rick stein's chicken chettinad

Featuring the Chettinad flavours of Chettinad...

sources
chicken chettinad - Rick Stein's India, in Delicious August 2013, p47

valli little double-bill: courgette spaghetti with pesto and char siu beef and tenderstem broccoli stir-fry

sources
courgette spaghetti with mint and basil pesto - Valli Little, August 2013, Delicious, p110
char siu beef and tenderstem broccoli stir-fry - Valli Little, Delicious, August 2013, p110

summer spaghetti and fasting thai salad

The 5:2 diet has sprung up in this house, but I'm currently resisting. So whilst I'm filling up on summer spaghetti with the left over veg in the fridge:

Ana's fasting and loving it, on 2 grated carrots, a handful of noodles and 10 small prawns in a thai dressing:

sources
summer spaghetti - Delicious, July 2011, p38
thai salad - mimi spencer & dr michael mosley, The Fast Diet, p143

mozzarella, peach and parma ham salad

sources

mozzarella, peach, basil and parma ham salad - Delicious, 2005 now the Parsley Book

tom norrington-davies' chicken noodle soup with mint and lemon

sources

chicken noodle soup with mint and lemon - Tom Norrington-Davies, was Delicious now The Owl Book

some sort of chicken salad

I have no idea where it came from, but it features giant cous cous which Ana did *not* like...

nigella's curly-edged pasta with lamb ragu

sources
curly-edged pasta with lamb ragu - Nigella, Nigelissima, serialised in Delicious, November 2012, p22

chorizo and butter bean casserole

sources
chorizo and butter bean casserole - The Black Book

jamie oliver's proper bloke's fusilli

sources
proper bloke's sausage fusilli - Jamie Oliver, Cook With Jamie, p72

silvana franco's pot-roast cider chicken with creamy onions and little gem lettuce

sources
pot-roast cider chicken with creamy onions and little gem lettuce - Silvana Franco, Delicious May 2008, p43

anjum anand's green chicken biryiani

sources
green chicken biryiani - anjum anand

chargrilled pork with pineapple, peas and ginger

sources
chargrilled pork with pineapple, peas and ginger - Delicious circa 2005, now the Skull book

bill granger's goats curd and lentil salad with roasted beetroot

With only one day to go before the Whanau return home, it's time to remove all evidence of bachelor living, so gone are the copies of Razzle, cans of Special Brew, Gingster's chicken and mushroom slice wrappers. I've also got to somehow deal with the asparagus, curd cheese and beetroot cluttering up the fridge.

If only there was a delicious and simple meal that also handily uses up these stereotypically manly ingredients. Oh!

sources
goats curd and lentil salad with roasted beetroot - Bill Granger, Bill's Sydney Food, p83

bill granger's green papaya salad with char-grilled beef

Those of you who regular pitch up here to read the latest update, only to discover I'm as tardy as ever and curse the very ground I walk on, will know I bow to no man in my appreciation of the mighty Bill Granger.

However it's nice to know there was a time before he was a globe-striding camp cooking behemoth. When he was just a chap who owned a couple of really quite good restaurants in Sydney, and was convinced to write a cookery book.

What I like most about Sydney Food (apart from the fact I've nicked it off Kendra) is its gauche charm: Everything in it is quick, simple and available, reflecting the rhythms of the restaurants, and I suspect, Bill's wide-eyed joy at somebody paying him to write about something he loves. In it he displays a magpie's eyes for flavours and cuisine, where everything is grist to his cooking mill, giving you easy-to-recreate tastes of the Pacific.

Tonight's experimental salad is a case in point, even if green papaya is harder to come by in the supermarkets of Blighty. It's an unashamed take on Thailand's classic Tom Som Salad, full of zesty lime-spiked, fish sauce-sour flavours drenching cooling cucumber, fiery chilli and, because South West London only does Perfectly Ripe Papaya, delicately honeyed fruit. Not only that, it's super-cheap and quick.

The only downside in fact, was I couldn't attempt this bonkers method of shredding the papaya. If you're not sure about trying it with ripe-ish fruit, apparently you can simply replace it with white cabbage, which seems even more bonkers, but definitely worth investigating.

Wine Time
There's only direction I'm headed with Thai food, and that's with crisp, cooling wines with a nice dollop of residual sweetness to tame the heat. Think Gewurtz, Riesling, Prosecco and even Moscato - but try to aim for off-dry, so the sugar doesn't overwhelm everything.

sources
green papaya salad with char-grilled beef - Bill Granger, Sydney Food, p102