Braised pheasant

Braised pheasant

Ingredients

1 pheasant for two people

1 onion peeled and chopped

1 stick celery, chopped

1 large carrot, chopped

1 large bottle dry cider

2 large or three medium Cox's apples, cored (no need to peel) and chopped into 1 1/2 cm pieces.

olive oil

2 bay leaves

parsley

thyme

large know of butter

Heaped tablespoon flour

A metal casserole that can be used on the stove

Recipe

Heat some olive oil in the casserole and brown the pheasant on all sides. Remove and set aside.

Add the chopped onions, fry for 5 minutes.

Add celery and carrot. Fry for a further 5 minutes.

Replace the pheasant, breast up.

Pour over sufficient cider to cover about 2/3 of the pheasant.

Add bay leaves, parsley, thyme, plenty of freshly ground black pepper and salt to taste.

Bring to the boil, cover with lid and place in the oven at 140°C.

After 1 hour, add the apples.

After a further 1/2 hour, remove from oven, remove pheasant and place a carving dish with the apples and vegetables.

Heat the casserole and boil vigorously to reduce liquid by about 1/3.

Melt butter in a saucepan and add flour. Heat for a few minutes to cook flour. Add the liquid from the casserole whisk vigorously to obtain a smooth sauce. Taste and add salt and pepper if required.

Carve the pheasant. Serve with the apples, the vegetables and the sauce accompanied by a green vegetable and boiled potatoes.

Spiced duck breast

Chinese spiced duck breasts

Ingredients

4 duck breasts
Chinese 5 spices*
plain flour
white vermouth

Set the oven to 200°C.
Pat the duck breasts dry with some paper towelling.
Cover both sides with the ground spices and sprinkle salt sparingly.
Place in oven in a roasting tin for 20 minutes.
Remove breasts and set aside.
Place roasting tin on stove and add heaped tablespoon flour. Scrape round with a wooden spoon to incorporate any bits in the tin. Add wine glass of white vermouth; let the alcohol boil off. Add sufficient chicken stock to make a sauce. Adjust seasoning.
Carve the duck into 1 cm thick slices.
Serve on a bed of rice accompanied by the sauce and a green vegetable of choice.

Note:
Chinese 5 spices. 

Grind together:
1 teaspoon cloves
I heaped teaspoon fennel seeds
4 cm cinnamon bark
1 teaspoon dry roasted Szechuan peppers
2 star anise

The time of roasting depends on how you like your duck meat (well done to pink) and the thickness of the breasts. I usually check the temperature with a meat thermometer.

Biriani

Biriani

Serves 4

Ingredients

2 teacups basmati rice

curry of choice

3 cardamon pods

5 cloves

piece of cinnamon bark

5 curry leaves (preferably fresh, otherwise dried).

some strands of saffron

fried oninon rings

The curry can be whatever type of biriani you want to prepare - lamb, chicken, vegetable (mixed or a single vegetable curry). You will need enough for a single helping for one person

Method

Soak the saffron in a little hot water

Wash the rice and allow to dry.

Melt some ghee in a saucepan and stir in the rice

Add 3 1/2 teacups water with the cardamon, cloves, cinnamon, curry leaves and a little salt

Bring to the boil, turn the heat down, cover and cook for 10 minutes

Lift out the cinnamon bark

Grease the inside of a casserole with butter.

Add a layer of rice (about 1/3 of the rice) and pour in 1/3 the saffron water

Add a layer of curry then rice plus saffron water, curry and rice plus saffron again

Top with fried onion rings

Cover the casserole tightly and either place on the stove on a low heat for 10 minutes or in the oven for about 20 minutes

Aloo dum

There are dozens of recipes for potato curry (often called Aloo Dum). I have adapted this recipe from a dish I cooked with Chef Lokesh Mathur in his cooking class in Jaipur.

Serves 4 as side dish

Ingredients

Peeled potatoes in 1 cm cubes, 16-20 pieces

1 red onion chopped

3 green cardamons

1 black cardamon

3 cloves

2 tsp ginger and garlic paste

1 flat teaspoon red chilli powder

1 heaped teaspoon coriander powder

Tube of tomato puree

1 heaped tablespoon ot cashew nuts and melon seeds ground together

Yogurt, preferably Greek style, full fat 

small handful methi (fenugreek) leaves.

Method

Boil potatoes for about 10 minutes (until just cooked). Drain and set aside

Fry onions in some oil until golden brown

Add crushed cardamons and cloves, ginger & garlic paste, chilli and coriander powders and two generous squeezes of tomato puree. Fry for a few minutes.

Add ground cashew and melon seeds 

Add enough water to give a good paste

Stir in the yogurt and the methi leaves

Add salt to taste

Add the cooked potatoes and stir to coat them evenly

Cook briefly to heat the potatoes

To weigh or not to weigh?

To weigh or not to weigh?

For roast meat, I weigh the joint to calculate the cooking time.

For other savoury dishes, I do not weigh or measure anything. I just add what looks about right, occasionally varying quantities according to my mood. In my recipes, I have indicated quantities but, if you want to try the recipe, to not feel bound by amounts given, just use them as a guide.

For bread, pastries, cakes, etc., I weigh everything carefully.

For bread, I find 500 gm flour plus 300 gm water works well.

For pastry, I always use 2 parts flour to one part fat (margarine, butter, suet, goose fat) by weight.

For cakes, I always follow a recipe carefully.

Baigan Bhaji (Aubergine curry)

Baigan Bhaji

I used to cook this curry using a large aubergine purple aubergine found in supermarkets. However, the aubergine soaks up a lot of oil in the initial stages of cooking. I frequently eat at the Everest Spice, my local Nepalese/Indian restaurant, in Redhill. They serve a dish they call Bhenta Ko Tahkaari which uses small (about 4 cms long) aubergines. I now use whatever variety of small aubergine they have in my local Asian shop.I find they have more flavour and do not soak up as much oil.

Serves 4 as a side dish

Ingredients

500 gm small aubergines, cut into 2 cm pieces

2 or 3 dried chillies

2 heaped tsps garam masala

1 medium onion, chopped

4 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

1/2 tsp asafoetida (hing) powder

2 or 3 ripe tomatoes, tomatoes

tomato paste

juice of 1 lime

salt

vegetable oil

Use a heavy bottomed saucepan.
Crumble the chillies into hot oil and fry for 5 min.
Add garam masala.
After 1 min add onions and garlic.
Add asafoetida.
When the onions are translucent, add the aubergines.
Add the tomatoes, a good squeeze of tomato paste, lime juice and salt. Stir well.
If necessary, add just enough water to stop the ingredients catching on the bottom of the pan.

Cover and leave on a low simmer until the aubergines are cooked, about 30 min.

Garam masala Heat a dry pan and dry fry 5 tsps cumin seeds, 3 tsps coriander seeds, 8 cloves, 8 green cardamon pods and 1 brown cardamon pod until they start to brown slightly. Let the seeds cool and then grind them with a 2 cm piece of cinnamon stick and about 1/4 nutmeg. Grind into a powder. I use an old coffee grinder kept just for spices.

Note: The number of dried chillies added depends on how hot the chillies are and how hot you like the dish. I buy a large packet and experiment . Alternatively, you can leave them out and add chilli powder at the onion stage.

At this point, you can also add thinly sliced fresh chillies (red or green). I usually deseed them.

Persian Lamb Casserole

Persian Lamb Casserole

When I was in Isfahan with my friend, Alireza Ardjmand, we had a spiced lamb stew with fruit in it. Ali said the fruit was pomegranate.This is my version using apricots.

Serves 4

Ingredients

750 gm lamb shoulder, off the bone, 2 cm dice

olive oil

heaped tsp cumin

6 cloves

8 green cardamon pods

2 tsps allspice seeds

3 cm piece of cinnamon bark

1 onion, finely sliced

3 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

vegetable stock 

8 apricots, stoned and cut in quarters. Use fresh if in season, otherwise use dried, soaked in some hot water, if necessary

salt 

black pepper

Use a casserole dish than can be placed on the stove.

In a frying pan, heat some olive oil and brown the lamb. Set aside.

In the casserole dish, heat some olive oil. Add the cumin seeds followed by the cloves, cardamon and allspice, all crushed. Fry for 2 min.

Add onion and garlic. Fry until translucent.

Add the lamb and stir well.

Heat some stock in the frying pan and scraping up any bits from the lamb. Add to the casserole.

Add the apricots.

Pour in enough stock to just cover everything.

Bring to the boil and place in a pre-heated oven at 180°C.

Cook until lamb is tender (60-90 min).

In Iran, the stew was served with rice and salad.

Handi Lamb

Handi Lamb

Handi is a type of cooking pot but the word is often used to describe the food that might be cooked in a handi.

The recipe below is my version of the dish I cooked with Chef Lokesh Mathur in his cooking class in Jaipur.

Mr. Lokesh gave me a recipe which we then did not follow so I relied on my notes.

Serves 4

Ingredients

About 1 kg lamb on the bone. Scrag end of neck is suitable, I sometimes use Barnsley chops but these are probably rather expensive for this dish. 

coriander seeds

green cardamons

brown cardamon

cloves

peppercorns

1 onion

melon seeds

asafoetida powder 

chilli powder

melon seeds (ground)

garlic and ginger paste

salt

Cover the meat with water and boil for about 30 minutes. Skim off any fat after about 10 min. Remove the meat and keep the cooking water (to use later). If the pieces of meat are small enough, leave them on the bone, otherwise, strip off the meat and discard the bone.

Crush 2 tsps coriander seeds, about 8 green cardamons, 1 brown cardamon, 8 cloves and a tsp peppercorns. Add the spices to some ghee heated in a heavy bottomed pan. fry briefly, add a medium onion, sliced thinly. When it has softened, add 1/2 tsp asafoetida (hing) powder, 1/2 tsp chilli powder, 2 tsps ground melon seeds and 2 tsps garlic & ginger paste and salt. Fry for 5 minutes; add enough lamb cooking water to make a thick gravy. Add the pieces of lamb, stir well, cover and cook for another 10 min. You might want to add a little lamb water.

Garlic and ginger paste. You can buy this in an Asian shop. To make your own, place about one inch of peeled ginger root and eight garlic cloves with a little water in a small food processor and whizz together.

Okra curry

Okra curry (my version of Bhindi Sukha)

Adapted from a dish cooked for me by Bhaskar Battacharrya

Ingredients

Good handful of okra per person
dried chilli seeds
panch phoran
1 onion
asafoetida powder (hing)

Wash the okra.. Leave to dry. The top and tail them and slice into one inch pieces.

In a heavy bottom saucepan, fry a couple of crumbled dried chillies in vegetable oil or ghee. After 5 min, add 1/2 tablespoon panch phoran, allow to sparkle for a few seconds. Add a chopped onion, when it is a golden colour, add 1/2 teaspoon asafoetida powder. Stir in the okra. Add just enough water to stop the food catching on the bottom of the pan. Put the lid and cook an a low heat for 15 min. Add a little more water during cooking if necessary.

Panch phoran is mixture of cumin, black mustard, nigella, fenugreek and fennel seeds. Sold in Asian shops or add individual spices.

Note: The number of dried chillies added depends on how hot the chillies are and how hot you like the dish. I buy a large packet and experiment . Alternatively, you can leave them out and add chilli powder at the onion stage.

At this point, you can also add thinly sliced fresh chillies (red or green). I usually deseed them.

My dahl recipe

My Dahl Recipe

Ingredients

200 gm lentils.
dried chillies
panch phoran
1 onion
4 cloves garlic
fresh ginger root

Wash the lentils thoroughly. Add to a heavy bottomed pan and cover with water, add 1/2 teaspoon salt and boil for about 30 min. Add water as necessary. The dahl should be a half way between sloppy and dry. Stir in some tomato paste. 

Meanwhile, in some vegetable oil, fry:

a couple of dried chillies, after 5 min add half a tablespoon of panch phoran (see below), then half an onion thinly sliced and the garlic, chopped.

When the onions are well done, stir into the lentils. Add about 1/2 inch of ginger root, chopped finely.

Before serving, garnish with crispy fried onion rings. 

Panch phoran is mixture of cumin, black mustard, nigella, fenugreek and fennel seeds. Sold in Asian shops or add individual spices.

Note: The number of dried chillies added depends on how hot the chillies are and how hot you like the dahl. I buy a large packet and experiment . Alternatively, you can leave them out and add chilli powder at the onion stage.

At this point, you can also add thinly sliced fresh chillies (red or green). I usually deseed them.