Not Chicken Kurma

Last night I had two thawed chicken breasts sitting in the fridge, waiting to be used before they went bad. You can't refreeze meat after it's already been thawed of course. Why? Because every time you freeze meat, it forms ice crystals inside the cell walls. When you refreeze it, the ice crystals get bigger. And the bigger the ice crystals, the more damage they do the cell walls. The more damaged cell walls are, the worse the texture of the meat.

So I had to use these things, or lose them. I was so impressed by the chicken kurma I had at Bombay House last week, I decided to give it a try. Now, a lot of people would look up a recipe first, maybe online using this whole "Internet" thing we have laying around. I'm not most people. Other than chicken, I remembered the dish having curry, golden raisins and cashews. I knew nothing else about it. I assessed the items in my pantry and found that I had all of these ingredients. I also discovered that I had a few small cans of coconut milk left. I've used coconut milk in a lot of Thai curries, but something told me that it probably wasn't nearly as common in India. My tastebuds argued that it didn't matter, so long as it tasted good. My stomach argued that it didn't matter, so long as it was full.

First, I needed rice. Fortunately, rice is an easy dish that you can just start and ignore while it cooks. Since the curry would offer plenty of flavor, I didn't need much out of the rice. I really just needed it to be there, as a vehicle for the curry. I decided to go with plain white rice. Then something inside of me said, "wait! Didn't the Bombay House rice have little green bits of something in it?" I couldn't for the life of me think of what that might be, but I did think that adding a little bit of color would make it a little more interesting. So I measured out a cup of rice, minus one tablespoon. Then I added to it a tablespoon of Bhutanese red rice, which according to the package, cooks in about the same amount of time. I browned the rice in about a tablespoon of peanut oil, and since I knew I wasn't going to be using a salty liquid this time around, I added a pinch of salt. When it was ready, I added two cups of water, brought it to a boil, slapped the lid on, and let it sit on low for twenty minutes. When the timer went off, I moved it off the heat and gave it another twenty minutes. I would later discover that a little of the red color from the Bhutanese rice would color the white rice ever so slightly. It still ended up looking pretty keen, though.

With the rice out of the way, I turned my attention to the curry. I cut the chicken breasts (two of them, remember) into strips, and then tossed them with about two tablespoons of peanut oil and maybe two tablespoons of Madras curry powder because, well, that was what I had. Since the stuff I had already had salt in it, I dispensed with adding more. I already had a pan over medium heat, so I browned the chicken off in batches, just enough to give it a good sear on both sides. I did not bother cooking the chicken all the way through, but we'll get to that. It took about three batches to get it all browned up. While that was happening, I added one 5.6 oz can of coconut milk to my little two-cup food processor, along with a half cup each of golden raisins and cashew pieces. I processed that until it was nice and thick. It was still a little chunky, but it didn't have huge hunks of anything, so I was happy.

When the chicken was all browned, I added another teaspoons of oil to the pan, along with about a quarter cup of diced red bell pepper. I added a wee pinch of salt, and let the bell pepper sweat a little bit. Then I added all the chicken back into the pan, along with all of the coconut milk mixture. It wasn't as liquid as I would have liked, so I added another little 5.6 oz can of coconut milk. That's two cans total now. I brought it up to a boil, and then dropped it to a simmer for about 15 minutes. Since I hadn't cooked the chicken all the way through the first time, this would give it a chance to coast up to temperature, without making it overcook and get rubbery.

The chicken and the rice finished at pretty much the same time. Now, in the restaurant, they would serve each in a seperate container, and give you the chance to scoop out your own rice, and then top it with the curry yourself. In other restaurants, they would just serve the curry on top of the rice anyway. I believe the idea is that since there's so much liquid, you can mix it in with the rice and have something just a little more special than just chicken and rice. For photographic reasons, I served mine side by side, and then mixed things as I got to them.

Now, after I had gone to all this trouble of making what turned out to be a simple, yet excellently flavored dish, I then decided to look up an actual chicken kurma recipe. I was way off. First of all, I should have used yogurt instead of coconut milk. Second, I used a curry spice blend instead of making one up myself. Third, even though Bombay House used golden raisings, I could not find any recipes that even mentioned them. So this is Not Chicken Kurma. But it is pretty dang tasty.

Talk Like a Pirate!

Avast, ye mateys! Today be International Talk Like a Pirate Day! Arrr! T'was many years ago today (I'm not bein' sure how many, 'cause of the grog) that Cap'n Slappy and Ol' Chumbucket declared this day to be Talk Like a Pirate Day, and t'was some time later that it was promoted by buccaneer Dave Barry, and then went international.

I expect ye all to be talkin' like pirates on this very special day. If ye be needin' instruction, I suggest ye read this lovely how-to from Cap'n Slappy and Ol' Chumbucket themselves. They be the ones who started it, and they be the ones who know best. Or perhaps ye be needin' the one and only pirate keyboard. Be clickin' here if yer needin' a wee bit of pirate culture. So all ye mates and wenches be ready to be enjoyin' International Talk Like a Pirate Day, for today be among the best days of the year! So says me, Redbeard the Pirate! Yarr!

Orange Curd Mousse

I thought I had a great idea. Does anyone remember back when I made lemon curd? Turns out you can make orange curd the same way. Just use orange zest instead of lemon, and replace about 2/3 of the lemon juice with orange juice.

Making all that buttercream for the Tux cake left me with a lot of egg yolks. What do I do when I have leftover egg yolks? I make orange curd. I was armed with an industrial supply of orange curd, and I had no idea what to do with it all. So I decided to try making an orange mousse.

Now, let's get the basics of mousse straight. As we all know from our high school French class (don't worry, I didn't bother taking it either), the word mousse means 'froth' or 'foam'? So the first requirement of a mousse is froth or foam, right? Well, something like that. There's actually two main types of mousse: cream-based, and egg white-based. Either one of them can be whipped into a kind of foam, but with strangely different requirements. Cream needs to contain at least 36% butterfat, or else it doesn't really whip up. It also whips up better when it's cold. Egg whites whip up better when they're warm, and if there's even a speck of fat, they won't whip. Period.

The second requirement for mousse is smoothness. It needs to be perfectly smooth. Smooth, I say! Let's say you like chocolate. Who doesn't? And let's say you like sprinkling chopped almonds or something into your chocolate. It might taste good when you mix it into your chocolate mousse, but it's not really mousse anymore, right? Because it's not smooth. Mousse needs to be smooth.

Now, chocolate mousse is pretty easy stuff. I've always based mine off of Alton Brown's recipe, but I go a little simpler. I melt a little chocolate, and while it's cooling I whip up an equal weight of heavy cream, which I then fold into the cooling chocolate. It's an easy recipe. It's a recipe that I thought might work well with orange curd instead of chocolate. It would be like a orange creamsicle, but creamier and without a stick.

I put some orange curd in a bowl and whipped up an equal weight of cream in a different bowl. I folded them together and loaded the mixture into a piping bag with a star tip. I pulled out a martini glass, piped the orange mousse into it, and dropped a few pieces of crystalized ginger on top of it.



It looked okay but it was a little, well, loose. As opposed to stiff. Chocolate mousse can be refrigerated for a day or two, but I think this would have fallen into a puddle within a few hours. What went wrong? Then I realized my mistake. When chocolate cools, it hardens. If you cool a pound or two of chocolate, without anything mixed into it, you end up with a brick. When you cool curd, it remains soft and spreadable.

Just for the heck of it, I tossed the bowl into the freezer, and gave it a gentle stir (kind of like folding it) every half hour or so. After a couple of hours, I had what was basically ice cream. Really, really rich ice cream. In fact, thinking about it, I realized that egg-based ice cream is basically just a stirred custard (like curd) with a bunch of milk stirred into it. Mine was kind of like the same thing, but with a lot of butter added.



It tasted pretty good, maybe even a little better than in mousse form. Just like a super, super, super premium ice cream. Unfortunately, it was a little too super premium, by which I mean it had a lot of a fatty feeling on the tongue. It was just a little too much. In fact, the sugary crystalized ginger that I also added to it actually cut through the fat a little bit.

It was an eye-opening couple of experiments. I'm definitely going to have to play with mousses and stirred custards a little more in the future, but maybe not at the same time.

Bombay House

I love Indian food (dot, not feather). In fact, I'm not sure I have ever had an Indian dish that I didn't like. My favorite day in International Cuisine back in school was Indian Day. But I used to lament that there was no good Indian food in Utah Valley, where I now reside. In fact, I used to complain about the quality of restaurants around here in general. I can't do that anymore.

TuxGirl used to tell me about how great Bombay House in Provo is. In fact, lots of people used to tell me about it. In talking to Art last night, he told me that it's probably the best place to eat in Provo, and that he goes there all the time. I still don't know Art as well as I'd like, but I'm starting to trust his judgement in food. TuxGirl too, for that matter. So last night I decided to check it out.

I used to go to Chile's sometimes. I used to go to Applebees sometimes. Hey, they're both right down the street from me. I don't know that I can ever go to either one again, because they're not Bombay House. This place was awesome. I think the fact that every employee I saw there looked like they were actually from India probably didn't hurt. Every one of them was friendly, though I think they got tired of repeating things to me, with their thick Indian accents. The service was, well, I think efficient is the best word. Fast and efficient.

I ordered Chicken Kurma for myself and Lamb Curry for my wife. Even though I asked for the chicken to be hot (spicy) and the lamb to be medium (my wife is going easy on the spice while she's preggers), we both agreed that the lamb ended up hotter. In my very limited experience in Indian restaurants, the level of spiciness seems to be relative to the dish, not to the restaurant or cuisine as a whole, as in other restaurants. As for the flavor? I took one bite of my Chicken Kurma and I was in heaven. It was spicy, oh so spicy. It just about knocked my on my butt. It was also flavorful, tender and juicy. And it was even a little sweet. It seemed like the perfect medley that no other dish could ever contain, until I tried some of my wife's curry. It was also perfect. It had that rich, deep, yet sweet flavor so consistent with lamb. It was also spicy. It also tried to knock my on my butt.

I also ordered a side of naan, which is a type of Indian flat bread that I love so much. I spent most of the meal dipping it into all of the sauce that my chicken was swimming in, and when it was gone I considered ordering another naan. Both meats were swimming in sauce, in fact. I would pour it on my rice and just go at it. Did I mention the rice? It was some kind of long-grain rice that was fabulous on its own. It had little bits of green in it that I have yet to identify, but were just awesome. When we got full and had to get a to-go box, we made sure to take the rise with us as well.

Despite being full, I knew I wanted dessert. There were two big reasons why I wanted dessert, even though I knew I was too full for it. First of all, Jeffery Steingarten once said that there were only two types of food left that he was still squeemish on: bugs and desserts in Indian restaurants. In It Must Have Been Something I Ate, he talks about how he's gotten over bugs, but not Indian desserts yet. I thought I'd leave bugs to him, and handle the Indian desserts myself.

Secondly, back when I was studying ice cream a lot, I kept running across mention of kulfi, which is an Indian-style ice cream that is frozen without being churned. It's not flavored with things like chocolate or fudge brickle. It's flavored with things like cinnamon and cardamom. I had to try it. And I'm glad I did. It's sweet, very sweet. It was nutty and flavored with, well, I don't know what. I'm going to guess there was rosewater in it. Probably a few Indian spices that I'm not incredibly familiar with... yet. The texture made me wonder if they churned it, even though it's known for not being churned. However they did it, it was awesome. I ate the whole thing.

Like I said, the service was stellar. The waitor stopped by on a regular basis to check on us, and to keep our water glasses full. I was often surprised to look up and see somebody standing at our table, just finishing a question that I had managed to miss. They were to the point, none of this "good evening folks, my name is John and blah blah blah, would you like to hear the specials?" One guy stopped by at one point and simply said, "box?" when it was obvious we weren't going to be able to eat anymore.

I will be going back to the Bombay House again, probably on a somewhat regular basis. In fact, I think it's worth saving up to go once or twice a week. I don't know if I can afford to eat out in general all that often, but if I could I would probably eat there just about every day. Those of you in the area, check it out. Bonus! There's one in Salt Lake too! If you like food, I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Traffic Jam!

Welcome, Digg users! You killed my server!

My little server is a little underpowered, at least for any real amount of traffic. It wasn't ever intended to pull in the kind of load that digg.com started sending it immediately following my presentation at the PLUG meeting.

For now I've set up a redirect to the mirror that Ryan Simpkins was so kind as to put up. When things die down a little bit, I'll go ahead and put the tutorial back up on my own site. Hopefully my server can at least handle the redirect traffic for now.

Happy 10th Birthday, PLUG!

Finally, the Tux cake is revealed! I'm sure you're all going to be happy now that I'm going to stop talking about it. But allow me just a moment.

The Provo Linux Users Group celebrated its 10th birthday this evening. We started off with a presentation of the new website, and then moved onto a few words from our original founders, Mike and Thayne. Following that, I presented the Tux cake, along with a presentation of my tutorial, walking through how I built the dang thing. This how-to is now located in my tutorial area.

It was a difficult cake to build, but I'm glad I did it. We managed to convince Art Pollard of Amano Artisan Chocolate to show up, and we got somebody else to take a picture of him, me and Jayce (the president of PLUG).



We got a few other pictures in, some more morbid than others. There were a few kids there, egging me on as I cut into the cake. The older kid you see in the first picture is Thayne, one of the cofounders of PLUG.



Geez, people! Take yer dang pictures already! I posed for a lot of shots with the initial cake cutting. There was some sort of Linux kernel joke associated with this one, but I don't remember what.



How could you not love a lobotomized picture of Tux? We were originally talking about coloring the cake layers used for the head gray, and then use red velvet cake for the body. We have quite the macabre group, don't we? I'm still a little sad we didn't do that.



All in all, it was a fun time. And since I know you're wondering, Jayce's presentation on mod_security went well too. We had a great turnout, and a great time. See how much fun Open Source can be?

New Wallpaper and PLUG Reminder

James brought in some pears yesterday, straight from his own tree. This morning I decided to take the liberty of photographing them. And why not? They're pretty. Okay, so they're not pretty. Have I mentioned pears bruise easily? But that's just the beauty of home grown fruit: it has personality, right? It certainly has more flavor. The one I ate yesterday was probably the juiciest pear I've ever eaten. When I have room in my fridge again, I plan to steal a few pears and see what I can come up with in the kitchen. For now, check out them out in my wallpaper area.

Speaking of that fridge, it is currently home to the confectionary version of Tux, our beloved Linux mascot. He's about 98% complete at this point. He is looking a little surprised at the moment, possibly because he's still sans beak. I plan to remedy that tonight as soon as I get home from work. It was a difficult venture, but I'm glad we decided to do it. Be sure to head down to the PLUG meeting tomorrow night to check him out, before we lob off his head with a kitchen knife and serve him up to hungry computer geeks.