Happy New Year!

Monday, January 3, 2011

Well praise the Lord and pass the hors d’oeuvres I’ve finally graduated from soup purees, Tofu and soft fish, and have now moved into the ground meat portion of my recovery, boy am I excited and my taste buds are tickled to be back in business too.

I’d almost forgotten what meat tasted like and my butcher had almost forgotten what I looked like. The closest I came to enjoying the savory flavors of the holiday season was some of the side dishes and fix’ns with gravy, and lots of it…

I don’t mean to offend the Vegan’s out there, but I’m a meat eating omnivore not that I can’t appreciate great salads and vegetables, I do, in fact a large portion of my diet is based on fresh raw food, unfortunately it does require the elusive component of masticating, and at the moment, I only have my training wheels on. It’ll be several months before I can go prime time with real grown-up fare, but until then, I’m just as happy as a speckled pup on a new mowed lawn to be eating ground meat again.

One of the first things I made recently was a couple of my favorite curries. These dishes are from my Thai recipes, I’ve substituted ground turkey and hamburger meat for chicken and braised beef; for those of you who have not moved into this portion of post op, you can still substitute the “Other White Protein” i.e. Tofu. These versions are quick and easy to prepare I hope you enjoy them. It’s great to get back to eating like a semi-normal person again!

Bon Apetite,

The 2th Fairy

Hurry Curries

Yellow Curry

A rich creamy spicy and very satisfying dish served over rice. You’ll find this same style of dish in East Indian cooking as well. Serve it with a soft flat bread to soak up the sauce.

Ingredients
3 cup cubed potato

2 cups coconut milk

3 tablespoon Thai yellow curry paste

¼ cup fish sauce

1 ½ tablespoon palm sugar (you can substitute brown sugar)

2 lb Ground turkey or beef

2 Carrots thickly sliced

1 cup Coconut Cream
2 Cups Chicken Stock

¼ Sliced Sweet Red Pepper

Method
Boil potato cubes for about 5 minutes, drain and set aside. Pour 2 cup coconut milk into a sauce pan. Over medium, heat coconut milk and bring to a boil, add curry paste. Stir until fragrant. Season  adding sugar and fish sauce. Add more chili paste to increase spice level. Add stock. Add turkey and cook till opaque. Add sliced carrots cook for 5 minutes till tender. Add potatoes.

Add remaining coconut cream and stock continue cooking for another few minutes until vegetables are soft and tender. Add sweet pepper at the very end. Remove from heat serve with jasmine rice. If the sauce is too spicy, add creamy peanut butter to soften spice level.

Red Curry & Bamboo Shoots

Surprisingly this dish isn’t as spicy as the yellow curry but just as yummy. I usually make a large pot since it tends to be eaten very quickly. If you’re not able to eat the bamboo shoots, you can omit them altogether, but their texture does add a certain quality to the dish.

2 cups coconut milk

¼ 2 tablespoons red curry paste

1 lb ground beef or turkey

1 can bamboo shoots cut into thin strips

¼  cup fish sauce

2 cups chicken or vegetable stock

2 tablespoons coconut cream (optional)

1-cup boiled potatoes

Pour half of the coconut milk into a large pot, over low to medium low heat. Add the red curry paste. Break up the paste and mix it with coconut milk. Stir constantly. Lower the heat if it splatters too much. Add ground beef when you see red oil bubbling on top. Stir and coat ground beef with curry sauce. Add bamboo shoots when beef starts to brown. Stir the bamboo shoots in. Add the rest of the coconut milk and Stock and the fish sauce. Let boil. Serve hot with rice.

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