Confession: Dinner in this house is usually very boring, which doesn’t make much sense because I do enjoy cooking. Yet somehow I get stuck in these long ruts of making the same thing over and over and over again OR I simply feel too lazy/poor to go to the grocery store and buy exciting ingredients. So what ends up happening is meals like this:
Step One: Make Rice in chicken stock.
- Step Two: Heat a few cans of beans (Kidney and black beans pictured here). Add a jar of salsa. Simmer for a bit.
Step Three: Layer Rice, Bean mixture, and Cheese in 13x9.
Step Four: Top with cheese. Bake @ 350 for 10 minutes.
Step Five: Top with sauce and .... Enjoy?
Part of this meal is still sitting in the fridge, waiting for someone hungry and desperate enough to finish it off. In the meantime, we’d much prefer to feast on the Golden Chicken Curry I made last night. I had my first taste of this delicious dish last weekend at Cousin Jennifer’s house for a family reunion. It was so good that I decided I must make it ASAP.
As I perused the grocery store gathering ingredients for the week and this meal, I almost abandoned my cart when I realized I’d need to buy a whole chicken. My beef with making meals with chicken is that in order to be efficient, economical, responsible (you get the picture), I have to buy a bird, cook it, and pull off the meat myself. Not my favorite chore. In fact, I hate it. In my richer, careless, nine to five employed days, I always bought boneless, skinless breasts. How easy! How quick! How wonderful! Now that I’m home, I have no excuse.
In a series of very whiny emails to my sister-in-law I asked if there was some easy, wonderful, non greasy way to procure the meat for this recipe. Maybe some sort of special tool? No such luck. Her only suggestion was to warm it up first (I had cooked it in the crock the night before), and so I did.
Fortunately my reward for this unpleasant task was a wonderful, exciting, and new (!) meal for the Baer family. A giant mess in the kitchen later and dinner was ready:
Taste test: 9/10 (Austin) 9.5/10 (Kate)
Golden Chicken Curry via Mama’s Minutia
Adapted from a hand-me-down cookbook: The Flavors of Bon Appétit 2000
INGREDIENTS
the meat from one cooked chicken, chopped
1 hearty glug of oil
2 or 3 large onions, chopped
1/4 cup minced, peeled fresh ginger
3 garlic cloves, minced
3 tablespoons curry powder
1 teaspoon cumin
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tablespoons flour
1 cup plain yogurt
3 tablespoons tomato paste
3 cups chicken broth
1 cup applesauce
1 10-ounce (2-3 cups) package frozen peas
½ cup sour cream
½ cup coconut milk
salt, to taste
Possible toppings: cilantro, green onions, chutney, chopped bananas, raisins, chopped peanuts or cashews, coconut, etc.
**Note: Dish significantly improves (and warrants a 9.5/10) when topped with mango chutney.
INSTRUCTIONS
Sauté the onions in the oil till they’re translucent and tender.
Add the ginger and garlic and sauté one minute.
Add the curry, cumin, flour, and cinnamon and sauté one minute more.
Add the yogurt and tomato paste, stir until thick, and simmer for one minute.
Add the broth and applesauce, bring to a boil, and then simmer for a few minutes.
The perks of cooking your own chicken---instant broth!
Add the chopped chicken...
...and peas and heat through.
Remove the kettle from the heat and stir in the sour cream and coconut milk (you may continue to heat, as needed, but do not boil). Taste to adjust seasonings.
Serve over rice, with a smattering of condiments. Delicious!
All our leftovers are gone and now you’ve gone and made me hungry. Shame!
(I’m glad you liked it. But that probably goes without saying.)
I like how you take all of the ingredients over to your door for their glamor shots.
That rice and bean dish doesn’t look that bad. Was it really so terrible?
Not bad, just boring.
I thought you’d like that :) Otherwise they look so yellow!
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