First, I am well aware that “curry” is not a single thing. It’s more of a genre. Despite that, I’ve mostly used curry powder when making curry. I haven’t been pleased with the results. Since it was handy, I looked up “chicken curry” in The Joy of Cooking. It uses a Thai curry paste, for which they also have the recipe.
There are a lot of things in there that I don’t have – who does have cilantro leaves in March? Who has lemongrass, ever? However, it provided inspiration. The batch size is also a lot more than I wanted. I just made something up.
Onion – half a big white one
garlic – two cloves
turmeric – teaspoon
ginger half-teaspoon
curry – tablespoon
garam masala (another “there’s not just one”) – quarter teaspoon
black pepper – teaspoon
Thai chili peppers (those suckers are small, but hot; I just chopped up two dried ones, which I do have from last year’s garden).
Olive oil in the pan, dice chicken thighs (4), fry until fat melts, add onion, fry until water boils off, add all the spices (fry just a bit to “bloom” them), deglaze with half cup of chicken broth. Reduce while the rice cooks. Yummy.
It comes up now because it’s lunch time and I’m waiting for rice to cook before nuking the leftovers.
Speaking of rice, I’m still stocking long grain, Jasmine, and Basmati. They all have their place. I used the plain (and cheap) long grain under this. I think slightly overcooked, so it’s sticky, Jasmine is my favorite. The Laird likes Basmati best because it is not sticky. Cheap long grain is a good compromise unless the dish really wants one of the others.
Marked Up 