Squid Curry

 

Finally Zion is out of fever zone & is all charged up. These days he is so attached to me & walks along with me like my tail. I cant tell you that he even doesn't let me go for a bath or toilet:) At last I decided yesterday to have some "me" time while he was asleep. My hubby gave me a reward card & told me shop whatever you want:) Now that is like a super gift for a wife right? I reached the MRT & called one of my friends to say that I am shopping today. She & I have had so many good times shopping together in the past. Now she too is a new mommy so she hardly gets time to go out & have "me" time. Finally it worked for both of us:) We met at Raffels place had lunch together, did some window shopping, chit chatting & then shopped till evening in the malls. It was a great outing. More than shopping we enjoyed each others company. Its so much important to have this "me" time once in a while. Before having Zion I used to meet this friend almost every week & now its like once a month or once in 2 months kinds.

These days I am so lazy to blog but definitely not lazy to cook. I have been making so many new dishes but haven't had the time to upload any of those. Now today's post is a curry that I made some time ago. This is a simple style Mangalorean curry made with coconut milk. This is how my Mom makes most of the fish curry. A very tasty & easy curry to go well with everything be it rice or roti's. This is how I made it:
 
Ingredients:

• 1 Kg cleaned & cut Squid
• 2 Onions chopped
• 2 Tomatoes Chopped
• 1 Tbspn ginger garlic paste
• 1.5 Tspn Cumin powder
• 1.5 Tspn coriander powder
• 1 Tspn chili powder
• 1/4 Tspn turmeric powder
• 1 Tbspn lemon juice
• 1 cup coconut milk
• 1/4 tspn fenugreek seeds
• curry leaves to garnish
• 1/2  cup hot water
• salt as per taste
• 1/2 tspn sugar
• 2 Tbspn coconut Oil
• Coriander leaves to garnish

Directions:

1. In a heavy bottom Pan, add oil fry fenugreek seeds, onions, ginger garlic paste until translucent
2. Add curry leaves tomatoes & cook this until fat separation.
3. Now add in all the Masala's mentioned above & saute for a minute.
4. Add the cleaned squid into this & saute for 3 to 4 minutes.
5. Now add in hot water, coconut milk , salt, sugar, lemon juice & bring this to a boil in low flame around 2 mins. Keep stirring or else the coconut milk will split
6. Turn off the flame & garnish the dish with coriander leaves.

Note:

1. I used coconut oil coz I use it for most of my seafood recipe to bring out the unauthentic Mangalorean flavour. You can use any other cooking oil if you want.
2. I cut my squid in round shape & they look like small onion rings, Well you can cut it any shape you want. Make sure you have cleaned it well

 

Sambal Belacan Prawns

In the last 4 months my son has gone on a school picnic for the 2nd time. This time it was to the Bollywood veggie farm. I hardly remember me having any kind of picnic while I was his age:) This time I dint accompany him but asked my maid to go along with him. I have noticed that he is very well behaved & friendly with my maid. If I am around he simply tries to throw tantrums & I find it very difficult to handle him outside. Last time I had a crazy time when I went along with him to the chicken farm picnic. This time My maid was saying that he was so good & quite that the teachers were surprised to see him that way. He is the naughty & loud one in the class:)

 I was just talking to my other Mommy friends & they too had similar things to share. The kids generally throw tantrums at their mom's & I think they love doing it. After all that enjoyment at the picnic, there was slight drizzle which has made my boy sick. He has been having high fever since saturday & is recovering now.

Since zion  was unwell we did not do much over the weekend. We just took him out in the evening for a walk to the nearby mall. We suddenly happened to taste Dulce le leche ice cream at Baskin Robbins & loved the taste. Since I had all the ingredients to make this, I tried this one & It turned out amazing! I will be posting this recipe soon.

Coming back to today's post, Ramadan being around the corner, I wanted to post as many non veg dishes as possible . You wont believe that I have more than 50 pending posts sitting in my laptop. I create most of my recipes, I have even forgotten how I made some of them:) This is a recipe that I tried from one of my fav chef's book "Best of Wan" I love his recipes & this chef is very entertaining. He is a very famous celebrity chef in Malaysia & Singapore. I rarely try his recipes, coz they are very rich & addictive:) If you love rich Malay food, then you must try out recipes from his books. This is Prawns sambal Belacan which is very similar to rendang curry. This is how I made it & I would have slightly modified to suit our taste.

Making time: 45 mins
cooking time: 25- 30 mins
Serves: 4 people

Ingredients:

• ½ kg / 1 pound of medium-sized Prawns cleaned
• 4 Tbspn oil
• Salt to taste
• 1/2 cup fry roasted decisated coconut
• 3 Tbsnp Thick coconut cream
• 2 tbspn Turmeric leaves finely chopped to garnish
• 2 Kafir lime leaf finely chopped to garnish
• 1 Tbspn Lemon juice

 

Paste Ingredients: (to be finely ground)

• 10 Shallots (Red Onions), peeled
• 15 dried Chilis soaked in hot water to soften and drain
• 2 Tbspn chopped lemon grass
• 1 Tbspn chopped galangal
• 3 Tbsp roasted dry Shrimps
• 3 Kaffir lime leaf chopped
• 1 Tbspn minced ginger & garlic
• 2 Tbspn chopped Turmeric leaf
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/4 Tspn Tamarind Paste
• 1/4 tspn Palm sugar (Jaggery)

Directions:

1. Heat Oil and sauté the Paste until fragrant. Lower the heat in order to not burn the spices. Cook slowly till oil surface or separates.
2. Add around 1/4 cup of hot water & bring this gravy to boil. Immediately bring down the heat & add thick coconut cream
3. Add in Turmeric leave, White Sugar (or Palm Sugar), and salt. Simmer until the gravy thickens.
4. Add in the Prawns and continue to simmer until the water from the prawns releases & cook until the gravy is slightly dry. This should take not more than 5 mins.
5. Turn off the fire and add in Kaffir Lime Leaves, turmeric leaves and roasted desiccated Coconut Paste. Stir them well.

 

Note:

1. Prawns cook really fast so do not over cook them. If you cook longer they will turn out chewy/rubbery.
2. Sometimes depending on the type of kadai you use, you might require more oil for frying the masala paste. So add it according to your preference
3. If you life the dish more spicy add more chili's if you want.
4. Try & serve this dish fresh to enjoy the juiciness of the prawns
5. I would advice you to use fresh Prawns or shrimps.
6. Since I dont like & stand the smell on ready Belacan paste, I skipped adding that & replaced it with dry roasted shrimps.

 

Prawn curry

So finally I am back to blogging after a small gap. The last 2 weeks have been a really busy week for me. One I have been busy with my son' s2nd bday celeration & other is I will be starting work after 2 years of gap. So now its "Corporate2kitchen- kitchen2corporate"

Now coming back to todays post. This is an old dish that I made a week ago. As mentioned in my earlier posts, You already know that I am a great fan of Shrimps. Found these in the market after a long time as these are not very frequent visitors. The moment I spot them & I buy them immediately. These gets sold really fast. Shrimps have a natural sweetness & they taste good anyway you cook them. Just the salt & pepper is enough to season & this will still taste delicious. This curry is a very easy recipe & I have used the basic spices in this. Just the chili powder & turmeric powder. Just these 2 spices are enough to season this & make it delicious. BTW there are many other seafood which has natural rich flavour so overkilling them with lot of masalas/spices will spoil its natural taste.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 kg cleaned shrimps
• 1 onions chopped small
• 1 big tomato chopped
• 1 Tbsp minced ginger
• 1 tbsp Garlic
• 1 Tbsp Red Kashmir chili powder
• 1/4 tspn Turmeric powder
• Less than 1/4 tspn tamarind paste
• salt as per taste
• 1/4 Tspn sugar
• 3 Tbsp of thick coconut cream or milk
• 1/2 cup of hot water
• Coriander leaves to garnish
• 1 Tbsp oil

Method:

1. In a pan add oil fry ginger, garlic, onions until translucent for about 3 to 4 mins
2. Now add in the tomatoes, chili powder, turmeric powder, salt & fry until fat separation. The tomatoes need to become totally soft.
3. Now add in the tamarind paste, shrimps & cook this for about 2 to 3 mins.
4. Combine the coconut cream, sugar, hot water & bring this to a boil for about 2 mins.
5. Turn off the flame & garnish it with coriander leaves.

 

A small tip when cooking seafood:

 when making certain seafood dishes make sure you dont kill the natural goodness with overpowering spices. Keep it simple & it will taste good.

Singapore Pepper Crab

 
Singapore is a big food hub. It has people from across the countries & it showcases a wide varieties of cuisines. There are places to eat from $2 - $100. If you walk in to any Hawker centre (food court) you will get to see a variety of local & Asian cuisine. One of the very famous & expensive dish is Singapore Chili/Pepper Crab. There are many places here that sells the best crab in town. Most people love to dine either at the Seafood beach restaurants, famous ones like Long Beach &Jumbo sea food. If you go around Clar quay or Boat quay, there are a lot of restaurants around the river that serve fresh live sea food too.

The crab dish rates starts from somewhere $50 - $800. Since I make very good crab dishes at home, we never felt the need to eat it out much. Like the chili Crab these Pepper crabs are also very famous. I made this one couple of days ago & I loved these more than the Chili crab. The heat from black peppers are not so intense like the fresh chili's. They were very easy on the tummy & with no after effects:) While researching for recipes, I found one here @My singapore kitchen & I customised it a little bit to suit our tastes buds. If you want to make Pepper Prawns you can follow the same recipe but just skip the boiling process.

Ingredients:

• 4 Big Flower crabs cleaned & cut into half
• 2.5 Tbsp Black pepper corns
• 4 Tbsp Black soya sauce
• 1 Knorr Chicken cube
• 2 Tbsp Lemon Juice
• 2 Tbsp Butter
• 1 Medium onion chopped
• Coriander leaves to garnish
• 1 Tspn sugar
• 2 Tbsp ginger garlic paste
• 4 cups water

Method:

1. In a big pot boil 4 cups of water with 1 tbsp of soya sauce. While the water is boiling add in the crabs into it.
2. Close lid & let it cook for about 5mins.
3. Make a paste of Black pepper, ginger garlic, soya sauce in a blender
4. In a large wok/Pan add in 2 tbsp of butter & fry onions until translucent.
5. Add in the black pepper paste, Knorr chicken cube, sugar lemon juice & saute well until fat separation.
6. Now tip in the crabs to the masala, add in some broth from the pot.
7. Close lid & cook the crabs for another 5 mins. Add more broth if required. (I added around 2 cups of broth)
8. Finally garnish the dish with coriander leaves.

Here is the step by step picture that will help you further understand the process.

Step 1:
Boil water add soya sauce & crab to the boiling water & cook for 5 mins
 

 
Step 2: Make a fine paste with pepper, ginger garlic, remaining soya sauce.

 
Step 3:

1. Add Butter into the pan, fry onions, add the ground paste, chicken cubes, sugar, lemon juice & saute until fat separation.
2. Now tip in the crabs & some broth.Close lid & cook for another 5mins.

 

Dry Fish Chutney

This is my 1 st post under traditional for BM#27. Dry Fish Chutney is a traditional Mangalore dish. They are so famous & a very common ingredient in people living in coastal region. In childhood days whenever we visited Mangalore, My Mom used to make sure to buy a good stock of dry fish. She would mainly buy dry shrimps, Nang meen (I dont know what they call it in English) or big fish. In Singapore most people eat dry fish & they add shrimp paste in most of their local cuisine. Dry Anchovies are very famous here & you will find them in all the food court/ Hawker centre. Here they make a Anchovy relish with soya sauce to go with Rice. Like how we have pickle with rice. This particular recipe that I am sharing is my Moms recipe & we call it "Suki Maslichi Chutney" Most Mangaloreans love to have this with Porridge (Kanni/Ganji) A very easy one & can be made with any dry fish. I have used 1st quality dry Anchovies. This is how I made it.

Serves: 4
Making time 15 Mins
Utensils: A pan, mixer grinder & spoon to saute

Ingredients:

• 2 cups of Dry Anchovies
• 1/2 cup grated coconut
• 4 red chili dry
• 1/4 tspn Tamarind paste
• 1 tspn coriander seeds
• 1/4 tspn turmeric powder
• 1 small onion chopped
• 1 tspn ginger & garlic small pieces
• Handful of curry leaves to garnish
• 1 Tbsp coconut oil
• Salt as per taste

Method:

1. Clean the dry fish & remove any dirt from it. Rinse it well in water, drain & set aside.
2. Dry roast the dry fish in a pan for about 3 to 5 mins & set aside
3. Dry roast the red chili, coriander coconut for about 2 to 3 mins & grind it finely along with tamarind & turmeric.
4. Now in the same pan add oil, fry ginger, garlic, onion, curry leaves for about 3 mins until the onions are translucent
5. Now add in the ground coconut mixture, salt as per taste & fry this for a minute.
6. Finally add in the dry fish & mix it well. Keep tossing it on low flame for about 2 mins or until well mixed

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM#27

Shrimp Masala

Shrimps are so versatile & they taste good however you make them. A simple salt & pepper also will bring out a nice taste. Well shrimps are smaller prawns & they are tastier than the bigger ones. In India we mostly get Shrimps & in Singapore these are not very common. Its easier to get the dried shrimps here than the fresh ones. Fortunately the wet market near to  my new place has them every time I visit. Whenever I go there I pick like about 2 kgs & stock them in the fridge. Since these are so easy to cook, I make them whenever I want to make some quick meal. This one is so easy & can be done under 10 mins. BTW chemeen in malyalam means Shrimps. since I have mostloy used south Indian spices for this preparation, I named it Chemeen Masala.

Serves: 3 people
Cook time: 10 mins

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of cleaned shrimps (1/2 kg)
• 1 tbspn souf (whole jeera)
• handful of curry leaves
• 1 Tspn red chili powder
• 1/4 tspn turmeric powder
• 1/4 Tspn of pepper powder
• 1 Tbsp coarsely ground ginger garlic pieces
• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 Tspn lemon juice
• 1/4 Tspn sugar
• Salt as per taste

Method:

In a pan add oil, fry ginger garlic, sauf, curry leaves for less than a minute, Now add in chili powder, turmeric powder, pepper powder fry for 4 seconds on very low flame, Now  add in the shrimps & fry them for about 3 to 4 mins or until the water is drained off. Add lemon juice & some curry leaves to garnish.

Note:

• Do not over cook the shrimps. Maximum cook time will be 5 mins

Kalumakai Fry

 

 

Yesterday I went to the wet market to pick up some fresh fish & meat. I saw fresh Mussels with one of the fish mongers & I picked a kilo from him. Mussels are very cheap, I paid just $2 for a kg. Mussels/Kallumakai is very popular in northen Kerala. During college days my Mallu fiends used to get it from their home. Aari Kadka is a very famous rice dish made with mussels in northern kerala. I used to wait for my friends to bring this while they are back to hostel from holidays. There are plenty on recipes the keralites make with Mussels. One if the simplest & commonly made are Kallumakai fry.

 

This is the first time I am cleaning the mussels & I must say that they stink so badly.. yucks....  I have cleaned the smaller ones before but they don't stink like these... At once i felt like throwing them all, coz i just couldn't control the smell. But I knew that once they are cleaned properly & washed they will taste very good. Although I like Seafood, but if it stinks I don't eat.The cleaning was a really long process but the end result so superb. I also went through a lot of cleaning videos on the net. Here are few links you can refer to  if you do not know how to clean these. click here to view the video to clean the black dirt from Mussels.

 

 

Ingredients:-

• 1 kg Mussels / Kallumakai (Once cleaned it will be 1 cup)
• 1 Tbsp Ginger garlic piece
• 1 Tspn Kashmiri red chili powder
•  1/4 Tspn pepper powder
• 1/4 Tspn Turmeric powder
• 1/2 Tspn Cumin powder
• 1 Tbsp  Lemon Juice
• Salt to taste
• 3 Tbsp Oil for frying
• Handful of curry leaves

Method:

1. Wash the mussels well under running water. If there are any opened shells discard it as they are spoilt.
2. In a heavy bottom pan add water about 3/4th of pan & cook the mussels with shell for about 10 mins in this water or until all shells are opened.
3. Drain off the water & remove meat from the shells, set aside.
4. Now there is a black part in the mussel meat that needs to be removed after its been boiled.
5. Once you remove the black part, soak the mussels in turmeric water for 10 minutes.
6. In a mixing bowl, add all the above ingredients except oil & curry leaves.
7. Now heat the pan with oil & add this mussel mixture & cook it for about 3 to 5 mins. Finally garnish them with curry leaves.

 

Prawn Ghee Roast

Prawn Ghee roast is a Mangalorean delicacy. In this dish a ground chili paste is fried in Ghee (Clarifies butter) & then the semi cooked Prawns is added to it. You can try this dish with Shrimps, chicken & Paneer too. This is our all time favorite & a little spicy but very tasty dish. I have posted the recipe for this earlier also, but this one has some modification. The earlier one had onion paste in it & can be made as curry.  I feel this one is much better than the earlier one. Even the picture & presentation is better here. This is a dry dish and can be had both as starters & main course. Goes very well with steamed rice, neer dosa & Pundi.

Serves: 4 people
Making time: 30 mins

Ingredients

1. 20 medium size prawns ( half to 3/4 th kg)
2. 10 to 15 roasted Long Red Chilly (Byadgi) . You can remove the seeds if you don't like it spicy. (Generally these chilies are not very spicy but gives a nice color)
3. 1/4 tsp tamarind paste
4. 1 tsp Coriander powder
5. 1/4 tsp Cumin Powder
6. 1 Tspn Garlic & 1 Tspn Ginger
7. 1/4 Tspn turmeric powder for marinade
8. 7 -8 Tbsp Ghee or 1/4 cup of Ghee (Clarified butter)
9. 1 Tbspn Coconut oil
10. Salt as per taste

Method:
 
1. Grind ingredients 2- 6 to a smooth paste.
2. Marinate the cleaned prawn with some salt & turmeric powder for about an hour.
3. In a Pan/ Kadai add 2 tbspn of ghee & fry the prawns for about 2 mins & remove.
4. In the same Pan add rest of ghee & add the ground masala paste, salt. fry this on low flame stirring for about 5 - 8 mins or until fat separation.
5. Finally add in the prawns stir well & cook this for about 2 mins. In the end garnish this dish with 1 Tbspn of coconut oil & mix well

This is how the ground Chili masala paste looks like

The masala after frying in ghee

Prawn Ghassi Video recipe

 

Now we have settled completed in our new home. The good part is there is a very big wet market near to my new house. I had been there couple of days ago & picked up tiger prawns. I am so impressed with the variety of fish available in this market. So here after any day I can just walk up to this market & bring home the days fresh catch:)

 

Well I made Prawn Ghassi - Mangalorean dish with half a kilo. Ghassi is a semi thick gravy & is made in every Mangaloreans house. Ghassi can be made with any fish, meat or even vegetables. I was able to take a video recipe for this one. Although the video clarity is not so good but its watchable:) This is a very simple & tasty dish. Its a must try...

 

 

Serves 4
Cooking time - 20 mins
Cuisine- Indian Coastal

· 1/2 Kg Tiger prawns

 

· 1 cup fresh/frozen coconut pieces or grated

 

· 4 to 5 red dried chillies (if you can handle more, increase it)

 

· 1 tea spn coriander seeds

 

· 1/4 Tspn cumin seeds

 

· 1/4 tspn black pepper corn

· 1/4 Tspn Kashmiri red chili

· 1/4 tspn Turmeric powder

· 1 medium tomatoes chopped

· 2 slit green chili's

· 1 large onion chopped

· 1 cup of water

· 1/4 tspn sugar

· 2 Tbspn coconut oil (can use any oil)

· 1/ tspn Tamarind paste (optional)

· salt as per taste

· Coriander leaves to garnish

Method:

1.       Dry roast red chillies, coriander seeds, cumin, Black pepper until fragrant.

2.      Now along with coconut, turmeric, chili powder, grind this to a fine paste with 1/4 cup of water. Do not add too much water (This needs a good Indian mixer).

3.      In a pan add coconut oil, fry onion & green chili until translucent.

4.      To this now add in the ground masala paste, tomatoes & 1/4 cup of water. Close lid, cook this for about 5 to 8 minutes until the raw smell goes off & you see some oil floating on top or sides(On medium or low flame)

5.      Add in salt, sugar & Prawns in this. Now cook for another 3 to 5 mins with lid closed. Add some water if required.

6.      Turn off flame & garnish with coriander leaves. Prawn ghassi is ready.

Click here for video recipe