Not there yet? Have a great day & you'll be closer tomorrow!
Lovely day yesterday spent doing things I love, cooking, walking, working, in that order too! I also had my annual review with my manager and I think that went pretty well, of course there's always room for improvement but what I did appreciate was the recognition for all the hard work I put in and the results I get especially with the responsibilities that I have. I felt good after the call, I really did.
Then I sat and had me ten minutes looking through the new magazine, there are so many good recipes in their, I'm super excited for the new cookbook arriving next month now, it's all about 5 ingredients which is brilliant, I love an easy recipe. Anyway turns out I need to eat the food in the fridge cos I want to cook some recipes the weekend from the mag, including pizza, there's on recipe just like the pizza I ate yesterday, how fabs that.
I finally got round to try to make Harj's curry and lentils, both dishes took over an hour, if you follow her instructions properly, there's a lot of standing around and patience, I even nipped to the shop at one point whilst the onions were doing their thing.
I can't explain how good these two pans of food made me feel, I've always wanted to master an Indian dish so I can just come in and throw it all in the pan. I know feel like with a bit of practice I'm going to be able too.
It wasn't bad for a first attempt, I even had the thumbs up off Suman and Harjit themselves, next time more chilli (check me out getting brave). I had the lentils for my breakfast, they worked out at 1SP per 100g cooked weight because I used 3 tablespoons of oil in the recipe, I guess I could use less but they were lush. For my lunch I had sister food, chicken and orzo with veg, forgot how good a cold orzo salad was.
it might not look like a pretty bowl of food, but this is what proves beauty is only skin deep, this dish was so full of flavours, just divine.
This is the recipe and photos I followed to make Harj's curry lentil soup, now you could try using less oil, Harj doesn't measure her oil, she's a bit like Jamie Oliver and does the 'glue' thing (I used 3 tablespoons this time) if you wanted but I have to say, for me it was worth the points, I weighed the pot into portions at the end and had 1.6kg total which works out at 1SP per 100g of soup, lush. Seriously lush! I could honestly eat that for breakfast every day, I guess normal folk would eat it for lunch. I did however only use the 1 tablespoon on the chicken curry and that was sound so I'd probably try it with 1 tablespoon next time and save some points. I forgot to wash my lentils too :)
Harj's Lentil curry soup
4SP for the whole pan with these ingredients
1 small cup red lentils, mung yellow lentils & chana dal (pulses).
2 tsp turmeric
Boiling water - I used 2 kettle fulls
Base - 2-3 onions
Garlic - I used 1 frozen block - you get these from Asda or other supermarkets
Ginger - 1-2 blocks
3 x green chilli’s add more if you like it spicier
1tbs olive oil - 4SP
1-2tsp cumin seeds
Tomatoes - either tinned which need to be purée or passata.
1tsp garam masala
Coriander (optional)
Method:
Wash all lentils in saucepan with warm water - drain water and add boiling water.
Add salt & turmeric, bring to the boil be careful not to let it boil over, then turn gas down and simmer, cover saucepan but didn’t cover completely otherwise dhal will boil over - leave to simmer stirring occasionally until it start to thicken and looks like soup consistency. This can take up to 30-45mins to get right consistency.
Base
chop onions add to separate saucepan and add olive oil.
Cook for 5 mins and add garlic, ginger and chopped chili, if onions start sticking to saucepan keep adding water.
You need to cook onions until they are more or less purée, then add tomatoes.
Cook onions/tomatoes until they look like a paste then add to the lentils which should now have cooked and look like soup. Also add 1tsp of garam masala and coriander if required.
Here's the photos she sent me to work with;
285g / 10oz
add 2 level teaspoons salt to the lentils
2 teaspoons of turmeric added to lentils
add boiling water (1 x kettle)
For the base
chop 3 onions
garlic, ginger and green chillis
boil the lentils then simmer
add olive oil to onions, add garlic, then ginger
Then cut chilli and add
optional you can add cumin seeds - 1 tsp
lentils will thicken when simmering
add water if onions start sticking
once onions are cooked and this consistency add tomatoes (I use pasata)
about a quarter on a 500g carton
add garam masala to lentils, half to one teaspoon
onions should start to look like this
Now they are cooked, add to lentils
Finished product
Total cooking time 50 minutes to cook lentils, by the time the onion (thurka) had cooked it was an hour. I did add another half kettle of water to lentils as well.
And that is the magic of Harjit, the 'THURKA' is the onion base, if you can master that to your tastebuds it's the base for any curry you want to make, add any ingredients to it and you have it sussed. I'll never make one as good as hers but if I can be a good copy, I'll take that.
I need to get gone, I've a day job to get to ;) Here's to a very great day, let's make ourselves a priority!
Stay BeYOUtiful!
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(O,O)
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