Saw my cooking friend Jimmy in the back track this morning, and he invited us all round for an Indian themed dinner which we were happy to accept.
We had a starter of a grilled Mango and chili-prawn kebab. Grilled mango is rather delicious, and chili prawns are always good.
For mains we had a tandoori flavoured chicken. I have always done my tandoori stuff on the GF…
http://www.whatihadfordinnertonight.com/?p=4684
…as it provides the crispyness and relative dryness required, but these were done in the oven which was OK but we all agreed they were not particularly crispy and rather fatty… The burning question with tandoori is ‘skin on, or skin off’…personally I prefer skin off.
Egg fried rice was, well egg fried rice – Gomi and I tangled on this one once, but I feel egg fried rice should have evidence of EGG in it, and so I always make a light omelette which I chop and fold into the rice -, and my contribution to the evening was a home made Lentil Dal which were lentils with a vast array of indian spices, garlic, lemon juice and tomatoes. I tend to overflavour and over-spice Indian dishes (at least by European standards) and so it was (he said modestly!)…actually rather good. I mean, Indian food has to be s..p..i..c..y, no?
Caroline slaved over a home made Kulfi ice-cream confection – milk, condensed milk, rosewater, cardomam seeds, pistachios - which was absolutely wonderful, though she admitted to a dash too much rose-water…. and her daughter Poppy, decorted the dish with strawberries and a cape gooseberry.
We all felt quite full at the end of the evening, but felt we had had a lovely meal…..but I will always hold to my long held tenet that ethnic dishes, other than the challenge of cooking them of course, is always better left to the professionals in restaurants. The effort and faff at home never quite matches the end result.
Previous dinner posts from Peter
- Another culinary highlight ... but of a different kind. - May 17th, 2013
- A saturday evening in .... - April 20th, 2013
- Fish pie followed by Peter's Tiramisu ! - March 19th, 2013
- Borough Market, London - March 2nd, 2013
- “There were Angels dining at the Ritz .... and the motor was parked in Berkeley Square” - January 26th, 2013
Good grief don’t start saying we have tangled over things – people will begin to talk!
Those Khana Khazanas and so indian chefs- they have a way of tangling over things- you never get the actual recipe without knowing the maiden name of his second cousins wife, and that’s not Sesame for you. Looks delightful!
pssst… Hey everybody, gomi and anyardsroad are having another entanglement!
For the record, I too pre-cook the eggs then add them to the fried rice.
Any time I’ve added raw eggs to the frying rice they’ve just glued everything together in big nasty lumps.
Nothing like a good entanglement! Yes, adding the eggs direct just makes it into a mush.
No it doesn’t! Not when you stir them properly with chopsticks!
Wait …. you are cooking this with proper long chopsticks not a wooden spoon right?
Yes it does….!
NO it doesn’t!
*throws anyardsroad to the floor judo style*
aaah…nothing like a good FOOD FIGHT! If I can throw in a pretzel- likely it matters if the temperature( rice cooker)and portion of rice you’ve prepared is sufficient to retain high heat enough to precipitate the eggs fast while you mix (presume warm eggs, not out of the fridge). For me that never works, as in I get a sticky mush, because… the opposite conditions of those above. gomi- you the queen!
Usually I heat up the rice and veggies and do all the mixing first – the egg is the very last thing I add.
Same as when I make Pad Thai too.
what do you mean heat up the rice and the veggies. Does your rice sit a while in the fridge?(cause THAT makes a difference)
It depends actually but now I think about it if it’s been in the fridge I often zap it a bit first in the microwave to speed things up.
Pad Thai…..is that a fake Ipad??