No-waste curry: Using up veges and doing good

A while ago I visited Kaibosh, the wonderful Wellington food rescue group. It collects various kinds of leftover food and redistributes it to organisations who can use it. Currently they have 24 donors, from Countdown to People's Coffee, and the food goes out to 27 groups, from Wellington Women's Refuge to Lower Hutt Food Bank.
          They're now inviting people to "Make a Meal in May to share with the people you care about, and raise funds for Kaibosh at the same time". Find out how here.
           The main kind of food they rescue (over 60% of their collection) is fruit and vegetables. These also feature strongly on a really useful site, Love Food Hate Waste, dedicated to helping us all cut down on food waste at home.
            So this week I thought I'd update a remarkably simple, healthy recipe that I posted back in 2012, because it's a terrific way to use up as many veges as possible in a very tasty way - and it would make a great dish to serve at a May Meal for Kaibosh.

Vegetable Curry
(adapted from Doris Ady's recipe in The Sultan's Kitchen - for the full story, go here.)

Basic vegebtables:

1 large firm fresh potato (any kind)

1 large brown onion

1 large red, yellow or green pepper

To these you can add pieces of kumara, pumpkin, parsnip, carrot, celery, cauliflower, broccoli, green beans, as well as peas and sweetcorn kernels - whatever you have on hand and want to use up.  If you increase the quantity of veges, increase the spices proportionately.

Peel the potatoes (and other root vegetables) and cut them into cubes about 1.5cm square. (no need to be exact - it's jsut a matter of keeping them all roughly the same size and making sure the pieces won't take too long to cook.)

Peel and thinly slice the onion.

Deseed and slice the pepper.

Cut veges such as cauli and broccoli into flowerets. (If you're feeling really anti-waste, peel the thick main stalk and cut it into chunks too.) Slice green beans thickly..

Spices and liquid:

1 mild red chili (use a hotter one, if you like it, or dried chili flakes instead)

1 cm length of a thick piece of fresh ginger

1 cinnamon stick

1-2 tsps turmeric

(If you want a stronger curry flavour, you can add 1-2 tsps of a good brand of mild curry powder s well. Chefs would not approve, but too bad.)

1 tsp belacan or blachan (dried shrimp paste)

(You can buy this in Asian food shops. It smells very pungent, so once you've opened it, keep it firmly wrapped up in the fridge. It seems to stay perfectly okay to use for a long time, and gives the curry a totally distinctive flavour - but you don't need much! And it will still taste okay without this - or try a dash of fish sauce instead.)

2 cups of  chicken or vegetable stock (you can use stock cubes, but miso paste plus water is better, or proper stock)

Deseed and finely chop the chili (then wash your hands).

Finely mince together the peeled garlic and ginger (or use a food processor).

Put all the veges and all the spices into a deep saucepan. Add the stock - the liquid should almost cover the veges.

Bring to the boil, cover and simmer until the vegetables (especially the potatoes) are cooked but not disintegrating.

To finish:

1 small tin or half a larger tin of coconut cream

juice of 1 large lemon

salt

finely chopped parsley

Add the coconut cream to dissolve in the curry, and reheat gently.

Add salt and lemon juice to taste. (I like quite a lot of juice. Lime juice is even better.)

Before serving, sprinkle with chopped parsley.

To go with this:

A big bowl of rice (basmati and brown rice are both good), and quartered hard-boiled eggs. If you like them, add some of the side dishes that make curry so good - chutneys, sambals, yoghurt or raita, lime pickle, poppadums or naan bread. 

         This is so easy to make, and with no fat and lots of veges, really healthy too. Like most curries, it's even better the next day. You can also turn any leftovers into a delicious soup.

Pear and ginger upside-down cake - remembering Judith Hosking

I've always been very fond of upside-down cakes, ever since I was a young mother trying to find easy things (within my still very uncertain culinary grasp) that everyone would enjoy. I made two foolproof kinds: one with drained tinned Doris plum halves, and one with pineapple rings.
         In 1975 we had our only Christmas in London, and Chris's sister Judith, her husband Len and their three children came up from Hampshire to stay. It snowed, and we all went to the pantomime - Treasure Island, with Spike Milligan.
          To feed us all, I made a giant pineapple-ring upside-down cake. It went down very well, and there was enough left for the kids the next day. But when I first served it, I had covered it with whipped cream and cheerfully scattered hundreds and thousands over it. Overnight the colours ran, spreading a blotchy layer of assorted colours all over the cream, like some weird technicolour mould.  The children did eat it, but with much less enthusiasm. Dear Judith wasn't the least bit taken aback - she just laughed. She and Len were extremely kind to us while we were in Britain.
          I've been thinking about her because she died on 27 March, aged 82. I hadn't seen her for a long time, but then I managed to visit her when I was there in 2013, soon after Len died. I'm so pleased I did. This recipe is in memory of her. I made it for two friends' potluck birthday lunch on Easter Sunday.

Pear and ginger upside-down cake

2 c firmly packed soft brown sugar

250g butter, melted, cooled

600g fresh ripe pears, peeled, cored, cut into neat eighths or into 2cm slices

(If the pears are still too hard and not ready to eat, poach them briefly in light syrup before using.)

1 c golden syrup

2 large eggs

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda, sifted

2 and 1/2 c plain flour, sifted

2 rounded tsps ground ginger, sifted

1 rounded tsp mixed spice, sifted

(The original recipe has normal flat teaspoonsful, but I do like it spicy.)

200g light sour cream

Preheat oven to 160°C. (If you have a fan, don't use it - use bake setting.) 

Lightly grease an oblong or large square cake pan. (My tin was just right - 34cm long, 24cm wide and 5cm deep.) Line base and sides with baking paper.

Sprinkle 1/2 cup of the brown sugar over paper on base of pan. Pour 1/3 cup of butter over sugar. Arrange pear eighths (rounded side down) or slices in a single layer over butter and sugar.

Place remaining butter in a large bowl. Whisk in syrup, eggs, soda, flour, ground ginger, mixed spice and remaining sugar. Stir in sour cream. 

Pour batter evenly over pears. Bake for 1 hour and see if a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. If not, leave in for another 10 minutes and check again.

Stand for 10 minutes. Place a large platter over the tin and turn the whole thing over, so that the cake comes out neatly with the fruit on top. 

To serve, cut into neat squares. Though it's not at all necessary - this is a very moist cake - a little whipped cream or yoghurt or creme fraiche is definitely good with it. 

Here's mine just before I carried it off. Like most of my baking, it was a bit woggly, but delicious all the same.

Easter pashka

I know it's now too late to make the traditional Russian treat of pashka for this Easter - I'll have to put up a reminder for next year.  But I have visitors, so while I managed to make it in time for us to eat it on Easter Sunday, writing it up earlier didn't happen.
        It's the most fabulously rich, decadent dessert, so you need only very small portions. I was indulging in nostalgia making it, because it was Harvey's Easter specialty. He found it in a rather odd recipe book put out by the Consumer's Institute of New Zealand in 1983 (he was on their board at the time). The Complete-Menu Dinner Party Book consists of three course menus, often with alternatives, from Britain's Good Food Guide restaurants, with comments "to help antipodean cooks".
         We used only a few recipes from it, but they were all good ones. The recipe for pashka was part of an Easter Feast menu from the Royal Exchange Theatre Restaurant in Manchester. I've given quantities to serve 6 people, but it's so rich that you may well find it goes further. In any case, it pays not to eat it all up at first serving, because leftover pashka is absolutely scrumptious for the next couple of days - but keep it in the fridge.

Pashka
180 g full-fat cream cheese
90 g unsalted butter, softened but not melted
30 g sultanas (I used half sultanas and half dried cranberries)
20 ml vodka (I didn't have any, so I used gin - not very Russian, but it worked)
20g crushed, blanched almonds (I prefer walnuts or pecans)
1/2 tsp vanilla essence or vanilla paste
35 g caster sugar

For the custard:
1 egg yolk
1 tsp caster sugar
45 ml cream

glace fruit to decorate

* Soak the sultanas/cranberries in the vodka/gin for an hour. Find an earthenware plant pot with a hole in the bottom, or use a small colander, or put some holes in a plastic container. Line your chosen container with butter muslin, leaving enough draped over the sides to fold over on top later. (I used an old fine net food cover minus its ribs - it worked perfectly).

* In a food processor, combine the cream cheese, butter, soaked sultanas/cranberries, nuts, vanilla and first measure of caster sugar. Pulse to mix thoroughly.  Leave it in the processor.

* For the custard, in a small bowl, beat the egg yolk and sugar together until thick and pale. In a small saucepan, bring 30 ml of the cream to the boil over moderate heat. Pour it onto the egg and sugar, whisking constantly. Put the mixture back in the saucepan and bring almost to boiling point, stirring all the time. When the sauce begins to thicken adn small bubbles appear around the edge, remove it from the heat. Allow the custard to cool, but not set, then blend it into the cream cheese mixture in the processor. Add the remaining 15 ml of cream and combine.

* Spoon the mixture into the container, fold the overhanging muslin or net over the top, and put a heavy weight onto it. Stand teh container in a curved dish to catch any drainage. Leave it all in teh fridge for at least 24 hours. (I didn't actually get any draininge, the net sopped up the small amount of whey.)

* Unwrap the pashka and turn it into a serving dish - it should be fairly firm. The traditional shape is a pyramid, but a rounded shape is fine too. Decorate with glace fruit. Serve in small portions. Refrigerate any leftovers in a covered dish.

I didn't actually decorate mine, I forgot to get the glace fruit, but I rather like how the pashka tastes without it - it's less sweet. Using cranberries gives it a beautiful pale pink colour.