Chicken Tikka/Veg curry/Onion Bhajis

Two days after the spring equinox and we wake up to...SNOW!!! When will spring arrive?

Although staying in and baking all day sounds appealing, there are things to do, like buying presents for people, so shopping takes precedence. 

R was disappointed with the curry (but not as you know it...) last night, as he had geared himself up for something more in keeping with the flavour produced from a jar. With this in mind, I decide to make Chicken Tikka like I used to. This should be good compensation for my experimentation! There are chicken fillets in the fridge just waiting to be marinated and it wouldn't take much to add a vegetable curry of some description. 

So after an afternoon of shopping, I make a quick marinade:

1 tsp grated ginger

1 grated clove of garlic (about a tsp)

1 1/2 tsp ground cumin

1 1/2 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp chilli powder

1 tbsp lemon juice

2 tbsp tomato puree

3 tbsp natural yoghurt

Mix these together and pop in your chicken fillets. I do mine whole, but you could cube them. Cover the dish with cling film and place in the fridge for at least an hour, but as long as possible. It has been known for me to do this the night before cooking, so they have about 24 hours!

I'll be cooking these later on a bed of sliced onion, under a hot grill. Drizzle sunflower or vegetable oil over the onion before placing chicken on top, then drizzle some more oil over the chicken. Grill until starting to blacken at the edges, then turn and repeat. The blackened edges give it the look of the tandoori. This will take about 25 mins in total.

Now, normally I would serve this with a potato and cauliflower curry, but cauliflowers are so expensive at the moment and it is hit and miss how appetising  they look, so I opt for a potato and onion combination, with the addition of the few button mushrooms I have left from yesterday's meal. The base of this curry will be the same as the cauliflower one though. So start by preparing the spices:

Potato, onion and mushroom curry

1 tsp grated ginger

1 tsp grated garlic (with all this grating, I try something... grate the garlic whole, skin and all. Perfect - the skin saved my fingers and only the minutest bit got grated itself. There was a small pile of grated garlic on the plate and the skin was easily discarded).

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp turmeric

1 tsp chilli powder

1/2 tsp salt

Then the vegetables:

3 potatoes, cubed.

1 onion, chopped thickly

1/2 punnet button mushrooms, halved.

Heat 1/4 pint oil in a pan. Add to the oil 1 tsp cumin seeds. These will indicate when the oil is hot, and so when to add the spices. Stir fry rapidly for 30 seconds, making sure they don't burn, then add the onion and potato to the pan. Stir these well, covering them with the spice mix and allowing them to begin to cook. I don't cook them for long before adding the mushrooms and then enough water to just cover the vegetables (between 1/4 and 1/2 pint). 

Bring to the boil, cover and leave to cook over a gentle heat for 40 mins. The smell of the spices will seep out in the steam, enveloping your kitchen with the flavours of the East.

Finally, there has to be something to accompany our meal, and we ate the onion bhaji's R bought yesterday. No worries, I say, I'll make some more! Tucked away in my Indian cookbook, is a print out from an online Rachel Allen recipe for onion bhajis. I use this as a base and add some little extras.

110g plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp chilli powder

2 eggs, beaten

150ml water

4 onions, finely sliced

1 tbsp cumin seeds

1 tsp turmeric

1/4 pint sunflower oil.

Mix together the batter until smooth. Add the onions, cumin seeds and turmeric and stir, making sure the onions are covered in batter mix and the seeds are distributed evenly.

Heat the oil in a pan, and then add large spoonfuls ( I used a serving spoon) of the onion mix. Fry each of the bhajis for about 5 mins, or until golden on both sides, then place on kitchen paper to drain. 

I made more than I needed this time, and froze the excess. The others I kept warm until I needed them, but next time would just flash them under the grill for a few minutes each side to crisp them up before serving.

These three things were served together with plain boiled rice and some mango chutney - YUM!! :-)