Chicken With Salted Lemon and Olives

The word Tagine , also spelled Tajine, refers both to the cooking pot as well as a stew cooked in it. The tagine consists of two parts: a round pot (traditionally clay), and a conical cover with a small hole which allows some steam to escape and there are endless recipes prepared in a tagine from Northern Africa, especially Morocco. These 3 spices are typical - black pepper, ginger and saffron but other spices added makes this dish more flavorful. This tiny tagine that i own, is more for serving as it is too small for cooking. I bet that a stew cooked in a proper large clay tagine will cook a tastier stew.

Ingredients:

Marinade:

4 cloves of garlic, minced

1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 tbsp oil

4 chicken thighs cut into serving sized pieces

Spices:

A pinch of saffron
1 tsp ground cumin (optional)
1/2 tsp ground turmeric (optional)
1 tsp ground coriander (optional)

one stick of cinnamon (optional)

Oil for pan-frying chicken
1 big onion, finely chopped
1 tsp grated ginger

1 cup unsalted chicken broth or stock (or water)
1/2 cup olives
1 preserved lemon, cut into slices or chopped

salt, to taste

Method:

Mix the garlic, black pepper, and a spoonful of oil. Rub the chicken with the mixture and set aside for a few hours or overnight.

Heat the oil in a tagine or skillet. Fry the chicken until all sides begin to brown. Remove and set aside.

Add onions, ginger and spices.. Stir-fry over high heat until fragrant.

Put browned chicken back to cook and add chicken broth/stock, or water.

Bring to a boil and reduce heat.

Cover, but leave a crack for steam to escape. (if using the large tagine, there should be a steam outlet).

Simmer over low heat until chicken is tender and cooked through.

Add olives and preserved lemons and taste first before adjusting taste with salt.

Continue to simmer until sauce has thickened.

Serve chicken, covered with sauce...


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Chance Tomato Gugelhupf

I named this savory Gugelhupf after my dear friend, Nancy whose nickname is 'Chance'. This nickname is only known among our classmates from The Convent. Being taught to speak in english, we would all chance or dance but nancy somehow adopted the american slang and it was 'Chance", so that's why we nicknamed her so. Nancy has the same passion as i do, we both love to bake and our conversion would be always about baking something. I have told her that i wanted to make 'gugelhupf' but have not been able to bake one cos i do not have the proper mould. The day, i took her to Denver downtown, it was so hot that we can't remain outdoors anymore, by chance , we landed in TJMAX and what did we see? A blue silicone gugelhupf mould staring at us. Since my birthday was around the corner, 'Chance' gave me the most wanted present and so i have to bake a gugelhupf as soon as we got home. Thank you, dear 'Chance' for making this possible and hope that you had a safe and comfortable journey home to Malaysia.

Ingredients:

(for a 23 cm / 9 inch bundt pan)

3 large eggs + enough water to make 1 cup

1 tsp salt

1 Tbsp sugar

3 cups bread flour

1 tsp instant yeast

1 stick/4 ozs soft butter

1/4 cup pine nuts

1 bunch parsley

4 spring onions

25 cherry tomatoes

a dash of pepper

Method:

Roast pine nuts without any oil until fragrant.

Wash and chop parsley.

Wash and dice spring onions.

Preheat oven to 350 °F.

Put the ingredients for the bread in the bread machine according to the order listed, starting with the liquids and ending with the yeast on top of the flour.

Choose the dough function and when dough has formed, add in the butter.

At the first beep, add in the pine nuts, parsley and spring onions. Continue dough function until it is over. The dough should have been doubled.

Butter the bundt pan.

Wash and dry the tomatoes.

Roll the dough into a log shape.

Cut off 25 slices of dough.

Press down each slice, put one tomato on each slice, add some pepper.

Wrap each tomato into the slice of dough, forming little balls.

Put balls into pan.

Let rise until dough has doubled its volume.

Bake on bottom rail of the oven for 50 to 60 minutes.

Let cake rest for 10 minutes, then flip over onto a wire rack.

Serves
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Mussels The Asian Way

There are many ways to cook mussels but i like to cook them the asian way which i find is the best way as good mussels, fresh or frozen should be cooked in a subtle and simple way so as not to mar the flavor or texture - "Less is more when it comes to cooking mussels! "



Ingredients:

2 lbs mussels(fresh or frozen) - To clean mussels visit How to clean mussels

2 tbsp cooking oil

1 tbsp chopped garlic

1 tsp chopped ginger

1 tbsp chopped chili padi/jalapeno

3 - 4 tbsp shaoxing wine

A dash of fish sauce

Freshly ground black pepper to taste

2 tbsp chopped spring onion

Method:

Heat wok with cooking oil and when oil is hot, add in chopped ginger , garlic and chili padi .

Saute until fragrant but not browned.

Add in the cleaned mussels and stir.

Add in the shaoxing wine, fish sauce and black pepper.

Cover wok , this creates the necessary steam required to open the shells. It will also decrease the overall heat within the pan. Continue to finish cooking.

After about 4 minutes, remove the lid. At this point, most if not all of the mussels will be open. Mussels, unlike clams, will open before they are cooked all of the way through. If some of your mussels have not opened, then it is possible that either they were not cooked long enough, or they are bad and should be discarded. If most of them have not yet opened, place the cover back on the wok and wait another minute or two. Be careful not to cook the mussels for too long, as they will become tough and grainy if overcooked.

Sprinkle with spring onions and serve immediately.

Serves

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