The first thing I could ever “cook” was instant ramen to which my mother told me to add whole green chillies, coriander, lemon juices and some spices. I was in my single digits of age and thought the world of these noodles.
Since, I have eaten every noodle made available to me. My first part-time job was in a noodle place and when I don’t know what to eat its always noodles. I have now moved on from instant ramen to always having a variety of dried noodles to cook with. Whether that’s a Japanese soba or udon, Chinese flat wheat noodles or Vietnamese vermicelli noodles.
This recipe calls for a pasta machine. I got one a few months back and have had a good run with pasta from it, hence felt semi-confident with this. Many thanks to Alex-FrenchGuyCooking for this very precise recipe.
Ramen
Ingredients
1.5 tsp Sodium Carbonate Not Sodium Bicarbonate
250g flour
2 tsp salt
½ cup
Method
1) Bake the sodium bicarbonate in the oven at 160’C for an hour. The CO2 and H20 will evaporate, making sodium carbonate.
2) Mix all the ingredients together n a bowl.
3) Knead into a dough, it will be quite a rough and patchy dough. Don’t worry, it all changes after passing through the machine.
4) Pass through the pasta machine at setting 1 many times (I must have done atleast 6) and then increase the setting slowly to turn this into thin sheets.
5) The above part takes patience, its going to take quite a few passes before it turns out nice and thin.
6) Once around 2mm thick, pass through the spaghetti contraption of machine.
7) And now just dust in cornflour or just normal flour
8) Boil for around 3 minutes to get an al dente texture.
I was really really happy, they tasted exactly like the chewy stringy ramen noodles found in ramen shops.I served mine in a miso/shrimp paste broth topped with a caramelised onion, a boiled egg soaked in soy to get that lovely tint and a sesame and chilli oil (the recipe is in the name).
This dish was for me, solely for me and I have no qualms about that.
Goan Ambotik Curry
A spicy, sour, tangy South Indian curry. Once you get the paste ready, its relatively easy.
Ingredients:
Spice Paste
Black peppercorns
Cloves
Cinnamon Stick
Garlic Bulbs
Ginger
Dried chilli’s
Desiccated Coconut
Mustard Seeds
Cumin seeds
Turmeric
(for amounts see pictures)
Other
Two tomatoes (Boil them and then blitz to a paste for a fresh puree)
One onion.
Citric Acid/ Tamarind paste
Kokum petals (A sour dried mango like flavour – not necessary)
Cod pieces
Prawns
(Of course I would prefer fresh seafood but that’s not possible right now)
Method
1) First grind all the dry spices in a coffee grinder and transfer into a blender.
2) Now add to this the ginger, garlic and some water until it becomes a smooth paste.
(kokum petals & the spice paste)
3) Chop the onions into cubes and fry untill it starts to change colour and then add the tomatoes. Cook this for around 5 minutes.
4) Now add in the paste and some more water, bring to boil and let this simmer for around 20-25 minutes so that the raw flavour evaporates.
5) Add in a pinch of citric acid as that will elevate the sourness, I did this as I didn’t have any tamarind but otherwise add tamarind soaked in water. Also add in salt to taste.
6) Now add seafood and kokum leaves (I love sour so I now will use them in everything).
7) Cook for around 5 minutes and finish with two whole green chillies.
It’s a really tangy and flavourful curry and will work well with almost any seafood.
Alongside making the curry, I also made some Rajma! Well its not really rajma because rajma is beans but I didn't have any so made it with black chickpeas instead. It very much reminded me of the rajma i had with rice during my last few days travelling in India.
Simple Rajma Recipe
- Fry off a small cinnamon stick and two small black cloves in Ghee
- Now add a tablespoon of tomato puree from a tube. Cook this a bit until oil starts to rise.
- Add the red beans/black chickpeas to this, along with 1tsp fennel powder, 1tsp ginger powder, 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp chilli powder.
- Cover this with water, I would say around 1 1/2 cans of water (the can in which the beans were).
- Cook this on a low heat for around 30 minutes and then to thicken some more, mash some of the beans within. Sprinkle over some coriander and thats that.
(somewhere in India)
I have immense gratitude for all the resources and ingredients I have available to me to cook and learn whilst at home, and hope never to take that for granted.
Shanzé