  

Serves: 2 hungry people (yields 4 generous patties)

Cooking time: 25 minutes

ingredients

4 garlic cloves, crushed

1 lemon grass stalk, roughly chopped

2 inch fresh ginger, peeled and roughly chopped

Large handful of fresh coriander, roughly chopped

2 red chilli, deseeded
1 tsp salt 

500g boneless, skinless chicken thigh, cut into large chunks

2 tbsp oil

1 bunch spring onions, sliced into 1-inch pieces 

200g pak choy, roughly shredded 

1 tbsp fish sauce

50g toasted cashew nuts, roughly chopped

method
Preheat oven to 200 degrees C. 

Blend the garlic, lemon grass, ginger, coriander, chilli and salt in a food processor to make a thick paste. Add the chicken and blend until well mixed. Tip out on to the work surface and divide the mixture into 4 portions. Roll each into a ball and flatten into a burger shape. 

Heat the oil in a frying pan and fry the burgers on both sides to sear (around 30 secs each side). Transfer the burgers onto a baking sheet or roasting pan and cook, uncovered, for 25 minutes until the burgers are cooked through. 

Meanwhile, reheat the frying pan and stir fry the spring onions and pak choy for 1 minute. Add fish sauce towards the end and quickly stir through. 

Transfer cooked  burgers and vegetables to serving plates and scatter toasted cashew nuts over the greens. 

notes
For lamb burgers, use lean minced lamb instead of the chicken. Cooking time will remain the same.