Massaman Curry

I bought a pressure cooker. It's a second generation six-piece Kuhn Rikon Duromatic. It came in two different sizes, with a lid that can be shared between the two, another glass lid for cooking, and a trivet for steaming. Simply put, pressure cookers save time. Second generation pressure cookers are designed to be safer because they are supposed to be constructed with at least two or three safety releases, and they are designed to indicate clearly when the cooker has come to low or high pressure. There is no loud hissing. In older, or first generation, pressure cookers they usually have a jiggle top which releases pressure in loud hisses after reaching pressure.

Laura, of the Hip Pressure Cooking blog, has written extensive reviews on different types of pressure cookers, and I found her detailed, and highly knowledgeable reviews, are what sold me on the Kuhn Rikon. Her recipes are modern, adaptable, and reproducible. She has basic pressure cooking tutorials that are easy to follow, and her site has created a community of modern day pressure cooker enthusiasts.

Over the past few weeks, a personal barrier I had to using my new pressure cooker was relearning how to adapt recipes. I found that after a few weeks of trial and error, the learning curve for seasoned cooks is fast. The learning curve for beginner and novice cooks (the hubs is categorized in this category) is also fast. Our pressure cooker came with a cookbook which is a great reference guide. The hubs started out with potatoes, moved to cooking beans a few times, and made a rice pilaf, and a Mediterranean couscous. To vegetarians, the cooking time for beans and lentils will be slashed in half. This, and this reason alone, is one of the very essential reasons to own one, and it explains why pressure cookers are a sustaining life force in Indian households.

Channa Dhal Mushroom Massaman Curry
Adapted from Food and Wine
Yield: 4 servings

This curry is delicious. I think the ingredients list is a bit daunting, but the outcome is marvelous. With a pressure cooker you really save time because you can utilize the 12 minutes that the cooker is cooking to prepare other things and clean up. The sweet potatoes melt into the dish, the channa dhal bulks up the curry, and replaces chicken in the original recipe. I have added mushrooms, channa dhal, and coriander, and replaced water for the broth.

Ingredients for curry paste:
1" of ginger
2 cloves garlic
1/8 tsp salt
1 tsp Chinese five-spice powder
1 tsp cumin, ground
1 tsp coriander, ground
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp red chili flakes
1 can coconut milk

Ingredients for curry:
2 tbsp peanut oil, divided
1/4 cup channa dhal or split yellow lentils, soaked in 1 cup of water*
1 onion
1 sweet potato, peeled and cubed into 1" chunks
3/4 cup water
1 package of mushrooms, stems removed and quartered
1-2 tsp rice wine vinegar, optional
1 medium tomato
1/4 cup cilantro, chopped
1/4 cup peanuts, chopped
4 cups cooked white long-grain rice

Directions:

1. Soak the channa dhal in 1 cup of water. Set aside. 
2. The next step will be making a curry paste. You have three options 1) use a mortar and pestle, 2) use a food processor, 3) finely chop with a knife. I used the mortar and pestle because you end up with about 2-3 tbsp of curry paste a small amount for the food processor. In a mortar and pestle, pound together the garlic with the salt until it is a coarse paste. Remove this to a small mixing bowl that can hold 2 cups worth. Add the ginger and pound together. Scrape this into the bowl. Add the remaining spices and the coconut milk to the bowl and stir to combine. Set aside. 
3. In a 4 quart pressure cooker (my small pressure fry pan is < 3 quarts) heat up 1 tbsp oil over medium high heat. Once hot, sauté the onions for 3 minutes. 
4. Add the sweet potatoes, stir together, and then add in the channa dhal along with the water. Add 3/4 cup of water. Do not add salt. Bring the mixture to a simmer and then close the lid. Bring the pressure cooker to the first red ring and then cook over low pressure for 12 minutes. Use the natural release method. 
5. Heat up the remaining 1 tbsp of peanut oil over medium-high heat in a cast iron or non-stick skillet.  Once hot, add in the mushrooms and sauté about 7-10 minutes. Sprinkle the rice wine vinegar on top, cook 3 more minutes and cut the heat and remove the pan from the heat. 
6. Open up the pressure cooker and put it back on the heat. Stir in the coconut milk curry mixture, add the tomatoes and bring to a simmer. This should only take a few minutes. 
7. Garnish with peanuts and cilantro and serve immediately, preferably over cooked white rice. 

*Note: soaking the channa dhal is not necessary, but I find that it cooks faster.

Sweet potato pineapple muffins

Sweet potato with pineapple and fresh ginger.

Sweet potato with dates. Look at that fine crumb. 

Prepared muffin pans with oat-brown sugar topping.

Filled to just about 1/2 inch from the top, leave enough room for them to rise.

Fresh baked muffins, mmm lekker. 

In keeping with my goal of testing recipes multiple times, these sweet-potato pineapple muffins have been baked 4 times. The recipe has been adapted from Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. The original recipe calls for 1/3 cup of candied ginger. Instead, I used 1/3 cup canned chopped pineapple, or dates. I add in 1 T of fresh grated ginger, along with 1/8 tsp fresh grated nutmeg.

Muffins are quick breads meaning that they don't need to leaven or rise. To bake muffins, mix together all of the dry ingredients in a bowl, and all of the wet ingredients in another bowl. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and with a large spoon (not a hand or stand mixer) combine the wet and dry together with swift quick strokes. Avoid overmixing. The batter is ready when all of the flour is incorporated into the wet, a good rule of thumb is that the batter looks slightly undermixed. Drop batter by the spoonfuls into a greased muffin pan.

In general I try to make healthier modifications, but I find the proportions of this recipe work out nicely, and they aren't too sweet with a 1/2 cup of brown sugar, or heavy with 1/4 cup of vegetable oil. Subbing in whole-wheat pastry flour is fine. The pineapple and sweet potato make a delicious moist end product.

Sweet potato pineapple muffins

Yield: 1 dozen muffins

Ingredients listed in order of wet and dry:

Dry

1 and 3/4 cup all-purpose flour (can use whole wheat pastry flour)

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1/8 tsp nutmeg

Wet

3/4 cup cooked sweet potato, mashed (canned or cooked pumpkin would work too)

1/3 cup canned chopped pineapple, or dates, or candied ginger

1 tbsp fresh grated ginger (leave out if using candied ginger)

1/2 cup buttermilk (see note below)

1/4 cup vegetable oil, plus a tiny bit extra to grease muffin pan

2 eggs, beaten

a heaping 1/2 cup of brown sugar (yes I know it's a dry ingredient, but add it to the wet ingredients first)

Note: if you don't have buttermilk, yogurt thinned with water works, or add 1/4 tsp of vinegar to a 1/2 cup of milk. Stir the milk and vinegar together and let stand 10 minutes.

Directions:

Set oven to 375 ºF; grease a muffin pan or line them with muffin liners. 

1. Combine the dry ingredients from flour to nutmeg in a medium-size mixing bowl. Stir together to ensure that it is well mixed. Set aside.

2. Combine the wet ingredients together in a large mixing bowl. Stir together to combine. A sturdy spoon is sufficient as muffins do not require a hand or stand electric mixer.

3. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients. You should add the dry ingredients all at once. Stir together, scraping down the flour from the sides of the bowl. The mixing is done when the flour is mostly all incorporated into the wet batter. Undermixing is fine, but don't leave any huge clumps of flour.

4. Drop batter by the spoonful into a prepared muffin pan. Bake 20-25 minutes until a toothpick or fork inserted comes out clean. 

For the oat-brown sugar topping:

2 tbsp butter, softened

2 tbsp oats or more

1 tbsp flour

1 tbsp brown sugar or regular sugar

small dribble of vanilla extract

Combine all the ingredients. A fork works nicely to mash everything together. Distribute evenly over muffin batter once they are in the muffin pan. Seriously, I've been making this topping since my 9th grade home-ec class. 

Bhrelu shak (stuffed Gujarati vegetables)

Bhrelu shak is a dish of stuffed Gujarati vegetables. These are delicious roasted in a cast iron pan to mimic a hot tava, or they can also be prepared in a microwave or oven. I will provide all cooking options below. This dish is known to be oily, but this recipe uses less oil. Stuffing vegetables should be small potatoes, baby eggplants, and baby squashes if available. Avoid cruciferous vegetables like cabbage, cauliflower or broccoli.

Ingredients for stuffing:

1 cup gram flour

1/4 cup ground coriander

1/4 cup cumin

1 T garam masala

2 large garlic cloves, crushed

2 T ginger, chopped fine

1 chili, seeded and deveined, and chopped

1/2 cup cilantro leaves, washed and chopped

1 tsp salt

2 tsp brown sugar

1/2 tsp citric acid (lemon juice will make it mushy) you can omit if you don't have.

2 T vegetable oil plus extra for roasting

Directions to prepare stuffing:

1. Combine all of the stuffing ingredients in a small bowl and set aside. Mix together well. Adjust seasoning if needed.
2. Gram flour can be available at South Asian grocery stores, or substitute garbanzo bean flour (chickpea flour) from a health foods store.

Ingredients for vegetables:

1 cup red new potatoes, scrubbed and scored

8-10 baby eggplants, washed and scored

5-6 baby squashes or 1-2 large squashes

1 sweet potato

Directions:

1. For the baby or small vegetables, score them along one side, and score along the opposite side, so you can stuff the insides with the gram flour mixture.
2. If using regular sized vegetables, just cut them and coat them with the mixture.

Directions for cooking:

Cast iron or tava method:

1. Pour about 1-2 T of vegetable oil in a cast iron pan, and heat over medium heat.
2. Place the stuffed vegetables in a single layer and cook 2-3 minutes per side, until the vegetables are cooked and golden.
3. As they are cooking, add 1-2 tsp of water to the pan so the vegetables don't dry out. You can also add in a little oil as well. It is important to cook the vegetables in a single layer, so they cook evenly.
4. Continue rotating the vegetables to ensure that they get roasted and cooked. This method should take between 25-30 minutes.

Microwave method:

1. Place vegetables in a shallow microwave oven safe dish that has 1-2 T of oil and about 1/2 cup water placed in the bottom of the pan. Place the cover on the dish.
2. Microwave on regular power setting for 2-3 minutes and rotate the vegetables after each cooking cycle.
3. Cook this way for 20 minutes, or until the vegetables are cooked thoroughly.

Method for oven:

1. Heat oven to 375 F.
2. Coat baking or roasting pan with liberal amounts of oil (1-2 T) and arrange vegetables in a single layer.
3. Cover the pan with foil to help roasting, and check the vegetables often, about 5-10 minutes. Rotate the vegetables for even cooking and continue to sprinkle oil and water to the cooking dish to help add moisture during the cooking process.
4. Cooking time will be about 35 minutes.