It's Indian, and it's green: Saag Aloo Murghi

"Saag Aloo" means spinach and potato curry, and "Murghi" means chicken. Spinach is a great vehicle for curry, as it pairs well with the spices and has a great deal of antioxidants and Omega 3s. And as the final product turns out pea-soup green, it looks kind of gross, which adds greatly to its appeal, if you ask me. I pulled the idea for this one from a recent on-line interaction, and looked to a recipe in a book I picked up not long ago called 660 Curries: The Gateway to Indian Cooking by Raghavan Iyer. I also found a saag recipe online, wound up averaging the two and made a few changes and additions of my own.

Ingredients:

2 lbs. of chicken (1/2 lb. pictured)
1 large red onion
6 cloves of garlic, minced
1 Tbsp minced ginger
1 Tbsp ground coriander
1 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 1/2 tsp salt
8 oz. spinach, stems removed
1 bunch of watercress, stems removed
7 oz. coconut milk (about half a can)
7 oz. plain Greek style yogurt
3 oz. tomato paste
1 1/2 cups of water
3 small to medium potatoes, cubed (yellow, red or Yukon Gold)
8 oz. paneer,* cubed
1 small head of broccoli, chopped
1 carrot, finely chopped
Ghee, or canola oil and butter, for sauteeing

*or substitute any non-melting white cheese such as queso fresco

You probably want to see the mise on that... Here ya go:


Method:

Begin by cutting the chicken up into bite-sized chunks and sauteeing over medium-high heat in a large saute pan with a generous amount of ghee or oil and butter until it just begins to get some color (again, what you see here is a half pound of chicken, in a medium fry pan. When sauteeing two pounds, you'll want to do it in stages, as two pounds of chicken will be way too much for even the largest saute pan; the chicken will end up steaming instead of browning, which will compromise flavor development):


Set this aside, and clean out the pan. Saute the onion, with the spices, over medium heat until translucent, five to ten minutes. Add the garlic and ginger, turn the heat down to medium-low and continue to saute for another five minutes (here's that large saute pan I mentioned):


Add the salt, spinach and watercress to the pan, along with a half cup of water. Simmer for fifteen minutes. The spinach and watercress will fill the pan when you first add them, but as they simmer, they'll wilt and decrease greatly in volume:


Remove the pan from the heat, and allow to cool. Transfer the contents to a blender or food processor, add a half cup of water and puree. Set aside, and clean out the pan. Saute the potatoes over medium-high heat until they begin to get some color, about fifteen minutes. Add the paneer and let it get some color as well (stirring or shaking the pan occasionally), about another ten minutes:


Add the puree back to the pan, along with another half cup of water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for another ten minutes:


Add the coconut milk, yogurt, tomato paste, carrots and broccoli and continue to simmer, stirring occasionally, for another fifteen minutes (if it starts to look like it's getting a little too thick, you can add another half cup of water):


Add the chicken back to the pan during the last five minutes of simmering to bring it back up to temperature. Serve with some naan, roti or similar flatbread. Or serve it over rice, as I did (I like long grain brown rice, cooked with a mixture of chicken stock, water, butter and salt). This will serve about six. It's also a good recipe to do in advance and freeze in individual containers. If you do this, cook the chicken separately when you thaw and re-heat the saag.

Enjoy!

And defeat is mine...

I'm humbled to report, friends, that I have lost my title of chili champion. What I lost with is what you see above, the "Chilly Mary," my entry into this year's meat category. It's chili re-imagined as a cocktail, basically a chili flavored version of the bloody mary: Bacon infused vodka, tomato puree with a splash of pickle juice and worcestershire sauce, and chipotle syrup, shaken with ice and served in a martini glass rimmed with a mix of salt, cornmeal, oregano, cumin and smoked paprika and garnished with a cocktail onion and a square of bacon on the rim... An interesting concoction to be sure, but not enough to beat my good friend Matt, who won the contest handily this year with his latest iteration of chili pie (what won it for him this year, I believe, is that, with the help of his better half Shannon, he finally nailed his crust; built of butter, flour and cornmeal, it truly kicked ass). I wasn't able to fend off Matt's pie this year, but I did my best, starting with the martini glasses, rented from a local catering company:

The first step was to rim these glasses with the chili spice mixture:

Which led to the first rough draft of this project:

The final product, of course, fell short of winning, but was eagerly consumed by the crowd, as evidenced by the aftermath:

And now for some shots of my friends enjoying the evening:



Here's our gracious host, Greg (on the right; that's Ray Belt slouching on the left), getting ready to announce the winners...

This year's winner of the cornbread category, Kristy Orbitschkewitch:

And the meat champion himself, Matt Svaglic:

Here we see Tim Scott enjoying a frosty can of Hamm's (you PDXers will no doubt notice the sign and remember then 19 year old Jake Okenberg's run for mayor back in the early aughts...):

And here, just some of the mess to be cleaned up by Greg and Bonnie in the morning:

A good time was had by all, even the losers, for whom I am now qualified to speak. Thanks again, Greg and Bonnie, for putting on the eighth annual chili cook-off. Here's looking forward to the ninth, and more importantly (Greg...) the tenth...

Do You Love Your Farmer? I Do...

Well, not your farmer, mine... Anyway...

Laura and I have a subscription to a CSA called Happy Tortoise Farm, and normally our share is dropped off at the University of Portland, Laura's place of employment. This week, however, my better half is on Bainbridge Island, and it fell to me to pick up the veggies at the alternate drop-off spot on Alberta street. So I'm thinking, my farmer, Andrew, gets there at 4:30, I'll jump on the bike and make my way up there right as he's arriving and get first pick of the bounty. Which I did. Got all bundled up, mounted my fixie with its 48/18 gear ratio, and made my way, in nearly freezing temperatures, riding into the wind, uphill all the way (did I mention I ride a fixie, with a 48/18 gear ratio, and did I mention that such a gear ratio is not particularly suited to climbing [okay, so it's actually kind of a mellow gear ratio, I'm a bit of a candy ass; stop me before I sub-parentheticalize again...]?), to 16th and Alberta. Only to arrive at about 5:00 to find the pick up spot locked, dark and uninhabited. Shit. The pick-up must've been earlier in the day. I'm too late. So I make my way back home (downhill and with the wind to my back, thankfully), thinking I'd miscalculated and forfeited my veggies. Then, at about 6:45, I checked my e-mail and discovered that the pick-up was scheduled from 5:30 to 7:00. I had, ironically, gotten there too early, and didn't have time to make it back by 7:00. So I call Andrew and leave a message, thinking we might be able to meet up somewhere over the weekend for the veggie exchange. Long story short, he calls me back to say that I'm on his way home, and he can drop off the veggies, which you see above. It's an awful lot of trouble to go to for some veggies, to be sure, but how many people can claim such a relationship with the folks who grow their food?

This is why I love my farmer.

Essen und Trinken bei Prost!

The ugly one on the left is me. The so cute you could eat her with a spoon one on the right is Laura. The blurry, amorphous blob in front of us is someone else's boot shaped mug of beer...

I can't imagine a culinary tradition more appropriate to the onset of winter in the Pacific Northwest than that of Germany. This is not the season of microgreens, peas, basil or fiddleheads. Once the rains come, Northwesterners will, of course, still bike to work or don multiple layers for a drizzly hike in the Cascade range, but sooner or later we all go into hibernation mode, if only for brief, intermittent periods. This calls for a Netflix account, resignation to sky-high gas bills, and on those occasions when we do venture out, a certain kind of sustenance, one which might fairly be described as, well, a bit heavy: root vegetables; soups and pies made of squash and tree fruit; collard greens, cabbage, and anything pickled; meat, preferably of the porcine and/or smoked variety; and yes, dark beers of excessive alcohol content.

After witnessing the third round playoff bloodletting of the Virginia Tech women's soccer team by the University of Portland (it was like watching a pod of killer whales playfully tossing around a dead seal; Laura has season tickets), my better half and I met up with a few friends on Mississippi Avenue, at the recently opened Portland outpost of Seattle's Prost! I'd been meaning to head over to the place for a while, and fortunately, we were able to deflect our friends' suggestions of the Crow Bar or Amnesia Brewery and steered the crowd toward some German fare. Here's what we found...

Das ist ein Schwartzbier:

Ich prüfte das Braunschweiger, mit Brot und grüne Äpfel:

Und Laura aß das Landjäger mit Senf und Landbrot:

Na und, die Brezeln waren nicht so schlecht... All this is delivered amidst a most glückliches atmosphere and, if you get there early enough (we didn't), you can sample a variety of food carts in the adjoining parking lot, including a mexican cart run by Jesse Sandoval, former drummer of the Shins (that's another post in itself).

I give it fünf Sterne...

Interesting Stuff Going On in Ann Arbor...

This was brought to my attention by a friend from a past life in Michigan... A food salon! Sometimes, of course, you just want to space out while eating your breakfast, but for those times that you feel like mixing the most important meal of the day with a little thought, exchange of information, perhaps even a spirited debate over the various iterations of the systems that deliver plants and animals from the fields to our intestines, this looks like a good idea. Check it out. I'm sure something like this is happening in Portland...

On Sliding into Ditches, the Estacada Microbrew Scene, Cincinnati Rock Bands and Replated Sandwiches...

Maybe some day I'll get an iPhone, but until then, you'll just have to put up with these blurry shots, this one being of Cinicnnati's Over the Rhine, from my Samsung. Anyway, I hope you had a good Friday the 13th yesterday. Mine was a bit of a mixed bag...

So I took Burke up into the foothills of the Cascades for a hike yesterday at Bagby Hot Springs. We had a very nice hike in, followed by a relaxing 45 minute soak in the tubs with a couple of backpackers and a chilly but uneventful hike out. And I'm driving back toward Portland along highway 46 when I come upon the intersection with Highway 57, and think "I wonder what's up there?" Well, it turns out what was up there was snow... And ditches... I'm sure you can imagine the scenario that unfolded. Fortunately, I didn't hit any trees, and within five minutes I was able to flag down a couple of freelance loggers with a good sized rig and a chain. We got my crippled Volvo back onto flat ground, came to the conclusion that at the very least there was a hole in the radiator, and moved it to a clearing on the other side of the road. I caught a ride with them into Estacada, where I enjoyed a Tomahawk Brown and a couple of Clackamas Cream Ales at the Fearless Brewing Company while waiting for the wrecker. They were off to somewhere else, and wouldn't let me buy them a round, but Brian and Chuck, if by any chance you're reading this, many thanks to you both for helping me out of a jam!

Several hours and a big wad of cash later, the car was at my regular Volvo garage and I was back home, just in time for Laura to come pick me up for the Over the Rhine show at the Doug Fir. Over the Rhine were excellent, by the way, they put on a really good show. If you haven't been following the Cincinnati music scene in recent years, there's a lot of good stuff coming out of that town. Over the Rhine, the Heartless Bastards, the Greenhornes, and of course we all remember the Afghan Whigs...

Unfortunately, our post-show meal upstairs in the Fir's restaurant wasn't as rewarding. This didn't come as much of a surprise to me, as I've never found the Fir's kitchen to be anything more than mediocre at best, but to wit... Laura ordered a grilled cheese sandwich with tomato soup and I ordered Mac and Cheese (which, by the way, smelled of ammonia). Laura, ever the keen observer, noticed that her sandwich made its way to a nearby table, where it was quickly whisked away once it was determined to be the wrong order, and reappeared at our table suspiciously soon after. When Laura confronted the kitchen runner about the likelihood that she had, in fact, replated the same sandwich which had just been wrongfully delivered to another table (which is, in all probability, a health department violation), she took it away and brought Laura a new sandwich. But she was perfectly comfortable delivering that sandwich to my girlfriend in the first place. Food service workers take note: This sort of thing is NOT acceptable. Now, as if this weren't bad enough, we later heard a comment emanating from the kitchen about the "grilled cheese sandwich bitch." Again, food service workers take note: Comments like this are made all the time - I know, I've been there - but they should NOT be made within earshot of the subject!

While the Doug Fir remains one of my favorite music venues in town, it's not likely that I'll ever eat there again.

Pan Seared Scallops with Pumpkin Risotto and Sage Infused Brown Butter

Man, that's a crap photo... At any rate, I've been getting a lot of second hand produce lately from my girlfriend, who's having some trouble absorbing the bounty of her CSA. Recently sugar pumpkins have been factoring heavily into the mix, and having made my way through several of them last weekend by making a pumpkin pie, I decided to use up the rest and have Laura over for some pumpkin risotto (anybody out there like borscht, by the way? I've got like 37 beets...). No risotto ever suffered from the addition of brown butter, and brown butter, of course, attracts scallops, so I had my work cut out for me. Perhaps you'd care to follow along...

Ingredients

Diver or Sea Scallops, two per person
One sugar pumpkin, about six inches in diameter
Two medium shallots (or one really large one), minced
Three cloves of garlic, minced
One cup of Arborio rice
One stick of butter (8 Tbsp)
Two Tbsp of extra virgin olive oil
One cup of dry white wine (Pinot Gris or Chenin Blanc work well)
Four cups of chicken stock, kept warm on a burner
One cup of grated Parmesan, Grana Padano or Parmigiano-Reggiano
Two Tbsp of chopped scallions (garlic scapes or chives also work)
One handful of good sized sage leaves
One pinch of fresh grated nutmeg
Salt and pepper

Method

First, you're going to brown the butter. Place six tablespoons in a fry pan over medium heat:

Once it's melted, turn the heat down to medium low and add the sage leaves. The milk solids in the butter will sink to the bottom of the pan and begin to brown. When they've achieved a medium brown color, remove the sage (reserve it for garnish), transfer the brown butter to a bowl and place it in the fridge. You'll know it's time when you see this:

Next, cut your pumpkin in half, peel it and cut it into about 1/4 inch dice. Steam half of the pumpkin for about 20 min and puree it in a blender or food processor, or with an immersion blender. Reserve the other half.

Place three tablespoons of the brown butter in a large saute pan over medium heat. Saute the shallot and reserved pumpkin dice for a few minutes, then add the garlic and the rice:

Continue to saute for five minutes and add the wine and one cup of the chicken stock. Turn heat down to a simmer and continue to cook, stirring frequently and adding stock, a little at a time as the rice absorbs the liquid, until the rice is al dente (about 40 minutes). Be careful not to let the rice get too dry until it's cooked, at which point you can reduce down any excess liquid. Until then, you want to keep it looking more or less like this:

When the rice is almost cooked, add the pumpkin puree, nutmeg, scallions and cheese and start to work on the scallops.

Melt and/or warm the remaining brown butter in a sauce pan over low heat (if you want to get fancy with it, you can whisk in a tablespoon or two of the wine and a little bit of minced shallot, which will get you a sort of sage-infused, browned beurre blanc, but you'll need to multi-task or enlist some help, as this mixture needs to be whisked constantly while you're cooking the scallops). Place the remaining two tablespoons of unbrowned butter and the oil in a fry pan over medium high heat. Yes, you CAN saute with extra virgin olive oil, just don't turn the flame up all the way... When the oil and butter are hot, but not smoking, add the scallops, seasoned on both sides with salt and pepper, to the pan. Saute them for two minutes on each side. Plate them with the risotto, and drizzle the brown butter over the scallops or around the edge of the plate. Garnish with the fried sage and enjoy!