Fried rice: do it your own way (Do-Vember #18)

Do-Vember

In the freezer: cooked rice, spinach, diced onion. In the fridge: leftover beef, jarred garlic, mushrooms. Dinner: Fried Rice, from The More-With-Less Cookbook.

How did we do it our way?

1. No added eggs; Mr. Fixit can't eat them scrambled.

2. No leftover vegetables. We did have last night's carrots and beans to reheat on the side, but they wouldn't have added much to the rice. I added spinach and mushrooms instead.

3. I  cut the amount of sugar, salt and pepper in half, because I knew our leftovers weren't going to make a full recipe.

Still good!

Unjinxing dinner (Thai-style curried chicken)

I have had one cooking disaster after another lately. The crockpot ravioli all the Recipezaar commenters loved had the texture of shoe leather; a recipe for zucchini pizza squares that turned out fine the last time I made it (ten years ago) seemed to have lost its zip and wasted a whole lot of cheese; two different cookie recipes sounded good but didn't turn out so well. Mr. Fixit had a tussle on the weekend with a bag of uncooperative charcoal that wouldn't cook, wouldn't cook, wouldn't cook...even the toaster oven quit working.

Well, the Apprentice's birthday buttertart squares turned out all right.

And tonight's dinner was good too. I adapted this Canadian Living recipe for Oven-Baked Curried Chicken to make it on the stovetop, and also to lower the sodium a bit. I've made it in the oven (you should probably allow more cooking time than CL recommends, depending on your chicken) but I think I like it better on the stovetop anyway.

So this is my version. Total cooking time is 30 to 40 minutes. It might sound weird with the Dijon mustard and everything, but we thought it was very good, especially with some jasmine rice and Oriental-style vegetables, and a basket of chow mein noodles. And slices of microwave chocolate cake for dessert.

Mama Squirrel's Thai-Style Curried Chicken

1/3 cup 2% plain yogurt
3 tbsp liquid honey
4 tsp. Thai Kitchen Red Curry Paste
1 tbsp low-sodium soy sauce
1 tbsp vegetable oil or as needed to cook the chicken (I used more)
2 tsp Dijon mustard
1/4 tsp pepper
1 tbsp. cornstarch if required
4 boneless skinless chicken breasts (or more; we ended up with extra sauce so could probably have put in more chicken)

Preparation:

In a bowl combine together yogurt, honey, curry paste, soy sauce, mustard and pepper. Set aside.

Cut the chicken in medium-sized cubes--it's easier to cut if it's still partly frozen.

In a skillet (I used non-stick), heat the oil and start cooking the cut-up chicken. Now what actually happened tonight was that I put the lid on, and the chicken poached more than it browned, giving off quite a lot of liquid. That was fine too; but I stirred a tablespoon of cornstarch into the sauce mixture just in case. Cornstarch could be added at the end instead, if needed. Cook the chicken cubes until pretty much done, then stir in the sauce. Simmer the whole thing, stirring occasionally, 15 to 20 minutes more or until the chicken is well cooked and the sauce smells good. Serve over cooked rice (I like jasmine rice with this).

Layered Grain and Veggie Salad

This is nothing very original, but if you haven't tried grains in salad before, it's a good way to get started. I prefer layers to all-mixed-up; then it doesn't look like you just threw leftover rice in the bowl.

Layer (a glass bowl is nice so you can see the layers):

1. Cooked grains, hot or cold (I used two parts short grain brown rice and one part barley, and layered them while they were still warm; you could use pasta instead, but I like small grains (vs. white rice sticking out all over the place))

(I used 1 cup rice, 1/2 cup barley, 1 tbsp. oil, 3 cups water; but only part of that went in the salad!)

2. Chopped or shredded raw vegetables (I used diced zucchini, sliced celery, and finely-sliced carrots (leftover vegetable sticks))

3. Dressing--creamy or vinaigrette style both work all right, but I prefer something resembling chip dip for layering, because it stays put better. I used about a cupful of sour cream, a couple of spoonfuls of white salad-dressing-stuff (some Squirrels prefer it to mayonnaise), and about a quarter cup of bottled teriyaki sauce; but you can use any other sauce, or just a dry seasoning like curry powder. Yogurt can work too instead of sour cream if it's not too runny. Or tofu dip recipes work fine too.

Add in a layer of anything else, plain or exotic, that looks good. Chickpeas, frozen peas (don't have to be cooked), chopped tomatoes, sliced mushrooms, peppers. But the one I made this week wasn't so fancy: just a layer of grains, vegetables, dressing, then the whole thing repeated. Chill well before serving.