The Devil's Own Jism









Saturday 19/1/2013

Back to Feeding The Five (click here)




Diary and Notes

No insane gibberish to start today's blog - I have a tale to tell.

A long time ago (2005) my good chum Dr Phileus Algenon Welshegg bought me a box of hot sauces from a company in America amongst which was a bottle of Pure Cap - pure capsaicin dissolved on oil. This is not a cooking sauce but an ingredient, something you can add to chilli, curry etc to make them hotter without affecting the overall flavour of the dish.

Pure Cap is hot. Hot in a way - that in all likelihood - you have never experienced or even knew was possible. On the Scoville Scale it is about 500,000 - Tabasco is 5000. If you are a little unsure as to how hot that is - watch this.

Over the years my hot sauce supplies got smaller and smaller and I eventually ran out. I still buy the Pure Cap and use it to make a slightly hotter version of Encona sauce by adding 2 squirts to each bottle - goes really well with sausages or eggs at breakfast time - hot, but not too hot.

I ordered a new bottle on the internet about a week ago and to celebrate its arrival I made a very hot vindaloo curry sauce, to go with some chicken tikka and daal. Of course I didn't let the kids have any of this sauce, it was just for Toni and me. Toni tried a little, but only a little. I had a good dollop or two with each plateful of my tasty dinner. Scrum-diddly-umptions.

I have about 1/2 the sauce left and am going to offer it free - via Twitter - to anyone who wants to try it. I can always make more.

If you want to read the original hot sauce story and a recipe for Mad Dog Inferno Lamb Click Here. It's a very old site so the links don't work - sorry.

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For desert we had some baklava from the Khawaja Brothers in Chorlton



Menu

  • Poppadoms
  • Onion Bhajis
  • Vegetable Samosas
  • Chicken Tikka
  • Yellow Daal
  • Vindaloo Curry Sauce
  • Pilau Rice
  • Naan Bread

    Notes: I bought the naan bread and samosas. The supermarket samosas are really horrid. The frozen ones from Asian grocers (and the Asian section of Asda) are usually exactly like the ones from Take-Aways and not bad. If I had more time and less kids I'd make my own. The pilau rice is cooked basmati rice, fried with; turmeric, cinnamon, black pepper, green cardamom, mustard seeds, kalonji (black onion) seeds, cloves and fennel seeds.


    Ingredients*

    Onion Bhajis
    1 Cup Chick Pea (gram) Flour
    1 Onion
    1 tsp Turmeric
    1 tsp Cumin
    1/2 tsp Chilli Powder
    1/4 tsp Black Pepper
    1/4 tsp Salt
    Fresh Coriander Leaves
    Oil for Deep Frying
    		 Chicken Tikka
    2 Chicken Breasts
    2 TBSP Yoghurt
    1 TBSp Tandoori Masala
    Salad for Garnish
    		 Yellow Daal
    1 Cup Yellow Daal (lentils)
    1 TBSP Curry Sauce -
    before adding pure cap
    1/4 tsp Salt
    1 tsp Garam Masala
    Coriander for Garnish
    		 Vindaloo Curry Sauce
    1 Brown & 1 Red Onion
    1/2 Red Pepper
    1 2 TBSP Oil
    6 Cloves Garlic
    1 TBSP Garlic and Ginger Paste
    1 TBSP Curry Powder -
    I mix my own but Bolst's is really good
    1 tsp Hot Chilli Powder
    1 TBSP Tomato Purée
    1 TBSP White Wine Vinegar
    Squirts Pure Cap Chilli Essence




    Preparation

    A good tip: If making curry sauce and bhajis at the same time. Slice your onions and use the outside slices (the long ones) for the bhajis and the middle bits for the sauce. That way the best long slices make the bhajis and the rest gets liquidized.

  • Onion Bhajis. Make a batter from everything except the sliced onions and coriander - about as thick as American pancake batter is good. Add the sliced onions and chopped coriander and mix well. Leave to stand for at least 15 minutes. Deep fry in very hot oil and drain on kitchen paper.
  • Chicken Tikka: Mix the yoghurt and masala together. Chop the chicken and marinade for at least 4 hours. Get the oven REALLY hot. Put the chicken on skewers and cook for 10 minutes. They should be a little blackened. Serve on the salad with mint yoghurt.
  • Daal: Boil the daal in water for a minute or two then drain and replace the water. Simmer for 30 minutes. Add the curry sauce and keep simmering until the daal is really soft. Mush up with a potato masher or fork. Add extra garam masala and coriander before serving.
  • Curry Sauce: Slice the onions and fry in oil (or ghee if you have it) until really soft. Add the peeled garlic cloves, chilli powder and chopped pepper and continue to sweat until these are soft too. Add the garlic & ginger paste and curry powder then cook a little longer. Add some water (about 1 cup) and blitz the sauce with a hand held blender - leaving the odd lump left for texture. Stir in some tomato purée and simmer for a bit. This is a good spicy curry sauce. To pep it up a little, add some wine vinegar, give it a squirt of pure cap and a really good stir, then a few minutes more cooking - you're truly scrumptious.














    Today’s Ratings:

    Isis: Onion Bhajis, Chicken Tikka - yum.
    Eve: Onion Bhajis, Naan Bread, Rice - yum.
    Olias: Loved the Bhajis and lentils.

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    *All quantities are very approximate and for a family of 5 (2 adults, 3 kids aged 4 years, 3 years & 6 months)




    JCBorresen@GMail.com