Curry in a Hurry
Do you know what torture is, Gentle Reader? It's making chicken curry at the butt-crack of dawn and then having to smell that fabulous aroma every time you walk through or pass by your kitchen the rest of the day. That is gastronomic torture defined.
And I have only myself to blame. I had planned to make a curry recipe from 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer--our first from this book--for supper Saturday night because, but by the time we wrapped up our misadventures at the outlet center, we were too pooped to party and wound up dining on Subway and leftover creamy chicken and rice casserole instead. Then I got up bright and early Sunday morning and made curry--because I'm a freak.
Does Chicken Curry Get Any Easier Than This?
Maybe, but I sure can't imagine how. No, really, I can't. This recipe is incredibly simple and incredibly flavorful. Within less than an hour, I'd done the prep work, made the dish, put it in a container and into the 'fridge for supper tonight and cleaned up the dishes and countertops. It doesn't get any better than that.
1 small red onion, cut in half lengthwise and thinly sliced
4 medium-sized garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 lengthwise slices fresh ginger (2 1/2 inches long, 1 inch wide, 1/8 inch thick), julienned
1 1/1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cubed
2 t curry powder*
1 1/2 t coarse kosher or sea salt
1/4 C unsweetened coconut milk
1 large tomato, cored and finely chopped
2 T finely chopped fresh cilantro leaves and tender stems
- Preheat a work or well-seasoned cast iron saucepan over medium-high heat. Drizzle oil don its sides.
- Add onion, garlic and ginger, then stir-fry until the veggies are light brown (3 to 5 minutes).
- Add the chicken and curry powder. Cook until meat is seared all over (about 5 minutes).
- Sprinkle the salt over the chicken.
- Pour in the coconut milk, which will immediately come to a boil.
- Cover, lower the heat to medium and let simmer, stirring occasionally, until the chicken is fork-tender and no longer pink inside (5 to 7 minutes).
- Remove to a serving bowl the chicken from the thin yellow sauce.
- Raise the heat back to medium-high and boil the sauce, uncovered until it thickens, stirring occasionally (3 to 5 minutes).
- Stir in tomato and cilantro.
- Pour the sauce over the chicken, then toss to bathe it with the curry sauce.
See what I mean? Simple. Flavorful. And I didn't muck it up!
But I did futz:
- I only used 1 T of canola oil. After using 2 T in that beef stroganoff disaster, I decided that much oil is just too much for my gut to handle.
- I used my copper-bottomed 12-inch frying pan instead of my wok (an IKEA jobber I got back in 2000) because it was still out from Friday's chicken, beans and rice meal. Now if I had that cast iron wok I drooled over at the Le Creuset store yesterday, I could do up step 1 damn well and good, couldn't I?
- I used about a fourth of a can of Del Monte (no salt added) diced tomatoes because it was taking up space in the pantry and I'd bought it for just such a purpose--to replace a finely chopped fresh tomato or two or three in a recipe. I need to track down about how much a large tomato, cored and finely chopped, weighs so I can do a better job of replacing it with canned diced tomatoes instead of just eyeballing it and guessing. I don't guess very well when it comes to stuff like this.
- I may have but I may not have used more ginger than what's called for. I'm not sure. I wound up with about half a dozen julienned pieces that looked to my unfailingly erroneous eyes like about the size described in the recipe, and I threw them in because I just didn't want to toss them away but didn't want to stow them in the 'fridge.
- My leftover low-fat coconut milk got accidentally shoved toward the back half of the refrigerator shelf it was sitting on, so it had a bit of ice in it. I don't think that unfortunate mishap affected the flavor too much. Hell, like I'd know if it did!
- While I did use sea salt, I only used about 1 teaspoon. And it was, at least to my tastebuds, too much. Perhaps the next time I make this, I'll use only half a teaspoon. But I doubt I'd omit it since learning from the fine folks at America's Test Kitchen that salt is important for bringing out various flavors in a dish. Just another reasons why...
I Heart Christopher Kimball
Here is the curry after being reheated on the stove. I did add a teaspoon or two of coconut milk while reheating it over the lowest heat setting just to prevent it from drying out. I'm accustomed to curries with far more sauce, so I don't know if I screwed up the recipe (perhaps that tablespoon of canola oil I omitted would have magically created a cup or more of sauce) or it's just not meant to have a lot of sauce. Nevertheless, it reheated perfectly and was wonderful along with jasmine rice lightly flavored with a few star anise and a bay leaf.*The recipe actually calls for two teaspoons of English-style Madras curry powder, the recipe for which is included in the book. Since I was keeping things simple at Chez Boeckman-Walker at 7 AM on a Sunday morning, I used the curry powder acquired from the bulk spices section of Whole Foods. However, if you keen on being authentically Indian and making your own curry powder, here's the recipe.
aka Angrezi Curry Masala
2 t cumin seeds
1 t black or yellow mustard seeds
1/2 t whole cloves
1/2 t fenugreek seeds
1/2 t black peppercorn
5 to 7 dried red Thai or cayenne chiles, to taste, with stems removed
1 t ground turmeric
- Place all the ingredients except the turmeric in a spice grinder or coffee grinder [mortal and pestle, anyone? -Ed.], then grind until the texture resembles that of finely ground black pepper.
- Stir in the ground turmeric, which gives the mixture its characteristic yellow hue.
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