Zucchini Chicken Stir Fry

 I had picked a fresh zucchini from the garden and wanted to put it to use immediately. I used only about 300 grams of the zucchini - I still had about 400 grams left over that I barbequed for dinner the next day.  The taste of something that you have grown - picked fresh off the plant and cooked to perfection is something you cannot really describe.  It is an emotion - a feeling of immense satisfaction and joy.

This dish pairs well with a chinese fried rice and is very quick to put together, including the prep time. 

Basic Chicken Biriyani - Rajam's recipe

 For most Indians, biriyani is an emotion. There are so many different varieties of biriyani in India and the one you had growing up generally ends up being the winner. The reason is obviously it brings back so many fun memories, and secondly, it is a taste that gets embedded in the ridges and grooves of your brain. Nothing anyone makes is even remotely close to that taste that you know is possible and you strive hard to find it everywhere. I found many Indian restaurants in Melbourne cook the rice and the meat seperately and then layer it in and call it biriyani. Of course it made me mad because for me the meat and rice must be cooked together for it to have the status of biriyani.  Yes, biriyani definitely has a status, if the meat and rice are cooked together in a delicious conglomeration, then the status is definitely at the top.

The trick to getting a perfectly cooked rice and meat dish is 1) excellent quality biriyani rice, 2) infinite patience and 3) careful measuring.  I use India Gate "classic basmati rice extra long" because it never fails me. India Gate basmati rice cooks into a fine long grain, fluffy and beautiful and I know the ratio is 1 cup of rice means two cups of liquid. 

My mother used to make biriyani at home for special occassions and that is what I have tried to create today for you. This is not a very hot dish, but by all means reduce the number of green chillies if you feel it might be too hot for you.  The red chilli powder I have used is Kashmiri chilli powder  which is not hot. 

Also, my mother never used to marinate and seal the chicken when she made chicken biriyani.  However, the chicken she used were organic and small sized where as the ones I see here are huge and have very little flavour - even if they are supposedly organic.  So that is a variation that helps with increasing the flavours of this dish. 

Lets get to the recipe without further ado!  This recipe calls for marination of the chicken and I do it the day before I am planning to make the biriyani.

Basic Chicken Curry - Naadan Kozhi curry

"Amma, do you have a recipe for the chicken curry you make in your blog?" I was in India - and this request was from my son, in Australia - a very urgent text message. While I was flattered that he even bothered reading my blog, I had to disappoint him and say that I never thought to put it in since it was almost a staple and I assumed everyone knew how to make it.  "Well, I think you must add it in, it makes it easier for me" - was his verdict.  So here it is, the basic chicken curry - or naadan kozhi curry - which means traditional chicken curry.

My son is going through a phase where he loves drummettes more than any other part of the chicken - so I made this for him using drummettes. However, I prefer to make it with an entire chicken - including liver and gizzard. Both my children are not fans of the liver and gizzard, unfortunately, so I have just made it his way.  However, if you are willing to try it, add it in - it adds so much more flavour to the dish.

Larb Gai - Thai Chicken Mince with Peanut Rice

 One of the first South Asian dishes I tried was the Larb Gai when I migrated to Adelaide. Prior to that I hadn't really travelled at all, and the restaurants in India that I had been to in my home town and even in Chennai, a metropolitan town only served continental and Indian food.  

What attracted me to the Larb Gai was the mix of the fresh lettuce, onions and lime juice with the chicken mince - a perfect blend of sweet, sour and heat. It was served in lettuce cups as an entrée and I enjoyed the dish a lot.  Over the years I have had it several times and today I have served it as a side dish with shredded lettuce along with peanut rice. 

I made up peanut rice on the spur of the moment as I wanted to marry the flavours of the Larb Gai with the rice.  I also had a jar of Mayvers smooth peanut butter that was in the pantry which looked like the perfect thing to use for the dish.

Last month one of my friends, Nimmi visited Melbourne with her husband. We met at a Thai restaurant and one of the dishes we ordered was the Larb Gai. Even though she is well travelled, it is the first time she is tasting Larb Gai too. Both Nimmi and her husband enjoyed the dish a lot and it was a pleasure to see because you do want your friends to like what you like!  And it made me very happy that she enjoyed the dish as much as I did when I first tried it!

Grilled Chicken Breast

 

Chicken breast - I always make them too dry and chewy. Subsequently, I never buy or use them. When we were planning a little break to Phillip Island, my friend Anto requested me to bring Chicken Breast for the barbeque. I was really breaking my head looking for a good recipe.  eventually I found what looked like a good one on the internet, but didn't have most of the ingredients. 

So the next best thing was to substitute with what I had available in the pantry and hope it turns out good. And by God, it turned out alright! It was so good I decided to put it in my blog as it would be an easy thing to cook for a mid week dinner with salad.

This chicken breast is juicy, tender, a bit spicy with a touch of sweetness.

Chellammal Grandma's Chicken Curry

 I love family history - especially when it relates to food! My husband's dad is from a place called Agasteeswaram near Nagercoil. This recipe belongs to his mother.  What is beautiful about this recipe is the simplicity, use of easily available ingredients and the effortlessness of making this dish. Every time he spoke about his mother's special chicken recipe, my father in law's eyes would light up and he would promise to make it for me some day. He discussed the recipe with me, but never ended up cooking it for me. So based on what he told me, I have tried to recreate Chellammal grandma's chicken recipe. 

I believe when Chellammal grandma made this dish, it was almost pure white like the coconut milk she used. The reason for the colour in my dish is that I browned the chicken pieces before adding the coconut milk.

I can imagine grandma cooking this dish, putting it all together in an earthen pot, and after making sure the coals were burning red hot in her wood fired stove, she would go off to do other chores.

When she came back in an hour or so, the food would be ready to serve to the hungry family. 

Kerala Chicken Stew

 I decided to celebrate my birthday a day earlier - why not?!  Considering it is lockdown and I cannot do anything else anyway.  I got up early to day to make appam and chicken stew for the family.  This is such an easy dish and you can adjust the spice levels to suit your taste.  It goes well with freshly baked white bread - or any other type of spongy bread, like the Kerala Appam.

Quail Pepper Roast

 Tender, flavoursome and nutritious - almost no fat, and cooks very fast: Quail ticks all the boxes for a quick mid week dinner. Today I decided to fall back on my grand mother's fail safe recipe for all game meat as I was pruning my curry leaf tree and had a lot of curry leaves that I needed to use.

Quail tastes similar to chicken, except it is smaller and definitely more flavour.  I got a pack of 6 quail, from my local market. The plan is to cook them as whole birds and serve them up on a bed of  couscous.

Back home in my youth I have heard people say that quail is very good for health and that it is especially good if you suffer from respiratory diseases like asthma. My father used to eat quail eggs regularly for this reason as it was supposed to build up immunity.

I made the couscous with an Indian touch using curry leaves to marry with the flavours of the quail.  The fresh salad combines all the different elements with a sweet and sour and acidic touch. 

Pepper Chicken Drumettes

 The original recipe for pepper chicken can be found in a previous blog post: http://kitchenanugraha.blogspot.com/2018/07/ellas-pepper-chicken.html#more  This recipe calls for a full chicken cut up into pieces. The idea is to use the full chicken, including the liver and gizzard.

The other day I was in a hurry to get some food on the table and the only chicken that was available was chicken drumettes. I made these and took the left overs for my lunch the next day.  As soon as my lunch was warmed up, the team wanted to know what I was having - it smelt so good.  

And that is the story of the appetizing smell of the pepper chicken.  Once you have smelt it you will not care much for KFC :-),  I promise! It is so much more healthier and really delicious too.

And these are perfect for entrée - make sure you have plenty to go around! 

Kozhi Varuth Aracha Curry - Chicken Toasted and Ground Curry

"Varuth Aracha"  or "Toasted and Ground" - is a term you will hear quite often in Kerala cuisine. And once you are hooked to toasted and ground, you will keep coming back for more, I can guarantee you that!

What is being toasted and ground is coconut, of course - which is the major ingredient in most Kerala dishes.  The smell of toasted and ground coconut is enough to get your whole street talking and your taste buds into overdrive.  You must try this at least one time.

There are lots of toasted and ground coconut curries.  The main rule to remember is that when this is incorporated in a meat dish, you do not add tamarind.  But the same dish when you bring fish or vegetables into the equation, it calls for tamarind.

Tonight we had it with chicken - or kozhi.  Normally I would buy a whole chicken less than 2 kilos, with the liver, giblets, neck - and make the curry with the whole chicken. Because of COVID we have not been out for a long time and drumettes were the only pieces available at our local butcher, so we had to make do with that.  This sauce is flavoursome and luscious without being too rich and it is perfect for cool Spring/Autumn nights.

Karivepela Chicken - Curry Leaf Chicken

 My neighbour in Melbourne has a bushy curry leaf tree. At the start of Spring, he gives the tree a good pruning and the tree flourishes. The other day there was a knock at the door - it was my neighbour's son with a bag of fresh curry leaves from the tree.  I am so lucky to have such a good neighbour!

It is hard to preserve curry leaves - so I had to quickly look up recipes that used a lot of curry leaves.

I am trying this recipe for the first time - it is fragrant due to the amount of curry leaves in it.  The taste is a little pungent - but delicious, nevertheless, and the sauce is rich and thick. 

If I get a lot of curry leaves, I will make this dish again! A bit of trivia about curry leaves - they have vitamin A, vitamin C, phosphorous, calcium and iron and they are supposed to be good for regulating blood sugar levels.

Rajam's Green Chicken Kurma

 Once in a way you get an heirloom recipe - that just works and works.  This one from my amma is so simple - all you have to do is follow the recipe - :-) 

I bless her every time I eat it - it is just delicious! I wrote this recipe down on a piece of paper in the 90's when I got married and migrated to Australia.  I have used it so many times and the paper is aged, brown and tatty - I have stuck it in several places with sticky tape.  That is how trusty it is!

There is a secret ingredient in this recipe which I think attributes to the taste - you can decide for yourself after you try it!

So without much ado, lets have a look at the recipe.

Honey Mustard Chicken

 I must say this recipe made me very happy - all I got was praises from all around the table.  My experience with chicken breasts is that it gets too dry too quick and is pretty tasteless.  This recipe changed it all - it was moist and juicy, tender and delicious.  Bonus was that it is very easy to put together.  Definitely something I will go back to over and over again!

I adapted this recipe from one of my favourite food bloggers, Karina from Cafe Delights -  https://thefeedfeed.com/cafedelites 

Chicken - Varuthu Arachathu : Chicken with Toasted and Ground Coconut

One thing about growing up in Kerala is that you get used to coconut in many different ways and forms in all your dishes.  The coconut used for this traditional recipe is usually fresh, and freshly grated.  In Melbourne I have adapted to using desiccated coconut for all the recipes that call for fresh grated coconut.

Coconut is not something that is freely available here - and it is easier to adapt to desiccated or shredded coconut which is available in all the supermarkets.

Varuthu arachu means toasted and ground to a paste. There is no mention of coconut in the original name, it is taken for granted that it refers to coconut. Toasted coconut has an amazing smell and when ground to a paste for a curry, it makes the curry smell and taste better.

Mrs Briganza's one pot Chicken Gravy

Mrs Briganza was my needlework teacher in school.  This recipe was posted on our school watsapp group chat - so I decided to try it out.  Mrs Briganza lost both her legs in an accident and she was on a wheel chair. Her devoted husband Timmy took her everywhere in that wheel chair. I know her since she was my needlework teacher and my friend Sonia and I used to go to her house to work on our needle work projects for grade 10.  Grade 10 was an important year in our school curriculum and determined what sort of college we would get admission to.  Thank you for sharing this recipe, Faby, my family loved it - and I will remember Mrs Briganza every time I make it!

Milk Chicken Curry

It was Friday night- and after a busy week I really did not feel like cooking.  My supplies were running low too - milk was about to reach its expiry date and I had no vegetables except onions in the pantry.  I told my son to make the rice and I googled chicken and milk.  And surprise, surprise, Jamie Oliver, my favourite chef turned up right at the top with a milk chicken roast.  It was a no-brainer - I decided to Indianise the recipe - so here goes....and it was absolutely tasty and it will be a repeat recipe in our house.

Appam and Stew

Christmas time is a time of eating and making merry in our culture like a lot of cultures. In particular a lot of my compatriots will remember getting up early for the Christmas morning service and coming home with tummy rumbling to a delightful breakfast of appam and stew.  Today I recreate the magic for you with all locally available ingredients in Melbourne.  You will have to create the magic yourself, though! Both these recipes are gluten free with the option of making the stew vegetarian. 

Ella's Pepper Chicken

The beauty about this recipe is that every Nagercoil household – or Kerala household has the ingredients for this recipe, usually growing in their back yard.  It is the easiest, tastiest no fuss recipe for chicken that I grew up with.   I am dedicating this to the memory of my grandmother Ella Chellam who used to cook this up in a  jiffy for all of us grand kids during summer holidays.  It formed part of our picnics to Pallivilai – my grand father’s orchard / holiday home and has left an indelible mark in my brain.  It formed part of my father’s last letter to me where he promises to send me some pepper chicken via courier as I wont be coming home for Christmas – and he knows this is my all time favorite dish.  

Butter Chicken

Now that you know how to make Tandoori chicken (recipe at http://kitchenanugraha.blogspot.com/2017/07/tandoori-chicken.html), Butter chicken is really easy to do. When I first came to Adelaide I used to work as a kitchen hand in an Indian restaurant.  Manjeet, the chef there, taught me how to make this dish and over the years I have made it many times.

Tandoori Chicken

This is a favourite with young and old alike - it goes nicely with a schooner of beer or a glass of wine or just by itself.  I do not have the clay tandoor oven, which gives the tandoori chicken the classic burnt / charred marks. So I make do with my electric over and the grill plate to finish off.