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Beet Curry

Heather and I spent much of the weekend assigning photos to recipes for Feast — only to find that I somehow didn’t actually have a photo of the beet curry. So I made it again today and photographed it. Guess I know what’s for dinner tonight…

*****

Sri Lankan Beet Curry
(30 minutes, serves 4)

This dish has a lovely sweet flavor with just a hint of spice—beets have a higher sugar content than any other vegetable, and sugar is sometimes made from beets.

3 medium onions, chopped fine
3 TBL vegetable oil
1/4 tsp black mustard seed
1/4 tsp cumin seed
4 large beets (about one lb), peeled, cut in thick matchsticks
1-2 rounded tsp salt
1 rounded tsp turmeric
2-3 tsp lime juice
1-3 chopped green chilies
two dozen curry leaves (optional)
2 cups coconut milk

1. Sauté onions in oil on high with mustard seed and cumin seeds until onions are golden/translucent (not brown). Add beets, salt, turmeric, lime juice, chilies, and curry leaves.

2. Lower heat to medium and add coconut milk. Cover and cook, stirring frequently, until beets are cooked through, about 20 minutes.

3. Remove cover and simmer, stirring, until well blended. Serve hot.

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Off to layout!

I have finished my edits on Feast, and am sending the cookbook to my indexer and layout person.

No more changes, Mary Anne. I mean it. If you decide you need to add another hundred recipes, please wait another decade or two.

Still planning to bring out more little cookbooks — Instant Pot Sri Lankan, etc., no fear. But this was a big production, as my mother would say.

Kickstarter launches April 1st with discounted pre-orders. Mark your calendars!

Eep.

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Halibut with Roasted Spicy Beets, Beet Green & Coconut Mallung, and a Dill-Citrus Gremolata

    I’ve been wanting to learn how to cook different kinds of fish, so tonight, I took on halibut. This seems like a fairly delicate fish, and many of the recipes I reviewed were very simple and lightly seasoned. Which is fine, but, y’know, Sri Lankans gotta bring a little heat, right?

So I took an pleasant-looking recipe on Epicurious, which made use of both beets and beet greens for a very pretty result, and started messing with it. Lime and lemon instead of orange, mostly to lead it in a Sri Lankan direction. A little green chili improved the beets, and a little lime juice improved the halibut.

The real excitement was taking the beet greens and using a mallung-style approach with coconut, lime juice, and sugar. So good! On roasting, the greens sitting under the fish soaked up lots of flavor, and the greens on the edge got delightfully crispy. I could’ve made a meal out of beet greens alone, which is not something I say every day! But they were delicious with the halibut and the roasted beets.

If you wanted to make it just a little more South Asian, I think you could add a t. of cumin powder to the halibut, and/or 1-2 T of coriander seeds and maybe a few T of yogurt to the beets. I’ll be trying that next time!

Ingredients:
5 tablespoons olive oil, divided

Gremolata:
1/4 cup chopped fresh dill
1 tablespoon finely grated lime peel + 1 tablespoon finely grated lemon peel

Beets:
3 medium (1 1/2- to 2-inch) beets with green tops attached; beets trimmed and scrubbed
1/2 cup thinly sliced shallots
1-3 green chilies, chopped fine (optional)

Beet greens mallung:
Beet greens very coarsely chopped (about 4 cups, ideally)
1/2 c. grated dried coconut (unsweetened)
1 t. lime juice
1/2 t. sugar
1/2 t. salt
1/4 t. pepper

Halibut:
4 6- to 7-ounce halibut fillets or mahi-mahi fillets (about 1 inch thick)
2 T lime juice
more salt and black pepper to grate over

1. Preheat oven to 450°F. Cover large rimmed baking sheet in foil and brush with 1 tablespoon oil. Mix chopped dill and grated peel in small bowl for gremolata.

2. Peel beets and slice into 1/4 to 1/3 inch thick slices; put in medium glass bowl; add enough water to cover beets halfway. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and microwave on high until just tender, 4-5 minutes. Uncover and drain. Return beets to same bowl, and add 1 tablespoon oil, 1 tablespoon gremolata, sliced shallots, and green chilies.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper; toss well.

3. Toss chopped beet greens in another medium bowl with 1 tablespoon oil, lime juice, sugar, salt, and pepper.

4. Spread beet slices in single layer on half of prepared baking sheet. Mound beet greens on other half of baking sheet.

5. Sprinkle fish with salt and pepper; place fish fillets on top of beet greens and pour remaining lime juice over fish. Brush fish with remaining 2 tablespoons oil. Sprinkle fish with 2 tablespoons gremolata.

6. Roast fish and vegetables until fish is just opaque in center, about 10-12 minutes.

7. Divide fish and vegetables among plates. Sprinkle with remaining gremolata and serve.

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Ginger-Garlic Chicken

(30-90 minutes, serves 6-8)

The timing on this is so variable because you can either do it the long way described below, the way my mother recommends, which is definitely a bit tastier — or you can do a much faster version, where you mix the spices with the chicken, skip the marinating, and then just sauté the chicken in the pan on medium-high until cooked through and serve. I use both methods, mostly depending on how much of a hurry I’m in. Regardless of which method you use, this dish is best served fresh; if it sits, the chicken will tend to dry up and not be as tasty.

NOTE: This is my daughter’s favorite chicken dish, and one she always greets with delight; she started eating it when she was about five, with no added chili powder. Over time, I’ve added a little more chili powder when feeding it to both kids, serving with milk to help them along; you can also use black pepper if you’d prefer.

1 heaping tsp ginger powder
1 heaping tsp garlic powder
1 heaping tsp turmeric
1 tsp salt
12 chicken thighs, about 2 lbs., deboned and cut bite-size
vegetable oil for frying
1/2 to 2 heaping tsp red chili powder (to taste, optional)

1. Mix first four spices in a large bowl; add chicken pieces and rub with your hands until well coated. Marinate 1/2 hour

2. Heat oil on high; add chili powder (if using) and cook 15 seconds, stirring.

3. Add chicken and sear on high, turning to brown all sides.

4. Reduce heat to low and cover; cook approximately 15-20 minutes, until meat is cooked through.

5. Uncover and cook until all the liquid is gone.

6. Tilt pan and push chicken pieces to one side; allow excess oil to drain to one side for 5 minutes. Remove chicken to dish and serve hot.

 

NOTE: If reheating a day or two later, I recommend reheating in a pan with a little coconut milk; just simmer 5-10 minutes, enough for the milk to thicken with the spices into a nice sauce. Or serve dry chicken with a nice coconut-milky vegetable curry, like carrot or beetroot curry.

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Chicken Salad, Sri Lankan-Style

   (10 minutes, serves 4)

You know how you’re tired and the kids need dinner, so you pick up a rotisserie chicken on the way home from work? And your family eats some of it that night, and maybe a bit more the next day, but they’re bored with it after that. But you can’t stand wasting food, so you spend a little time taking the remaining chicken off the bone?

In my experience, that results in about two cups of cooked chicken, a mix of light and dark meat, heading towards too-dry, so needing some moisture added to be tasty. Sometimes I make a spicy curry with the leftover chicken, but often, chicken salad is the way to go. Mayonnaise leaps to the rescue!

While you can certainly add a little yellow curry powder to chicken salad, I actually like it just fine without, and usually don’t bother. It’s the cashews, sultanas, green chili, and lime juice that make it ‘feel’ Sri Lankan to me.

Bonus — if you wait to add the cashews and cilantro, you can actually do everything else and it’ll freeze well. Then just let thaw in the fridge overnight, or at room temperature for a few hours (I wouldn’t try to use the microwave defrost on this, personally, for risk of the mayo starting to cook), add the cashews and cilantro, check your seasonings, and you’re ready to serve it to guests, or have it for a few days of sandwiches.

2 cups cooked chicken, chopped
1/4 c. cashews, chopped
1/4 c. sultanas, chopped
3-5 Thai green chilies, chopped
1/2 c. mayo
1/4 c. cilantro, chopped
1/2 – 1 t. fine salt
1/2 t. black pepper
1-2 T lime juice

1. Combine ingredients, adjust seasonings to your taste, and enjoy! If you let it sit for maybe 20 minutes or so, the flavors will meld a little better.

*****

(I do like a recipe with only one step!)

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Instant Pot Sri Lankan Lamb Curry in Coconut Milk

(1 hr, serves 8)

Cooking lamb curry in the instant pot is only a little faster than cooking this on the stovetop, but does mean that you can make it in advance, or go run an errand (or attend a board meeting, in my case), and let it keep warm until you’re ready to devour the dish.

3 TBL vegetable oil
3 medium onions, chopped
2 TBL ginger, chopped fine
6-8 garlic cloves, smashed
1 tsp black mustard seed
1 tsp cumin seed
3 cardamom pods
3 cloves
1 stick cinnamon
6-12 curry leaves (optional)
1-2 TBL raw red chili powder
1 TBL Sri Lankan curry powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
3 lbs leg of lamb, cubed, about 1 inch pieces, with some fat left on

1/2 c. ketchup
1 can coconut milk
1-2 TBL lime juice

1. In the Instant Pot, heat oil and sauté onions with ginger, garlic, mustard seed, cumin seed, cardamom pods, cloves, cinnamon and curry leaves until onions are golden/translucent (not brown), stirring as needed.

2. Add chili powder, curry powder, and salt, stirring to combine, then add lamb and sear, stirring occasionally, for a few minutes, to bring out the flavor of the meat.

3. Add ketchup and coconut milk, stir well, scraping up any bits stuck to the bottom.

4. Set to pressure cook for 15 minutes; allow pressure to release before opening. Add lime juice and salt to taste, simmering if needed to reduce liquid.

5. Serve hot, with rice or bread.

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Instant Pot Black Pork Curry / Uru Mas or Padre Kari

 

 (1 hour, serves 6-8)

Cooking this in the Instant Pot only saves about 30 minutes off the traditional recipe, but it does make it easy to set it going, and then wander off, knowing it’ll be kept nice and warm for you until you get back. When I made this test batch, I was able to take Anand to his swim lesson after I set the pressure-cooking going, knowing that it’d be all done and ready for me to eat when we got back!

This traditional tangy, peppery dish gets its dark color from the combination of dark roasted curry powder, tamarind paste, and lots of black pepper. (The colloquial name ‘padre kari’ refers to the black robes of a padre / priest.) Tamarind paste is fairly easy to find in Mexican and Indian markets, or you can order it online. It keeps well in the pantry for a long time, even after opening. Typically, you’d leave a good portion of the fat on the pork pieces; it soaks up a ton of flavor, and is truly delectable, balancing the meat, which can otherwise be a bit dry after long cooking. But you can trim all the fat off if you’d prefer.

3 medium onions, chopped
2 TBL ginger, chopped fine
6-8 garlic cloves, smashed
6-12 curry leaves (optional)
1 tsp black mustard seed
1 tsp cumin seed
3 TBL vegetable oil
1 TBL Sri Lankan curry powder
1 heaping tsp salt
4 tsp black peppercorns
3 lbs pork shoulder, cubed, about 1 inch pieces, with some fat left on
3 tsp tamarind paste
1/2cup white vinegar

1. In the Instant Pot, sauté onions, ginger, garlic, mustard seeds, cumin seeds, and curry leaves in oil until onions are golden/translucent (not brown), stirring as needed.

2. Add curry powder, salt, and peppercorns, stirring to combine, then add pork and sear, stirring occasionally, for a few minutes, to bring out the flavor of the meat.

3. Add tamarind paste and white vinegar; stir well.

4. Set to pressure cook for 30 minutes; allow pressure to release before opening. Serve hot, with rice or bread.

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Instant Pot Beef Smoore

   Instant Pot Sri Lankan Beef Smoore
 
This dish translated really easily to the Instant Pot — I hardly had to modify it at all. And it’s simple enough that even a novice cook shouldn’t find it too intimidating. It normally takes 4-6 hours by the traditional method, but this was just an hour, start to finish. Maybe add another 10-15 minutes if you’re slow at chopping onions, but still — v. speedy, and I didn’t notice any lessening of flavor from the traditional version.
 
Beef Smoore / Mas Ismoru
(1 hour, serves 8)
This is a dish of Dutch / Sri Lankan origin. Yummy with rice — also great in weekday lunch sandwiches on hearty Italian bread, or shredded into a pita or folded naan, with some pickled onions and a little yogurt. Long-handled metal tongs will help with moving the large piece of hot meat. This is made to authentic Sri Lankan spice levels; reduce chili powder for a milder version. Delicious with a deep red wine; garnish with cilantro if desired. A fabulous dinner party dish.
 
3-4 lb chuck roast
3 TBL ghee or vegetable oil
1 TBL salt
1 TBL pepper
1/2 cup vinegar
1 TBL tamarind, dissolved in one cup water
2 medium onions, finely chopped
6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 TBL finely chopped fresh ginger
1 stick cinnamon
2 stalks curry leaves
1 stalk lemongrass, chopped
2 TBL Sri Lankan curry powder
2 tsp chili powder
1 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp fenugreek seeds
1 tsp salt
1 cup coconut milk
1. Set Instant Pot on sauté and heat oil. Rub beef with salt and pepper, then sear the beef until lightly brown on all sides, which adds great depth of flavor to the sauce.
 
2. Add the vinegar, tamarind water, onions, garlic, ginger, cinnamon, curry leaves, lemongrass, curry powder, chili powder, turmeric, fenugreek, remaining salt, and coconut milk. Stir to combine, scraping up any browned meat on the bottom of the pan.
 
4. Cover the Instant Pot and set to pressure cook for 45 minutes. When finished, release steam and then remove lid.
 
5. Remove meat to a serving dish; if the gravy is too thin, reduce it by boiling rapidly uncovered. Transfer gravy to a serving bowl. Slice the meat into the desired thickness, and pour gravy over the slices; serve hot with rice or bread.
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Instant Pot Sri Lankan Red Lentils (Masoor Dal)

  Okay, so this was my first instant pot experiment, and I definitely went wrong in a few ways. For one, red lentils are delicate and don’t actually take that long to cook, so it doesn’t really make sense to make them in a pressure cooker — the stovetop works fine. All the lentil recipes I looked at warned against red lentils for the pressure cooker!

But I love them, and they’re what I normally cook if I’m making a Sri Lankan lentil dish — I’m pretty sure that’s common throughout the country. Also, I’m nothing if not stubborn. So I figured what the heck, let’s try.

And so I cobbled together a recipe from suggestions here and there, using my own regular Sri Lankan red lentil recipe as the base, and set it going. Only to hear a beep and see the ‘burning’ alarm! OH NO.

(I admit to a brief moment of panic there, that I had perhaps just broken my new expensive device!)

But it turned out to be basically fine — when my instant pot thinks it doesn’t have enough water, and things have started sticking to the bottom, it turns itself off (and tells you it’s burning). So I opened it up, took the lentils out, and there was a little stuck to the bottom, yes, but I’d say more caramelized than burnt; I didn’t feel like it hurt the flavors at all. (A bit of a nuisance to clean, but not bad. Soaking took care of it.)

The lentils overall were quite porridge-like in consistency, but that’s actually how I usually cook them on the stovetop anyway; I like them better that way than the more soup-y preparation that is common. But I’m pretty sure that if you just added 1-2 c. of water, you’d get that version, and without the ‘burning’ warning!

I’ll try that next time, just to know for certain, but here’s the ‘burning’ porridge version, for your amusement. I served it to guests, and they said it was delicous!

2-3 T oil or ghee

2 medium onions
1 stick of cinnamon
3 strips of lemon rind (about a quarter lemon)
dozen curry leaves
2 c. red lentils
1 can coconut milk + 2 can water
1 dried red chili, broken into pieces
1 pinch saffron
1 t. salt

1. Dice two medium onions and put in Instapot with oil, cinnamon stick, lemon rind, and curry leaves. Sauté 2 minutes, stirring. Hit cancel to stop the sauté function.

2. Add lentils, coconut milk, chili, and saffron to pot (should not be more than 1/2 up the pot interior).

3. Seal the lid, then set to cook on HIGH pressure for 10 minutes. (It will take about 8 minutes for the pressure to build, then the timer will begin.) [note –I’m not actually sure where in here it turned itself off, but close to 10 minutes, I think]

4. Once the timer has stopped, let the pressure release naturally for 15 minutes, then vent to release the pressure completely.

5. Open the lid, taste, and adjust seasoning as desired. Serve hot with rice, garnished with cilantro.

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Instant Pot Chicken and Potato Curry

It’s going to take me a while to figure out what the Instant Pot is actually good for. For example, this chicken and potato curry isn’t really any faster doing it this way than on the stovetop — you need the same time sautéing, then the time for preheating and pressure cooking, then you need to remove the chicken and potatoes and cook down the sauce, ideally.

I think the only time I’d maybe do this is if I wanted to do the first step in the morning before work, set a timer, and then have it pressure cook the rest when I got home (or just before I got home)? Although I don’t love the idea of uncooked chicken sitting all day at room temperature. Do steps 1 and 2 in the morning, let it keep warm ’til you get home, and then do step 3? That’s a lot of morning cooking time. Just do step 1 in the morning, so you’re ready to quickly cook it when you get home? But you’re still looking at 30-45 minutes then, so….?

I am new to the ways of the Instant Pot, so feel free to opine. This works, anyway, if you really want to use one for chicken curry

******

(serves 4-6)

This is the classic Sri Lankan chicken dish; if you were just going to make one, this should be the one.

2-3 medium onions, diced
3 TBL vegetable oil
1 tsp black mustard seed
1 tsp cumin seed
3 whole cloves
3 whole cardamom pods
1 cinnamon stick, broken into 3 pieces
1-2 TBL red chili powder
1 TBL Sri Lankan curry powder
6-8 pieces boneless chicken thighs, about 2lbs, skinned and trimmed of fat
2 russet potatoes
1/3 cup ketchup
1 heaping tsp salt
water to cover
1 TBL lime juice

1. In the Instant Pot, sauté onions in oil on medium-high with mustard seed and cumin seed, cloves, cardamom pods, and cinnamon pieces, until onions are golden/translucent (not brown). Add chili powder and cook one minute.

 

2. Add curry powder, chicken, potatoes, ketchup, salt, and water. Pressure cook on high 8 minutes (allowing time for preheat cycle beforehand, about 15-20 minutes).

3. Release steam, open and remove chicken and potatoes to a serving dish. You can serve now, but the sauce will be very liquid. I recommend going back to sauté mode, stirring in lime juice, and simmering it down 10-20 minutes until it’s thickened.