Kitchen3N

Recipes and food fun from Apt 3N

Ramadan Round Up

Ramadan is halfway over, but there’s still time to make some of my favorite recipes for this time of year! Going clockwise from the top left:

Citrus Quinoa Salad with Dates, Almonds and Mint – we consume a lot of dates during Ramadan. This recipe uses up any extra dates you may have in a salad you can feel good about eating at the end of a long fast!

Meyer Lemon Strawberry Lemonade – I know sugar is the devil. I know. But you have to try this lemonade. It is light years beyond any bottled strawberry lemonade you can find. Recipe adapted from Pioneer Woman.

Basil Smoothie – a surprising staple in many homes I’ve introduced this smoothie to. Basil, yogurt, sugar and ice makes for an unexpectedly refreshing drink.

Tandoori Chicken – an easy, make ahead dish. When you’re fasting, you’re low on energy. So the less time you have to spend on your feet in the kitchen, the better. These chicken legs get a quick marinade of yogurt and spices. Then about 45 minutes before eating, pop them in a hot oven. That is all.

Mint Limeade – aka virgin mojitos. The refreshing flavors of lime and mint make this the perfect compliment to your break-fast meal.

Haleem – a protein packed Ramadan must. It’s one stop, one pot iftar. Stewed meat, grains and lentils combine to make the most filling, comforting dish possible. Can probably make this in your slow cooker as well.

Fruit Chaat – refreshing and easy. Simply combine your favorite fruits – try to ensure varying textures and levels of sweetness. Try apples, grapes, kiwis. Or pineapple, cantelope, raspberries. Or mango, blueberry, nectarine. Leave the yogurt/chaat masala dressing on the side, or mixed in, for a variation of your favorite fruit salad.

Banana Date Nut Bread – another healthy way to use up dates. The potassium from the bananas and dates combined with the fiber from the whole wheat make this bread great to have on hand when you’re short on time for your pre-dawn meal. Can bump up the fiber content with flax seeds, chia seeds, etc.

Aloo Chop (Fried Mashed Potato Balls) – not the healthiest thing on the list, but a comfort food must for many of us South Asians. Mashed potato balls stuffed with bits of hard boiled egg, breaded and fried. Yum!

Beef Tagine

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I have been bitten by the travel bug. Not recently. The bite’s been smoldering more or less my whole life with my actual escapades limited only by finances and well, youth. And now, in the absolute DEAD of winter. With over a foot of snow in NYC in the past two weeks and with even more snow on the way this weekend!!! This is usually about the time New Yorkers duck out for more tropical climates. My husband and I ran away from a devastating snow storm in March 2010 that brought down power lines and trees in upstate NY. So, we were jerks and literally left our friends in the dark while we frolicked around Montego Bay.

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That same winter I had gone to Fez, Morocco for a work retreat. Although I didn’t have a chance to see Casablanca or ride camels in the desert, it was a great bonding experience with my colleagues. We did this great exercise in negotiation where small groups of us ventured into the bazaar with trinkets we had brought with us from our respective countries and tried to barter for the best deal. Someone traded an NYC Taxi Magnet for a lamp. Someone else bartered a snow globe for, what was it…a tagine?!

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Segwayyyyy! A tagine is a Moroccan earthenware pot that’s meant for low and slow cooking. It’s got a flat bottom with low sides and a conical top that’s supposed to accumulate the condensation. That ends up basting the meat throughout the cooking time. Now, I didn’t make it back with a tagine, but I did score a Martha Stewart dutch oven when I got married. It’s got little bumps all along the inside of the lid that effectively does the same thing as the tagine top.

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With the bottom round roast from Honest Chops, you want something that cooks for a long time to break down and tenderize an otherwise tough cut of meat. I went through all my recipe books and as much as I would’ve loved to try beef bourguignon or a beef daube, or even a pot roast, I just don’t have a good substitute for wine! Do you?

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And since I’ve posted many a curry on this site, I thought I’d try something different. So I went with Jamie Oliver’s recipe for beef tagine. Spices, beef, chickpeas, vegetables, broth. Right up my alley, right? Unfortunately, it wasn’t. I felt like there was a spice overload. A whole tablespoon of cinnamon – not bad. But then a tablespoon of cumin. A tablespoon of ground ginger. Paprika. Ras el hanout. I don’t even have ras el hanout (literally – top of the shop) spice mix. So I just did a quarter tsp of spices typically found in it – ground cardamom, coriander, chili powder, turmeric, nutmeg and all spice.

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You rub the spices into the meat and let it sit overnight (or at least 2 hours). They look and smell great at this point. Like fragrant truffles (is that redundant?). And when you brown it in the oil, it gives off the slightest golden hue from the turmeric. But that’s where my love affair ends. I tasted it 1 hour, 1.5 hours, and 2 hours into the cooking time. And I thought it was perfect at 1.5 (which is half the cooking time he suggests). I just wanted to avoid the fate of a certain boneless short ribs. But it was good at 2 hours as well. The prunes were a good additional as well. All in all – worth trying, just not my favorite.

Recipe courtesy of Jamie Oliver.

Ingredients

  • 1 tbsp cinnamon, cumin, paprika, ground ginger
  • 1/4 tsp turmeric, nutmeg, coriander, chili powder, cardamom and all spice
  • 2 tsp salt (more to taste)
  • 1/2 tsp pepper (more to taste)
  • 1 to 1.5 lbs organic, grass fed, bottom round roast, cut into cubes
  • 2-3 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 yellow onion, diced
  • 1 bunch cilantro stems, chopped
  • 1 can chickpeas (14 oz)
  • 1 can crushed tomatoes (14 oz)
  • 3 1/2 cups vegetable stock
  • 2 summer squash, sliced (I don’t know if this is the type of squash he had in mind, but he didn’t specify so I went with the easiest one)
  • 6-7 prunes, chopped
  • cilantro, for garnish
  • cooked couscous, quinoa or rice for serving

Directions

  1. Rub all the spices with the meat and let sit in the fridge overnight or two hours at a minimum.
  2. Heat oil in a tagine, dutch oven, cast iron casserole, or large pot over high heat. Add the meat, spices and all, and let brown for 5-7 minutes. Add onions and cilantro stems and stir, scraping up browned bits from the bottom of the pot. Cook for an additional 5 minutes. Add chickpeas, tomato and broth and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat to low and cook for an hour and a half, stirring occasionally to make sure nothing sticks to the bottom.
  3. After an hour and a half, add squash and prunes. Cover and cook over low heat until squash cooks through (about 30 minutes).
  4. Taste for seasoning. Garnish with cilantro and serve with preferably quinoa and a hit of lemon or lime juice.

Haleem

IMG_1248Warning: this post isn’t about finding the mother of all haleem recipes. I’m not even gonna say it will give your grandma’s a run for her money (though it’s darn good). No, this post is about accessibility. Haleem is not an enigma. Sure, there’s barley, wheat, lentils, even dried papaya. But you don’t have to go out of your way looking for ingredients you don’t usually stock your pantry with. Nor do you have to run to Jamaica or Jackson Heights, or wherever you go for your fix. Instead, you pick up a box of Shan’s Easy Cook Haleem mix and get ready to wow the salwars off your friends and family.

IMG_1234Let me first back up a bit for those of you who aren’t familiar. Haleem is a thick, spicy stew made by creating a flavorful broth of spices and meat (usually goat meat or chicken), then thickening with lentils, barley and wheat. It is traditionally eaten during Ramadan, at iftar (or evening breakfast). But it’s so warm, spicy and hearty – it’s really ideal for the dead of winter!

The box includes a spice mix (which you totally don’t need all of). It is really, really spicy and salty, so I only use like 2/3 of the packet. Use 1/2 if you’re a spice eating lightweight. It also includes the lentils and grains, pulverized, so you wouldn’t need to soak them overnight like in a traditional haleem. Again – accessibility! The instructions neglect one very important ingredient: garlic/ginger paste (or finely minced garlic and ginger). Make sure to add a good heaping tablespoon to the meat as it cooks. And finally, contrary to what it says on the box, it is not ready in 30 minutes, even if you have a pressure cooker! For me, goat meat (or mutton) takes a good hour and half over a low flame, with the lid on, to get fully tender. I also get the onions going very early on, because I like to caramelize my onions low and slow. Once you do add the grains, they tend to clump up. So add them slowly, and stir continually, to breakdown any clumps.

meat and onions, going side by sidethe finished productTraditionally, you serve it with chopped cilantro, grated ginger, crispy onions, a slice of lemon/lime, and perhaps some green chilis. Not here. I loathe fresh ginger and raw chilis. I just like to add the cilantro and citrus to brighten up an otherwise long-going stew (cook time was 2 hrs!). This serves about 8-10 people. And even though Ramadan is coming to an end, it’s a great dish for your Eid spread!

Ingredients

  • 1 box Shan Haleem mix (including spice mix and grains)
  • 1/2 cup oil
  • 1 heaping tbsp garlic/ginger paste
  • 1.5 lbs mutton or chicken (don’t cop out and make the chicken one!), cut into pieces
  • 15 cups water
  • 1 large onion, or 2 medium
  • cilantro, fried onion, ginger, green chilis and/or lemon wedge for garnish

Directions

  1. In a large pot, heat up half a cup of vegetable oil or ghee over medium high heat. Add 1/2 to 2/3 of the spice packet. Add the meat and garlic/ginger paste and stir to combine.
  2. Add water, bring to a boil over high heat. Then lower the heat, put the lid back on and simmer for an hour, hour and a half. Stir occasionally to make sure no funky stuff is going on. Meat should be tender and falling off the bones when done. Taste for seasoning.
  3. While the meat is going, thinly slice the onion and add to a separate fry pan over low heat, to two tablespoons oil. Stir occasionally, increasing frequency towards the end. It take a bit of babysitting (after about 20 minutes) to make sure the edges don’t burn. Once they’re browned, turn off the heat.
  4. Meanwhile, from the haleem pot: take the meat out, and shred it using your hands or two forks. Then add the meat back into the broth along with the contents of the grains packet. Stir continuously to make sure there are no clumps. After 20-30 minutes, add caramelized onions and remove from heat. Add a cup of water if it looks too thick.
  5. Serve with cilantro, fried onion, slices of ginger, green chilis and/or lemon/lime.