I really enjoy cooking…when I have a clean kitchen, time, and  people who are actually going to eat what I make.  This is usually not the case these days so my dinners are usually easy  to make and easy to clean up.  But tonight I actually made a whole Indian meal.  It wasn’t too time consuming.  I used the crock pot and the rice cooker and got those started around 12:30pm and we ate around 5:30.

I made Chicken Curry, Rice, Curried cauliflower, Cucumbers and sour Cream and heated up some Naan.

The Sri Lankan Chicken Curry is really easy.  This recipe serves 4.  I always make more.

3 T oil

2 onions finely sliced

1 one inch long piece of ginger chopped

2 garlic cloves

1/2 t turmeric

1 t chili powder

2 t garam masala

14 oz boneless chix (today I used a bag of the flash frozen chix tenders)

3/4 cup plus 2 T unsweetended coconut milk

2 tomatoes quartered

1/2 t salt

heat oil in a medium saucepn.  Add onions cook till golden. add ginger, garlic and spices-mix well for one minute.  add chicken mix well cook stirring for 5 minutes.  (at this point I threw mine in the crock pot with all the rest of the ingredients!)

Pour in 1 cup plus 2 T water.  bring to a boil.  reduce heat, cover and cook for 10 minutes

reduce heat to very low. add the coconut milk.  cook 10 minutes of until chicken is thoroughly cooked.  stir in tomatoes and salt.  cook 5 more minutes.  add fresh cilantro to taste-I add LOTS!

serve this over rice.  basmati is what we like best-I mix 1/2 brown and 1/2 white-cuz my family won’t just eat brown!  I added some olive oil, salt, frozen peas, a couple cinnamon sticks, cardamom pods, and some whole cloves in with the rice to cook.  It smells divine!

I also always serve this with cucumbers and sour cream-or you can make a riata.  I skin cucumbers and use the slicer part on my grater and grate into a bowl.  add salt-don’t be stingy with the salt here- and set aside so they make some juice.  add a few spoonfuls of sour cream and lots of black pepper.

Curried Cauliflower

1 head cauliflower cut up into pieces and put in a bowl with 1 t turmeric and 1 t salt.

Heat 6 T ghee (butter or oil will do) and saute cauliflower until tender. remove and set aside.  In same pan fry 1 t cumin, 1 t cayenne (use less this will be HOT), 1 t fresh ginger stirring constantly.  add 3 small chopped tomatoes and 1 t sugar and cook for 5 minutes.  add cauliflower back to pan stir, lower the heat, cover.  cook 8-10 minutes.  garnish with chopped coriander leaves (aka  whole lot of fresh cilantro).

We also always have Nan with this meal.  You can usually find it frozen if you can’t find it fresh.

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