Lamb Rogan Josh (Red Lamb Stew)

I've cooked at Eduardo's flat a few times, but recently he got a new kitchen fitted, and finally has a half decent gas stove and had been trying to get me to come around and cook for a while. As it was a new-ish kitchen, I couldn't think of anything better than letting it have that cooked-in smell of doing a good curry.

The last time I cooked at Ed's place, his girlfriend reckoned she had a reaction to the coconut milk in the Thai curry I cooked, so I decided that this time I would cook an Indian using yoghurt instead. I had wanted to cook something with Lamb, and after flicking through the Madhur Jaffery book, I settled on doing a Lamb Rogan Josh, as it seemed nice and simple, and I wouldn't have to carry too many ingredients with me (knowing that Ed was unlikely to have most of the necessary spices for even the simplest curry). Also, Lamb Rogan Josh is one of those dishes that I would regularly order in a restaurant, so I really wanted to have a go at doing it myself.

To be honest, I think I made it a little hot, so the recipe I'm writing is how I would do it if I made it the same again. This was partly because I was cooking less due to Katia being ill and not wanting to eat any, and so I didn't buy as much Lamb as I would have done if everyone was hungry. Also, it really could have done with a vegetable dish to go with it, but I forgot that I had considerably better cooking facilities, so concentrated on the main dish and forget to get together a vegetable dish to go with it. Due to the hour long simmering time, there is plenty of time to get something else together while waiting for the lamb to become tender.

Recipe for Lamb Rogan Josh (serves 2-3)

• 3 tablespoons Vegetable Oil
• 8 Cloves of Garlic
• 5cm Piece of Ginger (roughly chopped)
• 500g Lamb Shoulder Cubes
• 2 Bay Leaves
• 5cm Cinnamon Stick
• 10 Peppercorns
• 10 Cloves
• 8 Green Cardamoms (Broken)
• 2 Onions (finely chopped)
• 1 Teaspoon Ground Coriander
• 2 Teaspoons Ground Cumin
• 3 Teaspoons Paprika
• Half Teaspoon Cayenne Pepper
• 1 Teaspoon Salt
• 5 Tablespoons Natural Yoghurt
• 200ml Water
• Half Teaspoon Garam Masala

Put the Garlic, Ginger and a few tablespoons of water into a blender, and blend to a smooth paste. Heat the oil in a heavy bottom pan and then lightly brown the Lamb in batches, and remove to a bowl.

Drop in the Bay Leaves, Cinnamon Stick, Cardamom Pods, Peppercorns and Cloves into the pan and stir for about 30 seconds, then add the Onion and fry until lightly browned for about 5 minutes. Add the Garlic and Ginger Paste and stir and fry for about 30 seconds before adding the Ground Coriander, Cumin, Paprika, Cayenne Pepper and Salt. Stir these in well. The mixture will probably be fairly dry at this point, but then add the Lamb and juices back into the pan, and it should start to moisten up again.

Next start adding the Yoghurt, a tablespoon at a time, stirring it into the mixture and ensure that it's fully combined before adding the next tablespoon. Cook for a further 4 minutes, then add in the water, stir and bring to the boil, then reduce the meat to a simmer. Cover and simmer for an hour, or until the Lamb is tender, and the sauce has reduced to a nice Gravy. Finally stir in the Garam Masala.

Serve with Rice and ideally a nice vegetable dish.

Beef Bourguignon

I remember this dish being a regular instalment on the Tower Restaurant menu at South Bank University in the days when I used to type up menus for the day, but it was never anything I had thought of making myself until reading Pille's post at Nami-Nami. Her version looked really tasty, so I decided I just had to have a go myself. The only problem was that I mentioned this to my friends, Natalia and Gosia, making the further mistake of saying I'd cook it for them one day, and now, about a year later, we finally made the date, and I have finally made it.

The biggest obstacle to making this in the past is that most recipes I've seen require preparing the Beef in the marinade the night before, so if there is any chance that diners won't appear the next day, one may be lumbered with a large amount of food which will never be eaten. Most stews I make require a good few hours to cook, but with Bourguignon, I figured the overnight marinating was something which really had to be done.

There seems to be a couple of different camps when it comes to making Beef Bourguignon. Some cook the stew the night before, then store overnight and reheat before serving. Others seem to go for either a cold or cook marinade, leave overnight, then, cook for 3 or 4 hours the next day. Gordon Ramsay even has a same day recipe, but that feels like cheating to me. Personally, I went for the cook marinade method, although I couldn't fit it in the fridge, so I just left it near the window overnight.

Recipe for Beef Bourguignon (serves 6)

• 1kg Braising Steak, cut into nice chunks
• 1 large Onion, roughly chopped
• 2 ribs of Celery, roughly chopped
• 2 large Carrots, roughly chopped
• 1 bottle of Red Wine (preferably Burgundy)
• A few sprigs of Fresh Thyme
• A bunch of Fresh Flat-Leaf Parsley
• 5 Bay Leaves
• A bulb of Garlic, cut in half across the cloves
• 25g Butter
• 250g Smoked Bacon Lardons
• 400g Shallots, peeled
• 2 tablespoons Olive Oil
• 400g Chantaney Carrots
• 1 tablespoon Dijon Mustard
• 1 tablespoon Plain Flour
• Half pint of Beef Stock
• Salt and Black Pepper

First fry the Onion, Celery and Carrot together in a little oil for about 2-3 minutes. Then add the Wine, Thyme, Bay Leaves, Parsley and Garlic, remove from the heat, drop in the Beef, cover and keep in a cool place overnight.

The following day, drain the vegetables and Beef, reserving the marinade. Put the vegetables into a large casserole dish, and pat the Beef dry using kitchen roll. In another pan, add butter and fry the Bacon until golden, adding the shallots about halfway through. Remove from the pan and add to the Casserole. Next, add a little oil and brown the pieces of Beef in a couple of batches in the pan. Remove and add to the Casserole. Now add a little of the reserve marinade to the pan to de-glaze it, followed by the Mustard and Flour, stirring continuously to ensure there are no lumps as you add the remaining marinade and beef stock. Pour, this into the casserole, cover, and cook in a preheated 160 degree Celsius oven for about 4 hours.

If you want the gravy a little thicker, you can mix more flour with a little of the existing gravy, then add back into the casserole an hour before the end of the cooking time.

Garnish with Freshly Chopped Flat Parsley and serve with Potatoes, Rice or French Bread. In my case, Mash Potato with Chopped Spring Onions was requested, so that was what I cooked.

Beef Kerala, or maybe just Beef Curry Stew

I had various plans for cooking this weekend, but in the end, I decided I wanted something nice and warming, and with a bit of red meat for a change. Laura was going to come for dinner and didn't want to eat Lamb, so Beef it was. I really liked the Chicken Kerala recipe I made a few weeks ago, so decided to hunt the web for some ideas for a Beef equivalent.

I found a number of slightly different recipes, but which tended to follow the same theme, with one of the common differences between the Beef and Chicken variety being the addition of Black Mustard Seeds and Green Cardamom Pods. Also, none of them seemed to have as much in the way of vegetables, so I decided to add a bit of what I had, in this case, some Fresh Peas, a bit of Cauliflower, Carrots and Potatoes. This is where it tended towards a stew I think. This and the fact that after normal cooking time had completed, and after a little taste, I decided that the beef wasn't anything like as tender as I like it, so I decided to keep slow cooking it in the oven for a couple more hours which worked great.

The resulting dish was definitely a cross between a curry and one of my more traditional stews, but with a very different flavour. Still, it was missing something on the flavour front, but I'm just not sure what, so I will have to have a little of the leftovers later to try and figure it out. The taste was fine, but just something missing.

Recipe for Beef Kerala (Serves 6)

• 900g Casserole Steak (cubed)
• 8 cloves of Garlic (minced)
• 2" piece of Fresh Ginger (grated/minced)
• Half teaspoon of Salt
• Half teaspoon of Black Pepper
• 2 tablespoons of Vegetable Oil
• 4 Green Cardamom Pods (crushed)
• 1 teaspoon Black Mustard Seeds
• 5-6 Curry Leaves
• 3 Green Chillies (sliced)
• 3 Red Onions (sliced)
• 1 teaspoon of Ground Coriander
• 1 teaspoon of Ground Cumin
• 1 teaspoon of Chilli Powder
• Half teaspoon of Ground Turmeric
• 4 Tomatoes (chopped)
• 4 Potatoes (cubed)
• Half Head of Cauliflower (cut into small florets)
• 3 Carrots (julienned)
• 1 Cup Fresh Peas
• 400g Can of Coconut Milk
• 1 Teaspoon Garam Masala

First marinate the Beef in the Ginger, Garlic, Salt and Pepper for about an hour.

Heat up the oil in a heavy pan and add the Cardamom and Mustard Seeds. When they start popping, add in the Curry Leaves, stir for a minute, then the Chilli, stir for a minute, then the Onion and continue to cook until going golden. Put the Coriander, Cumin, Chilli and Turmeric into a small bowl and mix with some hot water to make a thin paste, then add this to the pan and stir well.

Next, add the Beef and continue to stir for about 10 minutes until the beef is browned all over, then throw in the tomatoes and continue to cook for a few minutes. At this point, I added the rest of the vegetables and a cup of hot water, covered, and allowed to cook for about 40 minutes at a simmer. Next add the Coconut Milk and Garam Masala. Stir in and simmer for a further 5 minutes without letting it boil.

At this point, most of the recipes said to serve it, but after finding a fairly tough piece of beef at the top, I decided to put it into a 150 degree Celsius cover for the next few hours and see how it came out. For me, this worked well, and the resulting curry/stew was definitely one to keep you warm in winter, plus I could imagine up a number of variations. I'm pretty sure none of the other recipes added much in the way of vegetables other than the Onion and Chilli, but the tomatoes I added as the Chicken version I'd made had used them, and as I wasn't doing any other vegetable side dishes to go with it, I felt it necessary to add some other vegetables in there.

Definitely a recipe I'm going to make again in future, even if only to see if I can figure out what the missing flavour was, if indeed there was any. I could just have been my imagination.

Chicken Kerala

I have been craving curry recently. It has been a while since I made a curry of any description, although I have made few spicy soups. When searching around for recipes, I found this one on the BBC website by Manju Malhi which caught my attention, mainly because I had pretty much all the ingredients already to hand, and also because it looked particularly quick and easy to make.

This recipe tasted great, and was extremely easy to do. I tend to do all the preparations before I start cooking, that way I can just empty the various bowls of ingredients in, TV-style, as I'm going along. It means I have more bowls to wash up, but it helps me to not forget any ingredients and make sure things go into the pot when they're supposed to.

Recipe for Chicken Kerala (Serves 3-4)

• 4 tablespoons Groundnut Oil
• 1 Onion, sliced
• 3 Green Chillies, finely chopped, seeds and all
• 2" Root Ginger, finely grated
• 2 cloves of Garlic
• ¼ teaspoon Hot Chilli Powder
• 1 teaspoon Ground Coriander
• ½ teaspoon Ground Turmeric
• ½ teaspoon Salt
• 400g Skinless Chicken Breasts, cut into bite sized pieces
• 2 medium Tomatoes, roughly chopped
• 3-4 Potatos, cut into 3cm cubes
• 330ml Coconut Milk
• pinch of Garam Masala

Heat up 3 tablespoons of the oil in a heavy based pan and saute the Onion and Chilli for a few minutes. Then add the Ginger, Garlic, Chilli Powder, Coriander, Turmeric and Salt and stir into the Onions and once all covered, add the Chicken and fry gently for about 8-10 minutes. If the pan gets too dry and stuff starts to stick to the bottom, add a dash of water. Next add the Tomato and Potato and stir in for another couple of minutes before adding about a third of the Coconut Nut along with about 200ml of boiling water. Leave to simmer for about 6 minutes, then add the remaining Coconut Milk and further simmer for about 10 minutes until the potato and chicken are cooked. Then sprinkle of the pinch of Garam Masala.

I served this with Basmati Rice and garnished with some, maybe, overly browned shallots and curry leaves, however, for the photo, I just stuck a couple of Coriander leaves on top, because the shots with the onion just didn't look as nice.

Beef and Guinness Stew

Another poker night, and I'm preparing the food for the occasion. Once again, I'm cooking Beef and Guinness Stew, partly because I want to perfect my recipe, plus the fact that I haven't eaten it since the last poker night, and it always goes down well. Only this time, instead of Garlic Bread (there wasn't any good bread when I was at the supermarket or at the mini-market I went to), I'm doing some hummus and guacamole with bread sticks, celery and carrot.

I realised that I hadn't made any notes about my last stew, so the recipe I was improving on I had to try and remember. The main difference was that I use braising steak instead of the casserole steak which I used last time as the pieces in the various packets didn't look very appetising, so I decided to cut the cubes out myself.

Recipe (serves 4-6)

• 900g (2 lbs) Braising Steak (cut into 2-4cm cubes)
• 3 tablespoons Olive Oil
  
• 2 tablespoons flour
• Salt and Pepper
• Pinch of Cayenne Pepper
• 1 large Onion (roughly chopped)
• 1 clove of Garlic (finely sliced)
• 2 ribs of Celery (chopped)
• 12-15 Shallots (cut in half)
• 600-700g (1.5 lbs) Baby Chantenay Carrots (just with the heads removed)
• 600-700g (1.5 lbs) Charlotte Potatoes (cut in pieces about the size of the carrots)
• 1 pint Beef Stock
• 1 pint Guinness (or similar Stout)
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire Sauce
• 1 tablespoon Concentrated Tomato Puree
  
• 1 tablespoon Dijon Mustard
  
• 2 teaspoons Dried Thyme
• 2 tablespoons Fresh Parsley (chopped fine)

Mix the flour, salt, pepper and cayenne in a bowl, then coat the beef cubes in about a tablespoon of Olive Oil and toss all the pieces in the seasoned flour.

Heat up the rest of the olive oil and then seal the seasoned beef in a heavy pan, cooking until lightly browned (about 4-5 minutes) and transfer the beef to a decent sized, heavy cooking pot. The in the same pan the beef was cooked in, add the onion, celery and garlic and cook until the onion is beginning to brown, then transfer this into the same large pot with the beef. Add the carrots, potato and shallots to the beef and mix around.

In the pan everything has been cooked in so far, add the Dijon Mustard and gradually pour in the Guinness, stirring continuously to de-glaze the pan and blend in the mustard. Then add the stock and pour over the beef and vegetables in the big pot. Mix in the Tomato Puree, Thyme, Parsley and some more Black Pepper and add the bay leaves. Cover and cook in a 170 degree celsius oven for at least 2.5 hours, however, you should check the seasoning half way through so that you can add a little more if necessary. Also, if the gravy isn't thick enough for your liking, mix some flour with water and add to the mixture during cooking.

Due to the usual lateness of some of the attendees, this stew was left in the oven for a good 4 hours, and all the better for it I reckon. The beef was extremely tender, with much nicer pieces than the pre-cut stuff. Preparing it yourself means you can ensure that all the pieces are nice.

Although I was expecting it to fill 5 people, 6 people turned up, a few people were still hungry (even after seconds) afterwards and more hummus was prepared. Maybe if you're cooking it for 6 hungry people, you should consider adding more beef and carrots, leaving out the potatoes, and cooking some separately, although I like having the potatoes in there. Thing is, would need a big pan to do that, and I'm not sure it would fit in my current combination oven.

Poker Night with Stew and Garlic Bread

I was hosting our infrequent poker night this evening, and rather than get pizza delivered like last time, we thought that we'd get a larger overall winners pot if I cooked and we got a load of beers from the supermarket. As one of the guys didn't turn up, this was actually not a bad idea as the pot was still a nice one to win, plus there was no shortage of food, beer and wine.

Ejaz requested that I do the Beef and Guinness Stew again, so I cooked that, plus got a couple of baguettes so that I could make some garlic bread.

The stew was very successful, although I think I might have put more cayenne pepper in the meat seasoning this time, as it was a quite a bit more spicy. Maybe too much. The garlic bread was also good, although the fact that Ejaz donated a couple of new knives (including a much needed bread knife) to my kitchen equipment cause, was a deciding factor as it meant I could actually cut the bread myself, rather than buying the pre-done stuff.

Beef and Guinness Stew

It's been cold recently, so more comfort food required, plus the fact that I hadn't made stew in years. Used 900g of lean casserole beef (seasoned in flour, black pepper, salt and cayenne pepper), lots of baby chantenay carrots, a couple onions, a load of shallots, a few ribs of celery, and pint or so of stock and a bottle of Guinness. Left to cook for 3 hours with some thyme and bay leaves, then just served as it was, but with a little bread to wipe up the gravy.

The amount I cooked would probably suite about 5 or 6 people (depending on the people). Might have been nice to have some dumplings too, but not really necessary with all the potato and carrot.

Thing is, there were only 2 of us, but I'm sure it will taste even better the next day, although I've already got a trade arranged for some lasagne which was made elsewhere tonight (although by the sounds of it, I'll be fishing the mushrooms out, so not the best trade I've done).

If I were making it again, I doubt there is much I would do differently. Except perhaps use a bit of bacon as well, as one recipe suggested. I would probably take the photo with the stew in a nicer plate or bowl, and slightly better presented. But other than that, it was pretty good as it was. It's what it tastes like that really matters, not whether someone has sloshed the gravy around on the way from serving to table.

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