Chicken Thighs With Spiced Sour Red Cabbage

I love vegetables since I was a child and my mom never complaint about it unlike some mothers on their children, except that I was quite skinny although I ate meat. Meat in our younger days tasted much better than what we have now. One of my favourite was Pork Belly in Soy Sauce with Eggs (I stopped eating pork since 1993, when my former employer had their factory and office next door to a pig slaughter house! I started to consume pork again slowly about 8 years ago but not as much as I used to). When comes to vegetables, what I had seen in my days were mostly green, except when comes to chillies, we have white, yellow, red, orange and with aubergines, there are purple, light green and white. Nowadays, we can see colorful cauliflowers, carrots, potatoes, tomatoes... the lots! What a vast choices to put on our tables and feed our families.

With so much varieties and colors of our food, we faced the problems of how to maintain their colors after cooking. Of course, we can eat them raw as salads but certain vegetables need to be cook or at least blanch them for few minutes to make them palatable, especially for children. Besides cooking colorful vegetables, it has to be presentable and taste delicious to encourage children (also adults!) to incorporate vegetables in their diets.

That in mind, I tried the first time to cook Chou Rouge or Red Cabbage/ Purple Cabbage to some countries. Most of the time, I added this beautiful cabbage in salads because the fear of seeing it losing its color (turned into dull blue when cook for long period of time to soften it) put me off from cooking it. Sure, I can always reach out for those bottled or canned Red Cabbage but I prefer to give it a shot before calling it quits! Btw, do you know canned beets are used in most quantity foodservice operations? I do envied those food magazines managed to capture the intense color of this Red Cabbage but when you knew about the tricks of how a dish was photographed to obtain such vibrant colors and shapes, it made me wonder if I should produced photographs of the 'real' results or follow the tricks to make the dish pleasing for the eyes (or acceptable for online food galleries).

I don't have right apparatus or appropriate tablewares to snap gorgeous professional photos and it's not easy when you have an excited toddler tagging with you who just couldn't wait to dip his fingers into the cooked food! Anyway, I decided to post here as it was. It would be great if any foodie friends out there have wonderful tips to share on how to cook Red Cabbage or any colorful vegetables! Experienced foodie photographers are encouraged to share tips and tricks on how to shoot challenging Red Cabbage dishes :-)

Chicken Thighs With Spiced Sour Red Cabbage

Serves 4

½ nos Red Cabbage (Chou Rouge)

200 g White Turnips (Navet)

4 pcs Chicken Thighs

2 Tbls Cooking Oil

½ nos Orange ~ for juice only

4 Tbls Apple Cider Vinegar (or more to taste)

1 tsp Ground Paprika

1 tsp Gound Coriander

Salt and Black Pepper to taste

Method:

1. Wash and slice thinly the red cabbage. Peel and grate coarsely the white turnips.

2. Wash the chicken thighs thoroughly and pat dry with kitchen papers. Marinade with some salt and black pepper to taste. Set aside for few minutes.

3. In a large deep pan, heat the cooking oil until it's hot (you will see the oil smokey). Shallow fry the chicken thighs on both sides until golden brown. Dish up and keep them warm in 2 separate plates.

4. In the same pan, add in the sliced red cabbage and white turnip. Cook for 2-3 minutes.

5. Add in the rest of the vinegar, orange juice and grounded spices. If you want, add in some salt and pepper to taste. Mix well and cook for 30 minutes on medium heat.

6. Arrange the chicken thighs on top of the vegetables and cook covered for another 15 minutes in medium heat. Serve hot as it is or with grilled polenta.

Enjoy!

Chicken In Coriander Curry

I got a big bunch of fresh coriander leaves in the fridge that I don't know what to do from last cooking episode :-D Have you noticed that Coriander Leaves are sensitive plant? Seems that it doesn't like moisture when you keep it in fridge even in the vegetable compartment. In other words you can't wash it until you need it but how can you stand looking at the soil-stucked roots which going to make a mess at the bottom of the compartment. Yes, this bunch was bought at the fresh market unlike from the supermarket, cleaned and packed nicely. Mine was wrapped in a large outdated Chinese newspaper. My mom always told me that coriander, bean sprouts and probably other vegetables keep longer if you wrap them up in newspaper. I bet it's the ink that preserves these 'sensitive' vegetables :-)

This recipe I wanted to share is quite unique because even though there's some chilli powder used, it doesn't taste hot at all but the main ingredient I wanted to point out is the use of Evaporated Milk to cook this curry which has the marriage of Malay and Indian influences. So, a less fat curry, yet you still have that special creamy taste of coconut milk! Of course, if you want the coconut milk, no problem. Just replace the Evaporated Milk in the recipe for fresh (the best!), canned or powdered coconut milk (follow the manufacturer's instruction to dilute the powder before adding to the cooking.) At least, all my coriander stalks were used! More fresh ones soon after CNY! Oh yes... I take this opportunity to wish all World Foodies who celebrate Chinese New Year with great prosperity and wealth. Most importantly, I wished you great health and best wishes for the Year of Ox. Here's a link on how Malaysia-Chinese celebrated Chinese New Year with their friends and families... the Malaysian way. While you're at the site, look out for the video recipes and for those interested in Feng Shui, there are some forecasts by Feng Shui experts as well. Keong Hee Huat Chye... Selamat Tahun Baru Cina!

Chicken In Coriander Curry

600 g Chicken Meat

Ingredients to blend:

3 nos Shallots

2 cloves Garlic

30 g Galangal

20 g Palm Sugar

1 tsp Belacan

2 stalks Coriander leaves ~ roughly chopped (approx. 20 g - 40 g)

2 nos Red Chillies ~ cut into halves

2 nos Geen Chillies ~ cut into halves

1 tsp Cumin seeds

1 tsp White Pepper

1 tsp Chilli Powder

3 pcs Kaffir Lime leaves

250 ml Evaporated Milk

A little bit of Tumeric Powder

Salt and sugar to taste

Oil for frying

Method:

1. Heat a little bit of oil in a wok or deep pot and add in the blended spices.

2.Add in the cumin, White pepper powder, cili, tumeric and kaffir lime leaves. Fry until fragrant.

3. Add in the chicken and stir until chicken meat are well coated with the spice mixture. Add a bit of water. Let it simmer until chicken meat are tender.

4. When chicken is cooked , add in the evaporated milk, chilli halves and chopped coriander leaves. Add in some salt and sugar to taste.

5. Remove from heat and serve.

Note: This dish is best overnight after the meat absorbed all the fragrant spices. You can eat with Naan, Rice, Bread, Noodles, Pita or even roll some meat and gravy in your favourite Tortillas!

Enjoy!

Easy Crispy Garlic Coriander Rice

I missed eating Garlic Rice for unknown reason but with sore throat, my family advised me not to take too much fried food. I'm getting better now... thank you for all your get well wishes! I hope I won't get this problem for awhile since more festive seasons coming soon. I don't want to be left out... ;-) So, I thought why not using my pre-fried garlic crisps and add into boiled rice instead of frying the rice. I always fried some extra garlic or onion crisps and keep that for later use. The addition of coriander gives extra fragrant to this rice dish. Since, it's just add-on dish, I even mixed 2 extra types of herbs - Basil and Tumeric leaves :-) For the Tumeric version, I julienned fresh tumeric root and chiffonade the leaves. Just before serving, I add in the herbs and stir the rice well. Then I served the rice with Stir-fry Gai Choi with Shiitake Mushrooms and Salted Fish (as in the pic).

Easy Crispy Garlic Coriander Rice

Serves 2

1 cup Rice, washed & drained

2 tbl Olive Oil

1-2 tbl Minced Garlic

2-3 tbl chopped fresh Coriander Leaves

Method:

1. Cook the rice according to manufacturer's instructions. Keep warm.

2. Heat olive oil in another pan in medium heat. When hot, add garlic and stir fry until fragrant and golden brown - about 1 minute.

3. Remove pan from heat and stir in chopped coriander leaves.

4. Pour the garlic -coriander mixture into the freshly cooked white rice. Stir to mix well.

5. Serve garlic-coriander rice on it's own or as accompaniment to meat and other fish dishes.

Notes:

If you want even faster, you can pre-fry the certain amount garlic crips in advance and bottled with the oil as well. When you need it, just add into rice or any dishes that you want. Besides Coriander, you can also use other herbs like Basil or Italian Parsley.

In this recipe, I used Basmathi rice. You can use Jasmine rice.

♪Enjoy♬