Each week, I enter the Steemit Iron-Chef contest. This week, the theme ingredient is nuts. I almost went for pecan pie (the trick is to use more pecans and less filling) but I figured there'd be a lot of sweet dishes. There are a few common dishes that I feed my family, that can be adapted to many ingredients (or whatever happens to be around the house): chilaquiles, frittata, stir-fry, and curry. These are dishes I can make taste good in my sleep. (I'm still working on plating, though I'm pretty happy with this one.) So I went with curry.
I read up on peanut curry. It's usually a chicken dish and a red curry. But after reading through a few how-to docs, I thought I could adapt the knowledge without any problem.
So I gathered up some core ingredients (and remembered to write a proof-of-work post-it this week!) and started deciding what to use. The only thing that I bought specifically for this dish were the two coconuts -- everything else we had on hand. A few other things were added after that pic was taken and I didn't end up including the onion, but it's nice to have a starting palette:
I want to talk a minute about peanuts. You probably know that they're not really nuts -- though they are for culinary purposes. But you might never have been exposed to them raw. They're really different. They're like a vegetable, with a hint of sprouting beans in the flavor. I adore them raw, my wife and daughter, not so much. These are the ones I buy mailorder and if you're in the US and don't know what I'm talking about, you might want to order some too! They're harvested in the fall, so I like to order a few bags in October when they're fresh and then freeze them. The bag in the picture above (lower right) has been in our freezer for five months. So anyway, I basically used the best peanuts in the world. ☺
OK, back to the curry. I simmered the coconut milk from those two cans and the coconut water from the two coconuts for a while to reduce the volume and thicken, then I added the commercial green curry paste, whisked it in and let it simmer for another couple minutes. (A note: I have made my own curry pastes from hard-to-find botanicals, specially-ordered and ground in a mortar and pestle; and I'm just not sure it's any better -- it certainly isn't better enough to justify the work. Maybe if I lived somewhere that those plants all grew, I'd feel differently about it.) I added the carrots and tofu and brown sugar and tamari and vegan fish sauce and let it simmer for about five minutes. Then I added the cauliflower and peanuts and gave it another five minutes. I added bell pepper and basil, stirred it up and turned off the heat. That's pretty much how simple it is.
In my head, when I was planning to use the coconuts as bowls, they were much bigger -- enough to hold a reasonable portion. When I got them open and started plating, they were very small. So this is an appetizer-portion I guess. (In the real-life behind the contest photo-shoot, I made two of these (half the coconut had holes from draining the water before splitting them) and then served dinner and regular glass bowls.
I really am trying to step up my plating game and I think it paid off. The coconut-as-bowl is stunning -- the contrasting dark brown and whiter than white is a powerful frame for the food. Also, holding the coconut, while eating out of it is a nice tactile experience. I have to tell you, getting a coconut to stand is an interesting challenge. I wonder if I could saw the tip off and make a flat patch, but what I actually did was find lids for tiny jars and they were perfect -- you can barely see one in the picture just below. So, I placed a combination of the more solid bits into the coconut, making sure to get some cauliflower, tofu, orange pepper, etc. Then I carefully ladled the coconut broth over those ingredients, trying to fill it up to just below the rim of the coconut. Then I topped it with pretty bits: carrot strips, a basil blossom spike, Fresno chile rings, some of the peanuts from the bottom of the pot, and a sprinkling of tiny basil leaves.
That's it! The curry was delicious. My daughter, Kivi, isn't a fan of nuts (weirdo!), but likes coconut well and tolerates peanuts, and she really loved this dish.
