bakebakebake: My Take On Indian Food

On livejournal I'm part of a community called bakebakebake. It's actually what prompted me to get back in the kitchen again, despite being busy with school work and whatnot. And when I got my mixer for Christmas, it was useful for making delights I could take pictures of and put online. One of the things that this community has is monthly themes. This month's theme was red because of 4th of July and whatnot. I've been stumped all month on what to make. Of course, cupcakes are easy, red velvet cake, something with strawberries. It was all so cliche though and I wanted to do something that I didn't think anyone else would be doing.

So two days ago it hit me: tandoori chicken! So I found a recipe from India Curry Recipes. When I was younger my family had these friends from India, and the lady, Eva, made and sold packets of spice mixtures for many different foods, tandoori chicken, curried rice, etc. Growing up whenever my mom would make tandoori chicken I'd get so excited for the red chicken, as I called it. It was one of those treats that I didn't get very often, because to make it takes more than a day, as the chicken needs to marinate. So being a working mom, making dishes that took lots of prep time didn't happen often.

Now, comes the frustration of making this dish. When I went to the grocery store yesterday to collect the spices I needed to make the tandoori I couldn't find the garam masala anywhere. Oh woe me, Safeway had sold out. So instead I got some curry spice and decided to deviate from tandoori chicken and make some chicken replacing the garam masala with curry powder. Of course, this makes the chicken taste different than had I used the garam masala (and why I can't call this tandoori chicken). But it still has the red tint (haha, food coloring?) that made the red chicken so special to me growing up.

Indian Spiced Chicken

Ingredients
2 pounds of chicken, cut into pieces
1 tsp salt
1 lemon, juiced
1 1/4 cups plain yogurt
1/2 onion, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp grated resh ginger root
2 tsp curry
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp yellow food coloring
1 tsp red food coloring

Directions
1. Cut slits into chicken pieces lengthwise.2. Place in a shallow dish, sprinkle both sides of chicken with salt and lemon juice. Set aside.
3. In a medium bowl, combine yogurt, onion, garlic, ginger, curry powder, and cayenne pepper. Mix until smoot. Stir in food coloring. Spread yogurt mixture over chicken. Cover and refrigerate over night.
4. Preheat oven to 450. Place chicken in a baking dish and bake 25 to 30 minutes (or until done).

And then I also made spiced potatoes and rice to go along with the meal. I made the rice as one normally makes rice, however, in the water I added some shakes of garlic salt and curry powder.

For the potatoes I cut them up into bite size pieces. In a skillet I melted some butter and added some water. I seasoned them with curry powder and paprika. I put the potatoes in and when boiling, I brought the heat down and covered them up and cooked until soft.

The Ultimate Chocolate Brownie Muffin

I've been wanting to make muffins, for some reason that's all I really wanted to bake. I didn't want a blog reason to do it, I just wanted the satisfaction of having a delicious muffin sitting in front of me when all is said and done. I am however going to start participating in the blog events like I had, because it's fun. But this is just my muffin.

I moved recently, so my baking has dwindled significantly, as someone broke into my car the first day in the new house and stole my bag of dried goods (the flour, sugar, etc.). So I was dreading starting my baking ingredient collection again, but finally I've gotten around to starting. So since I wanted to make muffins, I wanted to make something people would eat. So I asked my boyfriend what kind of muffin he wantd.

Alan: Chocolate brownie muffin.
Me: What do you mean by chocolate brownie muffin?
Alan: If you can't figure it out you shouldn't bake!
Me: OK, I'll find something to do.

To be quite honest, it's basically a brownie shaped like a muffin. But the boyfriend was happy. I found this recipe on recipezaar.com.

The Ultimate Chocolate Brownie Muffin

Ingredients:

3/4 cup good quality baking cocoa

1 tsp baking powder

3/4 cup butter, melted

1/2 cup boiling water

1 tbsp vanilla

1 1/4 cups sugar

2 eggs

1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350.

2. Line 1 muffin tins with muffin liners.

3. In a medum bowl combine cocoa and baking powder; mix to combibe.

4. Add in boiling water; mix well with a wooden spoon to combine.

5. Add in the melted butter and vanilla; mix well.

6. Add in the sugar, mix well with a wooden spoon.

7. Stir in eggs with a wooden spoon; mix until combined

8. Mix the flour with salt; add in the chocolate mixture; mix well to combine.

9. Add in chocolate chips.

10. Using an ice cream scoop fill each of the muffin tins almost to the top.

11. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until muffins are done.