Sali Murghi (Chicken and Apricot Curry with Matchstick Potatoes)

Happy New Year!

I have no good excuses for not posting. I was lazy at the end of November, in the US for most of December, and then ate nothing but BBQ and leftover Christmas ham during the holiday break. Yesterday saw the seventh-hottest day ever recorded in Perth, so all I could face was the usual Thai beef salad, thrown together from whatever salad vegetables I had, plus half a bag of fresh beansprouts and a big bunch of mint, for extra cooling effect. Nice to use a post-BBQ extra T-bone steak as well; never have I had such deliciously chilled and soft beef.

Anyway! Last year, just before I left for the States, a surprise present arrived from a friend in the UK: Rick Stein's India, a really fantastic compilation of Indian recipes from all over the subcontinent. On Sunday I decided to try out one of the more challenging looking recipes, sali murghi, or chicken and apricot curry with potato straws. The ingredients list is moderately long, but of course the spices are essential. We found that they combined beautifully with the apricots and other vegetables to form a thick and sweet-sour sauce that complemented the chicken and potatoes perfectly. From a single chicken, there was easily enough for six people, or for us, two dinners and two lunches. (We had the second dinner with perfect pilaf rice and quick-friend coconut vegetables.)

Ingredients
For the matchstick potatoes (sali):

• 250g of Chat (or other chipping/new) potatoes, julienned and soaked in cold water for at least 15 minutes
• a deep fryer or heavy-based pan full of vegetable oil for deep frying
• salt

For the curry:

• vegetable oil
• 8 black peppercorns
• 6 cloves
• 3 green cardamom pods, lightly bruised with a rolling pin
• 2 dried chillies
• 4cm piece of cinnamon stick
• 1 medium onion, finely chopped
• 100g tomatoes (about 1 large, or 2 small), finely chopped
• 1 tsp salt
• a thumb of ginger, finely grated
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1.5 tsp ground cumin
• 1.5 tsp ground coriander
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1 chicken, jointed into 8 pieces (get the butcher to do it!)
• 2 tsp jaggery, palm sugar, or brown sugar
• 150g dred apricots
• 3 tbsp white wine vinegar
• handful of fresh coriander, leaves torn off

Bruise the whole spices in a mortar and pestle and fry in a large casserole / Le Creuset for a minute until fragrant. Add the onion, turn the heat down, and fry for 10 min until softened and golden. Stir in the tomatoes, salt, ginger, garlic, cumin, coriander and turmeric, and cook for a couple of minutes. Add the chicken pieces to the pan and turn in the spce mixture, then add the sugar, apricots and vinegar.

(At this point, Stein suggests adding enough water to cover; if you do this, you will likely need to remove the cooked chicken and then vigorously boil down/reduce the sauce for ~10 minutes at the end, unless perhaps you remove the lid, but then the chicken may cook unevenly. I suggest instead adding 200ml of water, covering, and turning over the chicken pieces a few times until they are cooked, and leaving the lid off for the last 15 minutes of cook time.)

Bring to the boil, lower the heat, cover the pan and simmer for 30-40 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through and the sauce is reduced. Meanwhile, drain the potatoes, dry in a colander, and deep-fry at 180C for 2-3 minutes per batch until crisp and golden. Drain on kitchen paper and season with salt, then use to top to the finished curry, along with the coriander leaves.

Wagamama Week: Pumpkin Curry

I am a big fan of pumpkin curry; the sweet, earthy, melting flesh works amazing well with warming spices, and somehow becomes even more flavoursome when cooked nearly to destruction, unlike, say, the potato. I have two pumpkin curries I commonly cook, along with 101 other pumpkin-related recipes. So I was certainly willing to road-test the Wagamama version, which they claim was a one-off special that became so popular, it was added to the main menu.

Ingredients (Quantities in brackets are my revised suggestions):

• 100g brown rice
• 1 clove of garlic
• 1/2" piece of ginger root
• 1/2" piece of galangal root
• 2 lemongrass sticks
• 300ml hot water
• 1/4 tsp salt (1 1/2 tsp)
• 1 tsp sugar (3 tsp)
• 100g canned coconut milk (140g)
• 1 small pumpkin (1/5th of a Japanese pumpkin - about 400g)
• 2 courgettes (1)
• 6 button mushrooms (12 or 0)
• 4 baby sweetcorn
• handful of sugarsnap peas
• 4 x 1" cubes of tofu (don't bother)
• 2 handfuls of baby spinach (don't bother)
• handful of chopped coriander

Set the brown rice cooking according to its packet instructions.

Peel and grate or finely dice the garlic, ginger, galangal and lemongrass, or whiz in a little blender until a fine paste (you'll probably have to double or triple the quantity to get enough friction for a blender to work). Fry in a good glug of vegetable oil over a moderate heat for 6-8 minutes, stirring until softened and fragrant but not coloured. Add the hot water, bring to the boil, then add the salt and sugar; simmer for 20 minutes until reduced by half (I had to cover mine, as it reduced much more quickly than that.)

Meanwhile, peel and deseed the pumpkin, and cut into bite-size chunks. Scoop the seeds out of the middle of the courgette and cut into bite-size chunks. Halve the mushrooms and sweet corn. Stir fry the vegetables for 2 minutes -- I let mine rest occasionally so they picked up a bit of colour. Stir the coconut milk into the reduced sauce and then pour over the vegetables, add the tofu if using, then simmer for 15-20 minutes, or until the pumpkin is tender. Serve the curry with the drained rice, sprinkled with the chopped coriander.

Verdict:
Not bad. Nowhere near as good as either of the two curries I already know, but ok. The quantities they suggested were distressingly large for two people; I couldn't help but scale back the quantity of pumpkin (from a whole one to 1/5th of one!) and we still had enough left over for lunch the next day. The tofu didn't stand up to the treatment it was given; I definitely prefer mine fried to give it some bounce and crunch. I don't know what the spinach was for... looking pretty in their photo? And having all of those different vegetables in there made the curry lack focus; it was a bit too much of a jumble. I'd say either up the mushrooms, or take them out altogether. The sauce was extremely under-seasoned. I would add half a red chilli if you like a bit of spice, and the sugar and salt quantities given were insufficient by a factor of 2-3. I'm glad I used the full tin of coconut milk; their suggested quantity wasn't coconut-y enough. It also felt weird to eat a curry that had no spices in it.

Alu Gobi Bhaji (Spicy Fried Potato and Cauliflower)

Another one adapted from my Giant Asian Cookbook: a quick and simple curry that we served with delicious spinach and yoghurt.

Ingredients

• 2 tbsp of ghee or oil
• 1 tsp black mustard seeds
• 1/2 tsp asfoetida
• 1/2 tsp chilli flakes (optional)
• 1 large garlic clove, crushed
• a thumb of fresh ginger, finely grated or chopped
• 1/2 tsp ground turmeric
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 small head cauliflower
• 2 potatoes
• 1/2 tsp garam masala
• fresh coriander, to garnish

Fry the mustard seeds in the oil over a low heat until they start to pop. Add the asfoetida, chilli (if using), garlic and ginger and stir-fry until golden. Break the cauliflower into florets and dice the potato - it can help to leave the cauliflower a bit large and make the potato quite small, to even out the cooking time. Add the turmeric, salt, cauliflower, potato and 60ml of water and cook for 10-15 minutes, or until the potato and cauliflower are tender. Sprinkle with garam masala, top with coriander leaves and serve.

Butter Chicken

When I visited India, we had one particularly amazing meal out at a rather fancy restaurant, where the meals cost a whole $10! A friend of mine ordered this and I remembered that it's often cited as the measure of an Indian restaurant; if the butter chicken is good, then everything else is probably good too. His was excellent. We've had a couple of chicken breasts in the freezer for a while and I've been intending to do 'something Indian' to them. Then at the Good Food and Wine show I picked up a really nice 'butter chicken' spice mix and all the pieces fell into place. I don't normally use spice mixes but I tried a bit with some bread and olive oil and it tasted so much like the real thing from India that I couldn't resist :)

I used this taste.com.au recipe for a starting point, although we dropped the amount of yoghurt since I was worried cooking it would make it separate, and we found the overall result bit too tomatoey, so this recipe has a reduced amount of puree. We couldn't bring ourselves to pour in the amount of cream they said to use, but feel free if you weren't using those arteries anyway! We served it with some plain rice and spicy & sour green beans: perfect counterpoint.

Ingredients:

• two large chicken breasts
• 2 tsbp yoghurt
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp turmeric, 2 tsp garam masala, 1/2 tsp chilli flakes, 1 tsp ground cumin, 1 tsp ground cardamom, 1 tsp ground cinnamon, 2 tsp of paprika (or 4 tbsp of butter chicken spice mix!)
• 2 tsp grated fresh ginger
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 125g cashews, roasted
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 1 Indian bay leaf or normal bay leaf
• 200g can tomato puree
• 150ml chicken stock
• 125ml double cream (double the quantity for extra richness)
• fresh coriander, to garnish

Slice the chicken breasts into bite-size pieces. Put in a bowl and toss with the yoghurt, lemon juice, spices, ginger and garlic; marinade overnight, or for a couple of hours if possible.

Blitz half of the cashews in a blender until well-ground. Gently fry the onion in a little oil, then add the chicken and toss about until the spices are fragrant. Tip in the ground cashews, tomato puree, bay leaf and stock, and simmer for fifteen minutes, until the chicken is cooked. Stir in the cream and warm through; serve over rice, topped with a handful of coriander leaves and the remaining toasted cashews.

Laksa Lemak

This is a slightly vegetable-fortified version of a very seafood-heavy Singaporean soup from my humungous Asian cooking compendium. The whole house now smells of prawns but it was worth it :)

Ingredients:

• 10 raw prawns (or more if you're hungry)
• a large handful of rice vermicelli
• 1 tsp dried shrimp paste (don't inhale, lol)
• 1 large onion, peeled and cut into big pieces
• 1 tsp galangal powder
• 6 candlenuts
• 1 stem lemongrass
• 1 tsp ground turmeric
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• a 200g chunk of pumpkin, cut into bite-sized pieces
• 200ml of coconut milk (or thereabouts)
• a large handful of frozen peas
• one lime
• fried tofu, cooked crab or fish cakes (add if you're very hungry)
• a quarter of a cucumber
• a small bag of beansprouts

Peel and devein the prawns; reserve the flesh in the fridge and put the heads and shells in a stockpot. Cover with at least 300ml of boiling water and boil for 30 minutes, to produce a rich prawn stock. Drain and discard the heads and shells. Soak the rice vermicelli in hot water for 10 minutes, then drain.

In a food processor, blend the shrimp paste, onion, galangal powder, candlenuts and lemongrass, then fry for 7-8 minutes, turning frequently, until the mixture has darkened and reduced a little. Add the prawn stock and simmer for twenty minutes, then add the pumpkin and cook for a further five -- or until the pumpkin is almost done. Stir in the coconut milk, frozen peas, cooked vermicelli and add the raw prawns. Bring up to a simmer and cook for a few minutes; turn off the heat as soon as the prawns are cooked. Juice in half of the lime, and cut the other half into wedges.

Slice the cucumber thinly and add to the bean sprouts in a separate bowl; add the lime wedges to decorate. Serve the soup in deep bowls, topped with the extra protein if you're very hungry. Take handfuls of salad and top the soup, add a splash of lime juice and soy sauce and eat the salad with the soup. Yum!

Moglai Biriani

I've been in Tasmania for most of the last week, hence the lack of updates. Tazzie cuisine is excellent, featuring lots of fresh seafood and local produce. It was also wonderful to see so many apple varieties again - shame I couldn't take any back to WA, what with the quarantine.

Today we went into Perth to catch up on some bits and pieces of shopping we hadn't got round to in ages. One important task was to use a very generous book voucher we had received for the wedding from a friend. As you may have seen me complaining, I really could do with a few new cookbooks for inspiration! I found a rather hefty and inspiring tome - The Complete Asian Cookbook, which tours every country east of Turkey and north of Australia. I need to buy a few things from the market next weekend, but I did manage to put together a pretty amazing moglai biriani tonight, even with half the ingredients missing. What follows is what I actually made, but I thoroughly recommend picking up the cookbook yourself and trying the full, correct recipe.

Complete with Tasmanian Devil oven glove purchased
from Hobart's excellent Salamanca market!

Ingredients:
For the lamb:

• 1 medium onion
• 1 garlic clove
• 300g of lamb chunks
• 1/2 tsp crushed black onion seed
• 1 tsp powdered cumin
• 1/2tsp dried chilli
• a large handful of fresh mint leaves
• one tomato, roughly chopped
• juice of half a lemon

For the pilau:

• 1 medium onion
• 1 garlic clove
• 1/2 tsp coriander seeds
• 1/2 tsp cumin seeds
• 1/2 tsp black peppercorns
• 1/2 tsp powdered cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 100g basmati rice
• 3 bay leaves
• a chicken stock cube
• a handful of sultanas

For the topping:

• a handful of almonds
• half a cup of frozen peas
• a sprig of fresh coriander leaf

Finely chop the two onions and fry gently for five minutes, until golden. Crush in the garlic, stir for a further minute, then split between two pans, preferably a stainless steel suitable for cooking rice, and a heavy oven-proof casserole pot, like a small Le Creuset. To the latter, add the lamb chunks, onion seed, cumin, chilli, mint leaves, tomato and lemon juice; cover and simmer for an hour, checking occasionally and adding water if you find it sticking.

Meanwhile, toast the coriander seeds, cumin seeds, peppercorns and remove to a mortar and pestle once fragrant, then crush finely. Stir in the cinnamon and nutmeg, then add all of the spices to the onion and garlic in the stainless steel pan, along with the rice. Fry for a minute, then add the bay leaves, stock cube and sultanas, and twice as much boiling water as rice. Simmer for 20 minutes, checking occasionally and adding more water if you find it sticking - do not stir.

Ten minutes before the lamb is done, start the oven preheating to 160C. When the lamb is cooked and the sauce around it has thickened and become fairly dry, remove it from the casserole, and replace with half of the rice. Put the lamb back on top of the rice, then cover with the remaining half of the rice. Cover the casserole pot and place in the oven for 25-30 minutes.

Five minutes before the end, lay the almonds out on a baking tray and toast in the oven; keep an eye out so they don't burn. Remove and roughly chop. Heat the peas in boiling water in a microwave, then drain. Remove the biriani from the oven and serve, topped with the almonds, peas and coriander leaf.

Red Lentil and Sweet Potato Dhal

I really thought I had recorded this on here before, but I'm amazed to find that I've overlooked it! This is my fast dhal recipe - great as just a lunchtime snack with a bit of rice or bread, or a delicious protein component to any curry-type meal. The fried onion topping can be neglected if you're in a hurry, or replaced with baghar if you're feeling really authentic. I think I came up with this recipe independently, but it closely resembles Nigella Lawson's recipe. Convergent evolution or forgetful emulation? Either way it's delicious :) Like the aubergine curry I served it with, this serves four.

Ingredients:

• one large red sweet potato
• 1 thumb fresh ginger, finely grated
• 2 tsp ground cumin
• 2 tsp ground coriander
• 2 tsp ground turmeric
• a pinch of chilli flakes
• 250g red lentils
• 300ml hot water
• a small white onion, or half a large white onion

Peel the sweet potato and cut into 1cm dice. Fry in a little vegetable oil with the ginger for five minutes, stirring occasionally, to get a bit of caramelisation. Add the spices and lentils, and fry for a further minute. Pour in the hot water, cover and simmer for half an hour, until the lentils are cooked and the sweet potato has collapsed. You may need to stir and top up the water every so often; the end result should be deliciously thick and spoonable, rather than runny. Season with salt after the lentils are cooked - about 1tsp will be needed.

Meanwhile, peel the onion and finely slice into half-moons. Fry gently in a little vegetable oil for 10-15 minutes, stirring every few minutes, until completely caramelised and just beginning to blacken.

Stir the dhal briskly with a large wooden spoon, or mash roughly with a potato masher, until soft but not pureed. Serve topped with the fried onions.

Hot and Sour Aubergine Curry

I came home from work with just an hour and a half before my regular telecon with my colleagues in Cambridge. I felt like making the absolute most of my time and really pushing my cooking to the limit. So I cooked rice, two vegan curries, a raita, and some carrot bhajis in just under an hour :) We had a relaxed twenty minutes to eat and enjoyed a lovely glass of the SO's delicious homebrew lager. And the curries were amazing!! This was particularly great, since I usually have trouble making aubergines interesting, but in this they were absolutely exquisite, soft and melting. I adapted the recipe from 2-3 different sources on the internet, melding them together to get the best of both worlds in terms of ease-of-cooking and taste. The heat contrasted the sourness and it was perfect with the plain white rice and sweet red lentils. The quantities here serve four; I made enough for two nights for two people.

Ingredients

• two large aubergines (eggplants)
• one small white onion or half a large white onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1/2 thumb of ginger
• 1 generous tsp fennel seeds
• 1 generous tsp coriander seeds
• 1 tsp black mustard seeds
• 1/2 tsp chilli flakes (or 1-2 tsp if you like it hot)
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• half a tin of coconut milk
• 2 tbsp pomegranate molasses, or 2tbsp tamarind (1 tbsp tamarind concentrate)
• a generous handful of frozen peas

Preheat the oven to 200 C. Cut the aubergines into large-ish bitesize pieces, about 2cm on each side (they will shrink loads in the oven). Toss in vegetable oil and roast for 40 minutes, until singed at the edges and edibly soft, but not dry or overcooked. Meanwhile, finely chop the onion and gently fry for five minutes, then crush in the garlic and add the finely chopped ginger, and fry for a further three minutes. Pound the fennel and coriander seeds in a mortar and pestle (you can dry toast them first if you have time/pan space), then add them and the rest of the spices to the onions, frying again for a couple of minutes. Add in the cooked aubergine pieces, the coconut milk and pomegranate molasses, stir gently and bring to a simmer (you don't want to curdle the coconut milk). Add the peas and bring up to a simmer again. Cook for just a minute or two, until the peas are hot. Serve immediately, or cover and sit until needed.

Barramundi and Pepper Curry

This is roughly based on a taste.com.au recipe, but with red pepper (capsicum, as they call it here) substituted for the chick peas. Personally I would cut them a lot smaller than the SO did, but he was cooking while I was out exercising, so I can't complain :)

Ingredients:

• a fresh long red chilli, deseeded, coarsely chopped
• a stem lemon grass, white part only, finely chopped
• 1small white onion, peeled, chopped
• 1 garlic clove
• 1 thumb fresh ginger
• 2 tsp chopped fresh coriander root
• 1 red pepper (capsicum), deseeded and cut into small pieces
• 1 tin of coconut milk
• 125ml chicken stock
• 1 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 tsp brown sugar
• 300g barramundi fillets, cut into large pieces
• a handful of frozen peas

Blend the chilli, lemongrass, onion, garlic, ginger and coriander roots in a blender until minced. Fry paste in a wok over medium heat for 1 minute, then add the diced red pepper and fry, stirring, for another 2-3 minutes. Add the stock, fish sauce and sugar and cook, stirring occasionally, for another couple of minutes. Add fish and cook for 2-3 minutes or until flesh flakes easily when tested with a fork. Add chickpeas and frozen peas and heat through; serve with plain rice.

Pumpkin and Chick Pea Curry

Sometimes I crave a really warming, satisfying meal full of carbs and veggie proteins. I was really hungering for the sweetness of pumpkin and earthiness of chick peas, along with mellow spices and rice. So I trawled around on the internet for 'pumpkin and chick pea curry', and found quite a few recipes. Sadly, 90% of them involved adding 'curry paste' or 'curry powder' to the basic ingredients. Then I found this nice blog, where a fellow craving-strucken foodie had been inspired by a TV show to create the kind of recipe I wanted, right down to the neat little coriander leaf garnish. My coriander had wilted in the fridge, and I didn't have quite the same selection of spices or number of frying pans, but I did manage to create an extremely tasty and quick dish that really hit the spot. We stirred a few tablespoons of lemon juice and a teaspoon of mustard with our brown rice, and found that the lemony flavour complimented the curry nicely. Naan or chapatis would also be tasty. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

• 1 small onion, chopped
• two cloves of garlic, crushed
• 2 teaspoons grated ginger
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 tsp ground allspice
• 1 pinch cinnamon
• 1 pinch dried red chilli flakes (or more, to taste)
• 2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1 heaped teaspoon ground coriander
• 1 teaspoon turmeric
• 500g eating pumpkin (squash), peeled, seeds removed and cut into cubes
• 1 chicken stock cube
• 150ml boiling water
• 340g tin of chickpeas, drained
• a small handful of fresh coriander, washed and chopped

Set your rice cooking, or chapatis warming, as you prefer. Fry the onion over a low heat until golden and soft. Add the garlic, ginger and bay leaves, and fry for a further minute. Add the spices and again, fry for a further minute. Add the pumpkin and water, and dissolve in the stock cube. Cover and simmer for 8-10 minutes, until the pumpkin is tender. Switch off the heat, stir through the chick peas, and allow to warm through. Depending on your pumpkin, you may find that your curry is either too watery or too dry; if the former, remove the vegetables from the pan and vigorously boil down the liquid until it is thoroughly reduced, then recombine. If it is too dry, add a little water. Serve with your carbs and a garnish of fresh coriander.

Aloo Gobi

Apologies for the recent lack of posts... I will simply have to make up for it. Now!

Last week the SO headed off on another trip, so while he was away, I munched my way through leftover lasagne. In between days of pasta-based goodness, I was out visiting friends and had two fairly hasty and substandard meals out. It's disappointing when you pay much more than you would spend on food at home, and end up with food you don't enjoy. On Monday we did have the misfortune of choosing a pub which was closing for refurbishment and therefore selling out of meals as fast as we could order them!

Having not been shopping in a week and a half, by the time the SO returned, we were down to very little in the fridge. However that can sometimes be inspiring: from adversity springs creativity! Or in this case, aloo gobi :) This is a nourishing and warming curry which is delicious with rice, but even better with naan or chapatis. I decided to have a little fun and make some peshwari naan, and a rough mint raita. Supplemented with a couple of onion bhajjis from our local Shop of Awesome, it made a surprisingly substantial meal from a nearly-empty fridge!

Ingredients:

• 1 medium white onion
• 3 cloves garlic
• a half-inch piece of ginger
• 1 tsp cumin seeds
• 1/2tsp asafoetida
• 2 small dried chillies
• 1 tsp turmeric
• Half a cauliflower
• 2 medium potatoes, scrubbed
• a handful of fresh coriander

Finely chop the onion, and in a deep saucepan, gently fry it in a little vegetable oil for 10 minutes, until soft, translucent and beginning to caramelise around the edges. Peel the garlic and ginger, and finely chop them together, then add them to the cooked onions. In a mortar and pestle, pound the cumin, asafoetida and dried chillies together, until they are a little broken up. Add the spices and turmeric to the onion, garlic and ginger, stir and allow to cook for a minute until the spices become fragrant.

Chop the potatoes into small cubes and add to pan, stir through, then add just enough water to cover the bottom of the pan. Turn the heat to low, cover completely and allow to cook gently, stirring occasionally and adding more water if the pan goes dry. Meanwhile, break the cauliflower into florets. When the potatoes are just barely done, fold in the cauliflower and replace the lid, cooking for a further 10 minutes, or until the cauliflower is tender but not collapsed. There should be no liquid at the bottom of the pan: this is a dry curry. Tear over the coriander and serve - preferably with naan or chapatis.

Pumpkin Laksah

This is adapted from a Nigel Slater recipe - which will be a common theme here! I've added some more greens, reduced the coconut and changed the spicing a little, and replaced the cherry tomatoes with tinned, as it makes a very good storecupboard meal with that swap. I've also added some greens to make it a tad more nutritious. It's a warming, spicy/sour combination which takes less than an hour to make - as little as 30 minutes if you have a helping hand to peel and chop the pumpkin! We added some sneaky pakoras from the awesome local shop for a little variety.

I could fill a page about how delicious and wonderful the pumpkin we used for this dish is, but I think I will save it for another time. Suffice to say, you should use a firm winter squash with plenty of flavour, or it will be overwhelmed by the strong spice paste. We used a Crown Prince: these can stand lots of cooking without falling apart, and have sweet and delectable flesh. Never eat a carving pumpkin!

Ingredients:

• 500g good pumpkin, or butternut squash
• A handful of coriander stems
• 1 whole red chilli or a couple of birds' eye
• A thumb-sized piece of ginger, peeled
• 4 large cloves garlic
• 2 juicy whole lemongrass stems
• 4 tbsp of fish sauce
• 2x 400g tins plum (not chopped) tomatoes
• 400ml of chicken or vegetable stock (if using boullion, halve the powder)
• 1 400ml tin of coconut milk
• 200g crinkly green cabbage (e.g. Savoy), roughly shredded
• 100g dried egg noodles
• fresh coriander leaves
• fresh mint leaves
• two limes

Chop the pumpkin into large pieces and set it steaming: it will take about 20 minutes to cook through. Whiz together the coriander stems, chilli, ginger, garlic and lemongrass in a blender until you have a paste. Fry this gently in a deep pan (like the one pictured) in vegetable oil over a low heat, stirring so it doesn't burn, until the garlic is just cooked and starting to colour. Pour in the stock and coconut milk, stir and bring to a boil. Slice the tomatoes in the tins into halves or large-ish chunks using a table knife and lift the pieces into the pan with a fork. Add the fish sauce, mix very gently, and simmer for five minutes.


In the meantime, remove the steamer full of cooked pumpkin, and use the steaming water to blanche the shredded cabbage - a matter of a 90 seconds. Drain the cabbage, and cook the dried noodles, according to their packet instructions. Tip the pumpkin and cabbage into the curry pot, and add a swirl of cooked noodles into each bowl. Spoon the laksah into each bowl, top with generous handfuls of coriander and mint leaves, and squeeze over half a lime onto each bowl. Serves four; or more with pakoras or more noodles!