{"id":158,"date":"2010-08-13T10:14:48","date_gmt":"2010-08-13T15:14:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/2010\/08\/13\/subbed\/"},"modified":"2010-08-13T10:14:48","modified_gmt":"2010-08-13T15:14:48","slug":"subbed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/2010\/08\/13\/subbed\/","title":{"rendered":"Subbed"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of these years (evidently, not this one), I’m going to get better
\nat starting meal planning from what’s available, instead of working
\nfrom recipes and engaging in elaborate scavenger hunts to find the set
\ningredients.   Now, it’s not the south
\nof
\n France<\/a> or anything, but there is a summer Farmer’s Market on
\nGrand Manan, and goodness knows there’s plenty of local fish and
\nseafood to be had.  And, it’s always a bit of a gamble as to what
\nwill be at the grocery store on any given day — some days, the chicken
\nthighs are boneless\/skinless, some days they’re not.  Some days
\nthere are lemons but no limes.  Others, it’s the red onions that
\nhave vanished.  I have sympathy — inventory control must be
\nhellish on an island that can double in population on a sunny summer
\nweekend, and who knows what they’ll all take it in mind to want by way
\nof groceries.<\/p>\n

So I decided to make Indian Butter Chicken.<\/p>\n

Actually, I was looking for a set-and-forget meal, and came across one
\nfor
\nChicken Makhani<\/a>, and decided to give it a whirl.  Of the
\ningredients I needed, the grocery store was obliging with the chicken
\n(though with bones & skin) and the lemon.  IXNAY on the curry
\npowder, coconut milk, and cardamom pods (garam masala, fenugreek —
\nright out).<\/p>\n

Not deterred, I picked up some (unsweetened) dessicated coconut, and
\nheaded home to sort it all out.  The Internet was as obliging as
\nusual — turns out there are Ways to
\nmake coconut milk<\/a> from dessicated coconut.  Of course, that
\nrequires spinning the drenched coconut in a blender (which I don’t have
\non the island), and squeezed through cheesecloth.  Hmm.  I
\ndidn’t have any of that in the house, either.    Moving
\nfrom “not deterred” to “obnoxiously stubborn”, I elected not<\/span> to race out to the store in the
\nfew remaining moments of openness on a Saturday afternoon, and worked
\nwith what I had — my busted up  old Braun food pro, and a tea
\ntowel.  I had to work very<\/span>
\nhard not to think about how much fabric softener I’d used when I’d last
\nlaundered it… <\/p>\n

\n\"Coconut<\/p>\n

Does that coconut milk look faintly blue…?  (No!<\/span>).<\/p>\n

Next up were the spices.  I knew “curry powder” is a generic label
\napplied to a spice combination you can (and should) make up
\nyourself.  Even with the lack of critical components, I wanted to
\nhave a go — my random spice collection included some important pieces,
\nsuch as coriander seeds.  These toasted up nicely in a hot
\npan.  Of course, I don’t have a mortar and pestle ono the island,
\nor a blender (see note above) or a spice grinder.  I was resigning
\nmyself to resorting to the always-suboptimal ziptop and rolling pin
\nmethod (yes, I have a rolling pin — and no blender.  I didn’t say
\nit made sense, did I?), and then I recalled this trip’s extravagant
\naddition:  the table salt grinder, with its ceramic mechanism.<\/p>\n

\"impromptu<\/p>\n

\nIn the end, I didn’t have anything like the right components, but I
\nadded extra dried mustard, and a bit of this and that, but the grinder
\ndid it’s thing, and I had  curry powder & garam masala:<\/p>\n

\n\"ground<\/p>\n

\nIn the end, I guess all that really mattered was the chicken and the
\nbutter — set to slow cook for a number of hours.<\/p>\n

\n\"en<\/p>\n

\nAnd plated:<\/p>\n

\"respectable<\/p>\n

It was, actually, quite tasty.  A flavourful braise of
\nchicken.  Someday, possibly even soon, I will have to try the
\nrecipe again with more of the expected ingredients.  It certainly
\nwon’t be quite the same adventure, but I’m sure it’ll be tasty.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of these years (evidently, not this one), I’m going to get better at starting meal planning from what’s available, instead of working from recipes and engaging in elaborate scavenger hunts to find the set ingredients.   Now, it’s not the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all","category-food"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s7dQdt-subbed","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.knitbot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}