For those of you who don't already know, we are staying with a couple of friends (the Fishies) while we get the proverbial Ducks in something resembling a Row. And part of the deal was that we would show Papa Fishie how to cook with curry (this was arranged on his behalf by Mama Fishie- smart woman, that). What I did not bother to explain ahead of time (because I am, if nothing else, exceptionally good at working things to my best advantage) is that cooking with curry is basically just like cooking with any other spice(s)- you add it to whatever it is you're cooking and it's awesome. We have a couple of dishes we do on a regular basis for ourselves, but for tonight we thought we'd do something a little special and try our hand at massaman curry.
I know, I know- it's one of the cardinal rules of cooking that you don't try something for the first time for an "occasion", which this sort of was. But we're nothing if not brave, gentle readers! Some might say foolhardy...
Since all of our cookbooks are still packed up, we browsed the internet until we found a likely-looking recipe, went out and bought the requisite ingredients, and got to work.
We ran up against a problem almost immediately- the problem of Rice. See, Nathan and I have a most excellent rice cooker (courtesy of my brother circa Christmas 2008), which is the way that we know how to prepare rice. So I bought our jasmine rice in bulk with every intention of making it in our friends' rice cooker... which they don't actually have.
No problem! says I. I'll just put it in some water and it'll be fiiiine...
Only apparently rice, unlike noodles, has to be cooked in the proper ratio of water. Because if you use too much water, do you know what you get? Yeah, you get pudding. Proto-pudding, really. And then you run back out to the store and buy rice-in-a-bag (how I used to make rice before the ERC) because dinner needs to happen sooner rather than later.
In the meantime there was massaman simmering on the stove (under Nathan's watchful eye), making everything smell like curried-heaven. We'd started off by abandoning the recipe (which called for chicken) and stewing up some beef in coconut milk- but after that we more or less followed it. Which meant that by the time we added the potatoes (one less than called for) we were surprised that there was obviously not enough liquid to actually boil them. Since we didn't have any more coconut milk we substituted water (liquid is liquid, right?) and then reduce as much as we could.
Anyway it came out quite good in spite of the dilution, but also quite a bit more spicy than anticipated (which is what one gets for not making one's own curry but I will say that a yellow curry paste is supposed to be mild, damn it), and we spent much of the meal discussing how we would modify the recipe for our next endeavor. For starters we realized we need at least half-again as much coconut milk, and I'd probably double the amount of cashew butter, as well (recipe called for peanut butter, but we all know what that does to my system- substitutions must be made!). Furthermore we'd use about 1/3 less of that particular brand of curry, rein in the ginger (I used more than what was called for... usually it works out for the better but not in this instance) and add green onions for garnish.
(Oh, and we'd make certain- ahead of time- that there was a rice cooker available...)
So I was kind of disappointed that we didn't produce the mind-blowing meal we were hoping to, but on the other hand I'm glad that it was at least edible, which was not entirely guaranteed (proto-pudding, people: it was scary). Guess we'll just have tinker with it some more...
In other news, I am once again a full-time employee (woo hoo!) with benefits to resume by May. Furthermore we are (theoretically) taking possession of our new apartment tomorrow, and moving all our stuff in on Saturday (thanks in advance to Tavish and HopperGrass). Saturday is also Pie Day, when Papa Fishie will take us under his pie-making wing (apparently they're flying fishies?) and reveal to us Secrets of the Universe. I think it shall be Most Excellent. Expect photos...
No comments:
Post a Comment