Madhu Knits and Cooks

An Easier (and Quicker) Way to Make Vegetable Korma

My aunt's vegetable korma recipe is definitely a favorite dish of mine, despite my historical lack of favor for korma dishes.  My mother recently taught me a slight modification to this recipe, which makes the korma easier and quicker to construct, without a loss in flavor.  The modification is incredibly straightforward - substituting coconut milk for the shredded coconut, poppy seed and almond mixture - and I hope it will help simply your korma attempts in the future as well!

Updated Vegetable Korma (with Coconut Milk)

Ingredients:

• 1 2-inch piece of cinnamon stick
• 3 cloves (whole)
• 2 cardamon pods (whole)
• 2 dried bay leaves
• 3/4 tsp. cumin seeds
• 1/2 tsp. turmeric
• 1/2 tsp. garam masala
• 3 cups chopped onion
• 1.5 tbsps. ginger-garlic paste (available at an Indian grocery store, or blend equal parts ginger and garlic to a paste at home)
• 3 medium potatoes, cut into 1.5-inch pieces and soaked in salt water for at least 15 minutes
• 1/2 head of cauliflower, roughly chopped into bite size pieces (approx. 1.5 - 2 cups)
• 1 cup green beans, cut into 1-inch pieces
• 1 cup carrots, cut into 1-inch pieces, or substitute baby carrots
• 1/4 cup chopped tomatoes
• 3/4 cup coarsely chopped cilantro
• 4 - 5 green chilies (to taste)
• 1/2 cup green peas
• 5 tablespoons of coconut milk (canned - approximately 1/2 of a 5.46 oz. can)
• vegetable oil
• water
• salt

 Directions:

• In a large pot, heat approx. 3 tbsps. of vegetable oil on medium-high heat.  When hot, add the cinnamon, cardamon, cloves, bay leaves, and cumin.  Saute for approx. one minute or until fragrant.
• Add the chopped onion to the pot, stirring to coat the onion with the spices.  Cover and cook until the onion is translucent.
• Then mix in the green chilies, turmeric and ginger-garlic paste, and cook until the ginger-garlic paste is fragrant.
• Add the potatoes, 1/4 cup water, 1 tsp. salt, and cook with the spices for 5 - 7 minutes or until the potatoes are partially cooked (can be partially pierced easily with a knife).  
• Add the cauliflower, stirring to coat cauliflower with vegetable and spice mixture in the pot.  Cook for 4 - 5 minutes or until cauliflower is partially steamed.
• Mix in the green beans and carrots, an additional 1/4 - 1/2 cup of water (to retain a curry-like consistency to the dish, an additional 1/2 tsp. salt, and cook for five minutes or until vegetables are approx. 3/4 cooked.
• Mix in the green peas, the coconut milk, and the tomato.  Bring the mixture to a boil, adding up to 1/4 cup of water to ensure the dish retains a soupy consistency.
• Finally, stir in the cilantro, up to 1/2 tsp. of garam masala if desired, additional salt to taste, and cook until the vegetables are cooked to your taste.  If you would like an additional creaminess to the dish, you can stir in a bit of plain yogurt.
• Serve with rice or Indian breads.

Another Vegetarian Panna Cotta DISASTER!

Sadly, the headline of this post says it all.  I recently tried to make Panna Cotta again, this time with powdered agar agar instead of agar agar flakes, and the whole thing was a mess.  Basically, a sad, unsettled soup-like mess.  

I used David Lebovitz's popular Perfect Panna Cotta recipe and despite googling around to make sure agar agar powder could be substituted in the recipe without modifying the directions, the agar agar didn't firm and settle the heavy milk/sugar mixture.  I let the mixture sit in the fridge overnight, and still no settling.  Ultimately, I think the problem could either be with a) the agar agar itself that I used (which I tried to modify the amount to fit the gelatin called for in the recipe) or b) not cooking the agar agar with the water and cream to have it dissolve more thoroughly throughout the panna cotta.  

But thankfully, unlike the first Panna Cotta attempt, at least I knew it was a failure upon sight instead of having a deceptively good-looking dessert with undissolved agar agar shards throughout to ruin the eating experience.

If anyone has any recommendations on how to make a good agar agar Panna Cotta, please post in the comments!

A Baby Corn Manchurian Success!

After previously attempting Baby Corn Manchurian - one of my favorite Indian-Chinese dishes - with somewhat limited success, I recently pushed myself to attempt the dish again because of the dearth of Indian Chinese restaurants in Brooklyn (sad, but true).  The result was really good - flavorful, spicy and salty - and also much healthier than the first attempt because I sauteed the baby corn instead of deep-frying it.  The recipe details follow the picture below - definitely a dish that will be tried again and again in my kitchen!

Baby Corn Manchurian

Ingredients:

• One can baby corn, drained and rinsed
• 1 tsp. minced fresh ginger
• 3 - 4 tbsp. soy sauce, divided
• 1 tsp. white vinegar
• 1 tbsp. olive oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 green bell pepper, chopped (approx. 1/2 cup)
• 2 green Thai chiles, sliced
• 1 tsbp. tomato paste
• 1 tsbp. chile garlic sauce

Directions:

• Marinate baby corn with ginger, 1 - 2 tbsp. soy sauce and vinegar for 15 - 20 minutes.
• Heat olive oil on medium-high heat in a medium saucepan.  
• When hot, add onion and garlic and saute until the onion is translucent.  Add water (or more oil) if vegetables stick to the pan.
• Add the remaining soy sauce, tomato paste, and chili garlic paste and blend until combined and fragrant.
• Add the baby corn plus marinade to the pan, and cook on high heat until baby corn is slightly browned.
• Mix in the bell pepper and chile pepper, and saute until bell pepper is cooked to your preference.  Add salt if necessary to taste and serve.

No Knead Bread - A Future Monthly Treat?

I finally attempted Jim Lahey's famous No Knead bread recipe, and the result was pretty close to perfect.  A moist, fluffy interior coupled with a chewy, firm crust - and the flavor was very well developed as well with the 18+ hour rise.  

I made a few modifications to this otherwise very simple recipe.  I used half bread flour and half all-purpose flour, and substituted a bit more active dry yeast for the instant yeast called for in the recipe (maybe 3/8 of a tsp instead of 1/4 tsp?).  I also don't know if the dough truly bounced back and doubled in size during the second 2-hour rise, but it seemed good enough to me, so I went ahead and shaped and baked it without any problems :-)  

I also used a Tramontina dutch oven, which I didn't realize is only supposed to be used up to 400 degrees (this recipe uses a 450 degree oven) so the enamel turned a dark color during the baking process - hopefully we are ok from having consumed the bread!  And this is yet another push to actually invest in a Le Creuset dutch oven that can handle these temperatures.  

In any case, this is a great bread recipe that I will definitely use again in the future.  We ate the bread by itself, paired with butter and cheese, and ultimately for grilled cheeses a day later, and it held up beautifully for all of these purposes.  I think my next round of bread making will involve substituting some whole wheat flour, as well as perhaps experimenting with adding some seeds or other whole grain flour?  Looking forward to experimenting with this hopefully versatile base recipe!

Dal Makhani - Well, At Least I Tried It Once

With the cold weather hitting me like a ton of bricks, I have been spending far too much of time dreaming about very heavy, rich dishes that will protect me from the reality of several upcoming months of cold winter.

My first actual attempt of a new, enveloping winter dish was Dal Makhani, a Punjabi black lentil preparation with butter and heavy cream.  I decided to use the recipe found in Pushpesh Pant's India cookbook, a relatively new addition to our kitchen that Andy in particular has been using a lot.  For any Indian food fans out there (and I imagine many of the readers here are!), I'd highly recommend this 800+ page compendium of regional Indian cooking.

Sadly though, what I realized after making the Dal Makhani is that while my mind has been fixated on heavy winter foods, my palate isn't really that into those types of meals.  I made a few alterations to reduce the butter and cream to what I thought would be acceptable ratios - using one stick of butter instead of one and a quarter, and replacing the cream with a few dollops of fat free Greek yogurt - but the result was still way too creamy to be that enjoyable for us.  I also added an additional teaspoon or two of chili powder to give the dish more flavor, and a fair amount of salt to help enhance the flavors of the dish, but it still just felt like a creamy mess.  

A few other notes about this recipe:  I ended up soaking the beans for 24 hours, and kind of freaked out that I had oversoaked them and that they were starting to ferment because they soaked up all of the water, partially split and turned slightly green in color.  But apparently, that seems to be ok.  It only took one hour to cook the beans before they were soft, and then I cooked the beans with the spices for another hour before cooking the beans a final hour with the tomatoes and butter.

If I ever make this recipe again, I will probably half the amount of beans used because this recipe of 2.25 cups of dried beans produced maybe 8 - 9 cups of cooked beans and sauce.  I would also half the butter (if not more) and add more spices like cumin and onions to give the dish more complex flavors.