Friday Night Take-away: Chana Saag

With the Olympic Food Challenge taking up all of our time over summer we have neglected some of our own food traditions.  The Friday Night Take-away started before I had even thought of writing Tonight's Menu so it's about time we started cooking our own take-away inspired food at home again.

To ease our journey back into our Friday night ritual I'm using leftovers from the Olympic Food Challenge. Qorma e Sabzi from Afghanistan to be precise.  Fried onions and a tin of chick peas were added to the mild spinach curry, along with some garam maslala and chilli powder to lift the dish.

Having transformed Qorma e Sabzi into chana saag it was only right that we had even more leftovers to mop up the curry.  I had made too many puris for Pakistan so I defrosted a couple of them, warmed them up and tucked in.  We can get spinach dishes from the local take-away but they are nowhere near as good as this.

Butternut Squash and Chickpea Stew

When I told Mum what we were having for tea tonight she said "That sounds a bit vegetarian".  She was of course correct.  It is vegetarian, but we had the ingredients in the house and, although it has a relativity long cooking time, it's not very labour intensive.

The recipe is actually one of Simon Rimmer's from Something for the Weekend and although it is billed as a winter warmer I think it's fine as a summer supper.  The original recipe also has a potato scone topping but I have discarded that for this evening in favour of some boiled new potatoes.

Roasted butternut squash was added to fried onions, leeks and garlic.  A glass of white wine is poured into the pan and brought to the boil before the chickpeas, sour cream and double cream are added.  The mixture is then simmered for five to ten minutes.  The one ingredient that I didn't have from Mr Rimmer's recipe was tarragon.  I added parsley instead to add some freshness to the creamy sauce.  We all agreed that without the chickpeas this would make a great pasta sauce.  That said, I think I will have to cook something with meat in it tomorrow before a revolt takes place.

Vegetable and Chick Pea Curry with Dahl

The second Saturday of June.  It's a red letter.  It should be marked in all of your diaries.  If you make the effort to go to Leeds Carnival every year or wouldn't dream of missing Unity Day then let me introduce you to Beeston Festival.  Now in its 18th year, Beeston Festival takes over Cross Flatts Park for a day and puts on one of the best free shows in Leeds.

A dedicated committee of volunteers works throughout the year to put on the festival.  Four entertainment areas, children's and young people's activities, a bazaar with 80 stalls, a fun fair and a greenhouse made of recycled pop bottles don't just organise themselves you know.  As the Safety Officer for the festival, I was on site from 6:30 this morning and didn't leave until 7pm.  I can't take credit for the longest shift, that honour belongs to Jeremy Morton.

There is also great food on offer from your barbecue and jerk chicken to Indian and Caribbean curries.  I managed to inhale a burger whilst keeping an eye on all things Health and Safety, but by the end of the event I was knackered and ready for food.

I was met at home with the amazing smell of two curries bubbling away on the stove.  Z had found some leftover vegetable and chick pea curry in the freezer from earlier in the year.  She accompanied it with fresh dahl and ice cold beer.  The beer was generic lager, so nothing to write home about, but the daal was fantastic.  I think lentils are fast becoming my favourite part of any Indian meal.

With a full stomach and rested limbs I can now look back on the day.  We didn't have the glorious weather that normally accompanies Beeston Festival, but it wasn't a wash out either.  Every face I saw as I was moving around the park was clearly having a good time, and that's what matters.

Moroccan Chicken

The last time we cooked Moroccan Chicken was on the 6th March and a lot has happened during the passing two months.  So much in fact, that I have had to go back and re-read the post to see what we had done that day.  What we had done, was to deviate off a tried and tested recipe.  I even stated that I would be annotating the recipe so that we cooked it that way again.

Needless to say, I didn't annotate the recipe.  I knew that we had cooked it previously for Tonight's Menu but I couldn't have told you that we had substituted black eye peas for the traditional chick peas, or that we had cooked carrots instead of courgettes.  If I had done my research, I would have realised that tonight was the first time that we had cooked this meal for the blog.

To give credit where it is due, Z did the cooking, following the same recipe as before, only this time with the correct ingredients.  All I did was joint a chicken and buy some pitta bread to mop the juices up with.

Chana Saag Paneer

This was meant to be the meal that we cooked on Friday for our Friday Night Take-Away but as you will see from yesterday's post things got well and truly in the way.  I also have a new distraction, the Olympic Food Challenge.  I spent most of today creating a new blog for my one-off summer food adventure, so it fell to Z to make the evening meal.

We started with a couple of onion bhajis each before the main event.  Z fried onions and garlic with mustard seeds, cumin, coriander, chilli powder and cinnamon before adding the paneer.  Once the paneer had started to colour she added a tin of chick peas and a glass of water.  When the water had all but evaporated the pre cooked spinach went into the pan.

A couple of tablespoons of yoghurt were stirred through with a good handful of chopped coriander and the meal was ready to serve.  After waiting three days for this I had started to wonder if we were ever going to cook it.  I'm glad Z took the reins, it was delicious.

Vegetable Curry

There are occasions when you just need to use up all of those vegetables that are in the fridge.  I'm not advocating cooking without due care and attention.  I am advocating making the most of the food that is to hand.

After checking the store cupboards it was clear that a curry was the way forward.  I wouldn't call it an authentic curry but I did choose the spices with the vegetables in mind.  Most curries I cook start with mustard seeds but not tonight.  I felt that the flavour would have been to earthy and mask the sweetness of the veg.

The base of the sauce consisted of a finely chopped red onion, garlic, ginger, coriander, cumin, turmeric and chilli.  These were fried together with a tomato which added liquid and thickened the mixture.  The first of the vegetables, butternut squash, along with a tin of chick peas and some water was added and left to simmer until tender.

The curry was then finished with a tin of coconut milk some leftover roast sweet potato and two bunches of spinach.  If I had planned this curry and been out to buy the ingredients I probably would have omitted the squash and sweet potato.  I would have included paneer and fresh coriander and ended up with a completely different meal.  I'm glad I didn't because this curry was great.