I never thought it would happen, but I'm beginning to feel a little disillusioned with some food blogs. I'll probably get over it, but I keep reading the blogs of others with their sentimentality and nostalgic ponderings and sometimes I just think, yuck! Now, please don't misunderstand, there are lots of witty, insightful, home cooking blogs out there, but why does so much food writing have to be associated with grandmother's knees? I don't remember my grandmother's knees that well or her making anything memorably food-wise for me, (apart from her way with a packet of Bisto gravy). Why are some people so wrapped up in traditions? Sometimes I just want to break free from it and take a deep breath of fresh air. I like cooking and eating food, I enjoy reading all the latest magazines and looking at beautiful images, but the superstar blogosphere seem to highly feature two type of blogs that make me a little cranky.
The first is the well-written and well loved but overly sensitive and nostalgic types, where a simple plum becomes a metaphor for their childhood yearnings, (it has it's fans and it's place, I know and I often enjoy reading the stories myself). The other are blogs where the writers seem only interested in getting into as many parties and cheffy type gatherings as they can to boost their own egos and brag about how popular they are. Have these people ever boiled water, even? Have they had a disaster with a Hollandaise sauce? Have they hosted a dinner party where they made everything themselves? Probably not. They think taking some expensive Jamon Iberico out of a packet and plonking it onto a plate makes them some sort of smug self-congratulatory food genius. They write about food because they eat it, often at fancy restaurants. Not my idea of a food writer. Before I start to sound 'grumpy' like Elizabeth David as described by my hero, Nigel Slater, I'll stop. Here's some laksa for ya.
The only organic chicken I can buy at my local Safeway is a whole one, which actually works out much better as roasting a whole chicken is magnificent for the first meal, when it's just come out of the oven, all proudly golden brown and crispy, but then it just sits around sadly in the fridge getting drier and drier and limper and limper. Better to chop the thing up into breasts, legs and wings. Two meals, both freshly cooked, my idea of a chicken feast. This is what I did on Sunday, feeling a little sacrilegious to chop the breasts into bite sized pieces instead of roasting them whole, (why, really)? A packet mix of Thai yellow curry paste, a tin of coconut milk, lots of vegetables and we had dinner, albeit rather wet and watery. I like my curries with thick, rich sauces. The advantage to this dilemma is the opportunity to make a soup known as laksa the next day with the left over juices. Basically a curry with more liquid, laksas have the virtue of being able to take anything you throw at them, or, rather, into them. Use the base to use up all those vegetables that need eating or some frozen prawns still sitting at the bottom of the freezer.
Recipe : Laksa
1 tin coconut milk
1 packet of any Thai curry paste
1/2 cup water
2 chicken breasts, skinned and cut into chunks
1 red pepper, seeded and cut into thin slivers
4 scallions, thinly sliced
1 tbsp dried prawns
4 large, raw prawns
1 small piece of cooked salmon
1/2 sachet of Shirataki noodles or others, boiled until soft and drained
1/4 head cauliflower, broken into florets
1/2 tin bamboo shoots
1 tbsp fish sauce
2 tsp raw sugar
1 tbsp dried fried onions (optional)
A few cashews
A few drops of hot sauce
Heat the coconut milk and curry paste in a pan over medium heat, stirring well until the oil starts to float to the top, add the chicken, pepper, scallions, dried prawns and cauliflower and simmer, covered, until the chicken is cooked. Add the water, prawns, salmon, noodles and bamboo shoots and cook for a further five minutes or so until the prawns are pink, opaque and cooked through.
Season with the fish sauce and sugar until a good balance of salty, spicy and sweet is achieved to your liking and serve, garnished with the onions, cashews and hot sauce.
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