Curry and more curry

Okay, so I thought I would share a couple curry recipes that turned out pretty well, in case anyone is interested.

My husband is Indian, and I'm white, and before we started dating I was a pretty meat and potatoes plain kind of gal. Other than the fact that I now definitely can't eat potatoes, my tastes for food has broadened immensely since we have gotten married in particular. Anyway, so I used to think that "curry" just meant curry spice, but in fact, it's not. It's sort of a general term for sort of a gravy type sauce with distinct spices that are usually used. It took me a while to get a taste for it, but now I particularly enjoy it. Interestingly, my husband's family originates from the south of India and the cuisine and curry is referred to in Wikipedia under Malayali Cuisine.

Anyway, the good news is that I'm allowed to have Coconut milk, which is used in the following recipe for Cauliflower Curry. Sometimes my mother in law makes it with potato included, but in this case I used butternut squash and it gave it a really nice sweet contrast in comparison to the spices in the curry.

Curried Cauliflower

1 head cauliflower

Half a butternut squash, cubed into bite-sized pieces

1/2 large onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

~ 2 tbsps of olive oil

1 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

1 tsp turmeric

2 tsps ground coriander

2 tsps garam masala

1+ 1/2 cups of coconut milk (I used Maggi Coconut Milk Powder, a good tip from my mother in law)

Heat pan on medium high heat with olive oil, add onion and garlic and saute. Add the cauliflower and squash. Mix the coconut milk powder with water as directed on package. I put the spices all in the coconut milk and mixed, then poured it over the ingredients in the pan. Leave on heat with cover, mixing occasionally, until cauliflower and squash are soft to bite. Serve over rice of choice.

The second curry recipe I used over chicken, but this one calls for yogurt (as many curries do), and this is a little challenging because almost ALL yogurts on the market today are made from skim milk. Skim milk has potato source in it :( (Did I mention I miss yogurt soooooooooo much!) Anyway, my ND did let me know about one type of yogurt called Saugeen yogurt which is made from whole milk, and it's only available where I'm located at Planet Organic. They only make a plain yogurt, which is fine in this case as Indian curries call for plain yogurt. Anyway, I particularly enjoyed this recipe. Originally I was trying to make my own Tandoori Masala to make Tandoori chicken, and so I found this recipe online that was for Tandoori masala....anyway, it smelled right, but didn't taste like Tandoori. But, it turned out a lovely curry, and I enjoyed it very much so I thought I would share it with you...

Chicken Curry

1 pkg bone in chicken thighs (club package contained 9 thighs)

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1/2 medium onion, chopped

1 tbsp finely chopped ginger root (I didn't have fresh ginger on hand so I used dry ginger spice)

1+1/2 tsp tomato paste (make sure there's no salt in it)

1+1/2 tsp garam masala

1+1/2 tsp ground coriander

1+1/2 tsp cumin

1/4 tsp turmeric

1/8 tsp cayenne pepper

~ 100 g plain yogurt (Saugeen brand)

Mix the tomato paste, garam masala, coriander, cumin, turmeric and cayenne in with the yogurt. De-skin the chicken thighs. Put the thighs in a bowl and marinate them in the yogurt and spices overnight if you wish, or for an afternoon was fine. When they're ready, heat a pan over medium high heat. Saute onions, ginger and garlic. Add marinated chicken and any left-over yogurt marinade. Cover and let simmer until chicken is cooked. Serve with rice of your choice. I served this one over Jasmine rice, but of course Basmati is standard. Regular brown rice would do as well.

Anyway, I quite enjoyed these, and there's no salt added to them, and they're sugar free and potato free. The nice thing about curries is that they're not really that hard to make, once you've got the ingredients. Often grocery store bought Indian pastes have a lot of salt and sugar in them. We've gotten our spices from an Indian grocery, and they are way cheaper and make many more curries than the bottles you find in the stores. That being said, I am still trying to find a good recipe for Tandoori, and I have not been able to reproduce the flavor from the packaged stuff from the Indian grocery (it's full of salt!!) If anyone knows of a good recipe for it, let me know!

Enjoy!

6 weeks is WAY past! Update...

Okay so I realize I have been completely slack and many friends I know have been asking me how my eczema is and if it's gotten better. And I realize 6 weeks have come and gone and for anyone who might be rrrrreally interested as to how things are going I might have left you hanging...anyway, so a lot has happened in the last few weeks and I thought I'd update you on some things I've learned.

1.) Eczema

I don't have a pic to post but I would say that my eczema has, and has not, gotten better. Has: is less red and less raised from the skin. Has not: gotten smaller or gone away. In fact, I have new spots, particularly noticed on my thighs, and my forearms. Somewhat discouraging.

I had a follow up appt with my ND who placed me on a probiotic supplement that apparently is supposed to act as a barrier to my "leaky gut." Leaky gut meaning that my gut has toxins in it that it has not been able to handle, and thus releases them into my body and my skin reacts to this. What my ND REALLY wants to treat me with is an amino acid treatment, BUT (the big but) is that I am still breastfeeding my son, and the amino acid treatment is not safe while I am breastfeeding. So folks, my son loves the boob, and it looks as if we're in for at*at least* 3 months more of breastfeeding. So my treatment is kind of on hold.

Since I have gotten new spots of eczema since I started the probiotic, I asked my ND about what was going on because I was concerned. Her response went something like this:

I’m worried the eczema is acting up because your body is starting to mobilize toxins that have been stored because you have removed the food toxins from your system. This happens sometimes when we aren’t treating with L-glutamine (the amino acid) at the same time. As for the length of time, unfortunately it is all over the place. Sometimes we see results in 2 weeks but more often it is 1-2 months. The full term of treatment depends on how you respond but I’ve had people on it up to a year (mostly at a low dose). We could always do a high dose if you ended up going that route and it might shorten the duration.

So, I'll be honest. I have been a bit disappointed. But I will say I don't think I had the correct perspective on Naturopathic treatment. I think in our Westernized medical culture we're often so used to going to the doctor and expecting a quick fix or a drug that's going to eliminate our problems. And seeing an ND is not like that. It's more holistic, it takes time, and it's about healing from the inside out. So I'm not giving up just yet, even though I would have liked to have had better results right away. But I have come this far, and learned some really interesting things, and my cooking and eating has improved immensely in health and substance. And really, hopefully I will be able to get the proper treatment in a few months. Until then, I am just going to keep experimenting with cooking.

2.) Weight

BIG BONUS! I am 10 pounds lighter than I was when I just found out I was pregnant with my son in Dec 2008. People, I put pants on today that were TOO BIG. If that's not enough incentive for you to cut out processed sugar and starchy carbs, well, good on you. And I have not been exercizing, either. It will be interesting to see what happens when the weather gets better and I get out walking and running more.

I will admit, though, having to make most of your food from scratch seems to have eliminated some unnecessary snacking on my part as well, so I am certain this has contributed to my weight loss.

3.) Cooking

Okay I know I have not been updating frequently to give you some recipes, so obviously you can't know what I have been cooking, but really, the amount of stuff I am learning to make makes me feel really empowered. I know what's going into my food, and it has been perfect timing to learn to eat healthier, because my son turned 6 months this past February. He needs food with less salt, less sugar, more content, and he's getting it. Cooking for my son has been great motivation. However, there are days that the work involved in making your own food has outweighed the scales of motivation. But, I'm working on it, and it will get easier.

I will post a couple things I've been really excited about in the next day or so: I made my own pizza and pizza sauce from scratch, and I also whipped together a really nice chicken curry.

Until the next post....