Curry: Take Two

As I look back on this rapidly concluding semester, I feel that my cooking skills have come a long way.  In fact, I would even go so far to say as most of my food is more than edible—sometimes it even tastes good.  However, as a college student, I don’t frequent too many other food venues, so I mainly end up eating my own cooking, or the free pizza you can get from Little Casers when they close (all you need to go is go out back by the dumpster and wait for the employees to bring out the extra pizza).   Normally it is not an issue to only eat my own cooking, after all, I don’t think it is too unbearable (although I did feed the last serving of my steak fajitas to Dakota).  However, after making an Easter visit to Tyler’s parents’ house last weekend, I realized a downfall of eating your own cooking.

Whenever you only eat you own cooking, or only eat someone else’s cooking, you don’t always know what you’re missing.  After eating pork roast cooked in a perfect blend of Italian spices, loads or real mashed potatoes, honey-smoked ham, lemon bread dripping with power-sugar glaze, and homemade pumpkin pie, you realize that you are not all that great of a cook. 

So as I sit here, eating what has so far been my most flavorful recipe, I am deeply aware of how much progress I still need to make.  But that’s ok with me.  Because if I had mastered cooking in one semester, I would not longer need to keep a cooking blog; and then I could no longer provide a way for you to procrastinate on your homework any longer.  Here’s to ignoring that paper for five more minutes.

Steak Salad

I cannot wait for the day when I can just throw together a recipless meal with whatever inhabits my cabinet.  Tonight, I came close.  I had some idea running threw my head about different meals I want to make this week—like curry and stir fry.  However, despite the fact I seem to frequent a grocery store at least every other day, I can never seem to get all the ingredients together.  Just before I cooked dinner, I went to Safeway (for the second time today), but did I manage to get the Worchester sauce for the marinade I wanted to make?  Of course not; I had forgotten my wallet.  I could have asked Tyler to get it for me, but I couldn’t even remember if Worchester sauce was what that I needed.  Instead, I watched Ty spend $10 on Dr. Pepper and four boxes of Gushers. 

I went home to a cabinet full of mismatched ingredients, which my mind hopelessly tried to piece together to create a flavorful dinner.  Curry, stir fry, and stew all passed through my mind, but alas, I was missing at least one key ingredient for each.  Since I didn’t want to trek to Safeway for a third time, I improvised with a very simple meal.  I made a steak salad (since I wanted to eat a dinner filled with alliteration).  I didn’t know how to flavor the steak, so I put the two vanguards of spices, salt and pepper, and then on a whim, I added some cumin because it is my favorite spice.  Paired with spinach and carrots, the dinner was better the alternative—Ramen.    

White Chicken Chili

While most of my peers have spent their adolescent lives texting their parents, my parents never had texting.  And while that saved me getting the constant “check in text” from my parents, at times, I wished I could have texted my parents simple questions such as “Do I claim a 1 or a 0 on my W4 form?”  Had my parents had texting ability to answer these short questions for me, many disasters could have been avoided, like last year when I ended up owing $300 dollars because I claimed “1” instead of “0.”    Needless to say, when my parents got texting last week, I was ecstatic.   And their texting abilities came in handy, especially because I knew there was no room for failure when making this recipe. 

After a long debate with my roommate and my mom, I decided to make White Chicken Chili as my debut recipe.  For the first time in my newly sprouted adult life, I was cooking for a group of people, and I did not want to ruin my own coming out party.

At Wal-mart, however, I realized I didn’t know what butter beans and great northern beans were.  I stood dumbly in the bean aisle, desperately searching for ingredients that the small, selective Wyoming Wal-mart might not carry.  I knew it was too late to call my mom, it was well past 10pm in Wisconsin.  But then I realized I could text her to see if she was awake.  I sent a quick text, and moments later the slight humming of my phone alerted me to my mom’s message, which read, “I don’t know. Google it.” Impressed that my mom was still up and had such a rapid response, I really didn’t care that she didn’t know.  After some more searching, I finally found them on the top shelf, hiding from their 5’ 2’’ buyers.    

After the brief Wal-mart incident, the chili making went off without a problem.  I didn’t even cry much when I cut the onions.  I did go a little over board on the cumin—but it’s hard to be lenient when using your favorite spice, and it did give the chili a “nice kick,” as girls described it when the ate it the following evening.    

Finally, I have decided that I am going to be rating each dish because I do not have the vocabulary or food expertise to accurately describe what I cook.

Time Commitment: 30 minutes (experienced) 1 hour (me)

Overall Taste: 6 on a scale of 1 (horrible) to 10 (great)

Presentation: 2 on a scale of 1 (horrible) to 10 (great).  This chili had a funny yellow color….

Difficulty: 3 on a scale of 1 (easy) to 10 (difficult)

Ingredients:

1.       1 tablespoon vegetable oil

2.       2 medium onions, chopped (1 cup)

3.       2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

4.       3 cups chicken broth

5.       2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

6.       2 tablespoons lime juice

7.       1 teaspoon ground cumin

8.       ½ teaspoon dried oregano

9.       ¼ teaspoon red pepper sauce

10.   ¼ teaspoon salt

11.   1 can (15oz) great northern beans

12.   1 can (11oz) white shoepeg corn

13.   1 can (15 oz) butter beans

14.   2 cups cooked chicken breast

Directions

1.       In 4-quart Dutch oven, heat oil over medium heat.  Cook onions and garlic in oil 4-6 minutes until tender.

2.       Stir in remaining ingredients except chicken.  Heat to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer uncovered 20 minutes. Stir in chicken; simmer about 5 minutes.  

Steak Fajitas

As I handed her the plate of sizzling steak fajitas, Annie commented, “I have so you well trained.  I have you cooking for me now just like Tony does at home.”  Well I am sure the comment was comically well-intended, I am not sure my smile hid my exhaustion.  It was about 9pm, and Annie and were finally getting to dinner (with Annie doing the relaxing and me doing the cooking).  Not that I minded too much, I rather like cooking late at night.  Since discovering my chai tea recipe, I make it at least twice a week.  However, the steak fajitas presented a different challenge then mixing milk and tea bags to make chai.  I can’t seem to cook steak right.  Annie told me to put the burner moderately high and sear the meat for a few minutes both sides.  Even though I follow her directions, the meat seems to get too tough and rather tasteless.  These fajitas had a good marinade over then, but that didn’t save the steak from the frying pan and my cooking abilities. 

The first night when I cooked the fajitas they were decent considering the meat was overdone.  However, I had marinated a lot of meat for the fajitas, and I am not affected with over exaggeration when I say a lot.  I ate overdone steak fajitas for a week.  The last few servings were eaten only because my mom engrained a strong sense in eating leftovers in me, and unfortunately, my dad isn’t in Laramie to clean up the leftovers I don’t want.  Three years after leaving home, I am still finding things that I miss about it, and after the steak fajitas incident, I really missed my dad’s tolerant taste buds.  However, without my dad, I had a chance to be innovate and find a new “garbage disposal” that wouldn’t make me feel guilty about wasting food.  Turns out it wasn’t hard to find.  I just looked down into the most beautiful brown eyes that had long ago perfected the art of begging that labs are so well known for.  Dakota got more than one table scrap that night. 

Ingredients:

1.       Marinade (see below)

2.       1 ½ lb beef boneless top sirloin steak, 1 ½ inches thick

3.       2 large onions, sliced

4.       2 medium green or red bell peppers, cut

5.       2 tablespoons vegetable oil

6.       12 flour tortillas

7.       1 jar picante sauce

8.       1 cup Monterey Jack cheese

9.       1 ½ cups guacamole

10.   ¾ cups sour cream

Ingredients for Marinade

1.       ½ cup vegetable oil

2.       ¼ cup red wine vinegar

3.       1 teaspoon sugar

4.       1 teaspoon oregano

5.       1 teaspoon chili powder

6.       ½ teaspoon garlic powder

7.       ½ teaspoon salt

8.       ¼ teaspoon pepper

1.       In a small bowl, make marinade by combing all ingredients.

2.       Place beef in a resealable plastic bag or glass dish.  Pour marinade over beef; turn beef to coat with marinade. Cover and refrigerate at least 8 hours but no longer than 24 hours

3.       Cook beef either by grilling or on stovetop.  If on stovetop, cook with onions, peppers, and vegetable oil. 

4.       Heat oven to 325 degrees.  Wrap tortillas in foil.  Heat in oven about 15 minutes

5.       Build your own fajita (I hope I don’t actually have to write out this process like the book took a paragraph to do.  If you can’t figure out how to build your fajita and fold the tortilla, you probably shouldn’t be making this recipe.  Don’t feel offended, I am just saving you time and frustration).  

Hurry Curry Chicken

The beauty of the 911 system is that someone always picks up.  The dispatcher will always send help, even if you’ve done something stupid like starting your kitchen on fire with the towel that caught flame when you took out the pizza (which almost happened to me).  Regardless of the caller’s stupidity, the dispatcher is always there and will always send help.  I wish that I could say the same for my “911” system.

My “911” system is on speed dial, since I use it frequently.  However, I wouldn’t have quite so many calls logged to my mother if she would pick up everything I called.  And if she doesn’t pick up, I have to shuffle through my next “911” alternatives, my dad and my home phone, before I get to a reliable dispatcher, my sister, who will pick up the phone even if she is driving a stick shift through downtown Minneapolis during rush hour while drinking coffee (which she had done with me in the car). 

Fortunately, I didn’t have to go through my alternative options because my first dispatcher picked up.  When I called my mom, my curry looked more like chicken curry soup than chicken curry.  I tried to boil away the water to thicken the curry sauce, but, according to my mom, while boiling normally does thicken sauces, sauces that are yogurt based (like this one), only get more watery the more you boil them.  Immediately, I pulled the curry off the burner, and thought that we were going to have soup for dinner.  However, my mom and my roommates began to spew out a list of redemptive ideas.

Staring at my curry soup, with everyone talking at me, I could feel my stress level rise.  I don’t deal well with external stress, such as loud noises and crowds, because I generate more than enough internal stress for myself to handle.  That’s probably why I have adjusted so well to living in Wyoming—its endless tracts of emptiness inhabited only by antelope and the occasional person, creates little opportunity for external stress.  If you have ever driven the 120 mile stretch between Douglas and Gillette, you understand what I mean.  But the kitchen, at the moment, was far from the empty, exhaustive, fields of sage brush and antelope; everyone was loudly talking, trying to redeem the curry with cornstarch and water.  Unable to deal with the pressing external forces, I focused in on the curry, the only thing in the room that was quite and still, and realized that slowly, on its own, it was beginning to solidify.  Turns out I forgot a cooking rule: that once cooled, sauces tend to solidify.  So with everyone talking and freaking out, I grabbed a fork and dug into the wonderful curry. 

Ingredients:

½ 2.25 lb. pkg. Chicken Breast

1 tbsp olive or vegetable oil

1 tsp. paprika

½  tsp. salt and pepper

1 8oz container plain yogurt

½ cup low fat mayo

½ cup chopped onion

½ cup raisins

1 tbsp. curry powder

1 tsp ginger

Rice

1. In skillet, combine oil, paprika, salt, pepper, heat and add chicken cubes.  Cook over medium heat for  

    about 15 min, stirring occasionally until chicken begins to brown and juices run clear. 

2. Meanwhile, in small bowl, combine yogurt, mayo, onions, raisins, curry, ginger and mix.

3. Add yogurt mixture to chicken, stir and cook for 3 to 4 minutes or until bubbly and heated through.