Celebrity Chefs' Recipe Roundup

http://www.oprah.com/menu/food/menus/20090227-tows-celebrity-chef-recipes

Some must haves

In your kitchen storage, do you have the following items at all times?

Must haves

1. green onions
   
2. cilantro / coriander leaves
   
3. Cooking spray
   
4. Vinegar (both for cleaning and cooking)
   
5. Lime
   
6. Salt
   
7. pepper
   
8. Soya sauce
   
9. Oyster sause
   
10. Tomato sauce
    
11. Tomato Purie
    
12. Tomatoes
    
13. onions
    

 Should haves

1. Celery
   
2. potatoes
   
3. ghee
   
4. yogurt
   
5. Condensed milk
   
6. Coconut milk
   

This list will grow!

The Cooking Dictionary

Different Names for the same thing

1. Ladies' Fingers - Okra
2. Brinjals - Egg Plant
3. Leeks -
4. Spring onions - green onions
5. cilantro - coriander leaves
6. Rampa - screwpine

For more information on the food dictionary see http://www.epicurious.com/tools/fooddictionary/

Cooking Basmathi rice

There is no one right method of cooking your rice right. But here's what works for me

(when I started off we almost always ate milk rice and I was determined to master the art withour a rice cooker)

1. Soak the rice in water for 20 mins to one hour (The longer the better)

2. Bring water to boil

3. Add the soaked rice

4. Add Salt to taste

5. Test rice for soft texture

6. When the rice is cooked enough use a large strainer to drain off the extra water

7. Simmer the rice for a few minutes before serving hot.

8. For special ocasions add butter or ghee and for aroma and colour screw pine (rampa) and turmeric helps!

vIDEO KITCHEN TIPS

http://www.videojug.com/film/kitchen-tips-3sa

Food Floods

I know many people – especially like us living in foreign countries with little or no help – tend to cook up loads of food and store it in the freezer for future use. I never got around doing it. Any cooked matter more than two days old needs to be used up quickly or taken care of in other ways. Fresh food tastes better, is healthier and much more appealing but of course it takes work. So here’s a tip to ease out work for the lazy cooks like me.

Planning your cooking in advance not only saves money but also eases out your stress but who wants to go to bed thinking of what to cook in the morning?

The 7 Day rotation method for rice and curry

DAY 1: Cook one meat curry for two days. Decide how much you need and cook right away for not more than 2 meals.  When the meal is done refrigerate what is left over. (Do not freeze).

DAY 2: The next day you could cook up a vegetable curry for two days. Cook up extra rice. Store the leftovers in the fridge again.  The extra meat curry, a vegetable and rice should make a good meal. If time permits cook up some lentils always keep extra. Its not worth burning up your entire cooker to cook a small quantity.

Watch some 30 minute meals. Change the channel during the commercial and forget all about going back to it ;)

DAY 3: On the 3^rd day take out the extra rice from the fridge. Prepare a quick egg fried rice with green onions, carrots and anything colourful and interesting. The extra vegetable curry can be added into it. (I’ve tried it with ladies’ fingers and it tastes great) Fry some marinated shrimp to add to the colour and flavour. No one will guess that it has some of yesterday’s food and it gets prepared in no time!

DAY 4:  Time to start rotating. Cook a meat or fish curry for two days. Pull out some dhal curry if you have already prepared. Fry some papadams. Open up a bottle of chutney and cook rice afresh. “Tada” and you have a meal although you just had to cook up only one thing. Now that’s not too much is it?

DAY 5: Relax and get the husband to put his culinary skill into action. Remember to appreciate and thank him for the wonderful meal even if it was just cheese omelets and garlic toast. You need the break and he will be more than willing to repeat it!

DAY 6: Make biriyani (Buy the shan mix it’s the easiest thing in the world and awfully tasty too). Be sure to save the left overs for Biriyani tastes better as it gets older.

DAY 7: Order a large pizza (Don’t forget the soda! Keep it caffeine free if possible) Do your grocery shopping. Repeat DAY 1 with a touch of your own creativity and variation. 

Garlic it!

Garlic is an amazing ingredient which by itself is stinky and awful in taste. However, when added to curries it brings out aroma and flavour which is well missed in its absence. Garlic is also said to have various medical benefits. People do boil it up and drink the water it was boiled in. To me that's an eek thought! Bad breath is one of the by products which will ruin your appetite for garlic. 

 

For whatever it's worth here are some tips to help Garlic spice up your life

1. Garlic can be left either in or outside the refrigerator. Either way it has an expiration date (roughly about two weeks from the date of purchase)
2. if you are refrigerating it, make sure it is in a covered container by it self. Like onions they have a tendency to share their aroma with neighbouring food.
3. don’t waste time peeling out the garlic pods. Use a meet tenderizer (looks like a wooden hammer) to pound it and the peels will come off easily
4. Don’t bother chopping: smash up a few garlic with ginger for extra flavour for your curry
5. store the extra in a bottle for another time
6. If it seems like too much work just buy a bottle of ginger-garlic paste and keep it refrigerated
7. Mix garlic powder with butter. Make a spread on bread and toast or bake for some crunchy garlic toast.
8. If its too much work just buy frozen garlic toast and bake when necessary
9. Add garlic powder to cheese toast if you like to make it a little interesting
10. Never cook the lentil dhal without garlic (I don’t know why; my mom said so)
11. Enjoy garlic spread with crackers (I never tried that)

having garlic and ginger powder around the kitchen is handy when you run out of fresh garlic or ginger!

Cookaphobia!

Me creating a cook or food blog is completely bizarre cos I happen to be one of those rare individuals that do not fancy the preparation or consumption of food. I feel that we humans waste far too much time and energy for something which should be a source of energy to keep life going on in a body which is healthy enough to carry it on.

Having said that, I try to find easier ways to make cooking with my toddler easier and faster because although I would love to comepletely ignore it I have a husband who I feel the fastest way to his heart would be through his stomach. He absolutely adores food, is a slave to taste and can eat very large quantities of it.

So this space is going to be a place where I am going to be experimenting my writing on a topic that I very much dislike - "Food" - my greatest challenge. If I come across something like a cooking methodology which is worth remembering I will jot it down here. I hope you enjoy it (both the blog and your food). Feel free to share and comment for knowledge in a cage is as good as knowledge in a grave! (or whatever that means to you…!)