Friday night Seafood Laksa.

After a stressful and hectic work week, I was craving something tasty, but with a little bit of a difference, to make for our tea. Jason had gone home early from the high school he teaches at with the flu and had a sore throat. What a coincidence it was to discover the latest edition of Dish magazine in my email box with the perfect recipe for Laksa in it! Like Jewish Chicken soup but Thai and made with seafood! I’ve never made a laksa from scratch but the recipe was easy to follow and quick to make. 

First assemble your ingredients for the laksa paste.



Laksa paste ingredients.

1 small red chilli, de seeded

1 stalk of lemongrass, centre only

6 coriander stalks 

4 cloves garlic , chopped

2.5cm piece ginger, peeled and chopped

1 1/2 tablespoons shrimp paste

1/2 teaspoon turmeric 

2 tablespoons rice bran or peanut oil

To make the paste, put all ingredients bar the oil in a small food processor, blend whilst adding oil. You could also pound the ingredients in a mortar and pestle if you feel like working out that stress 😉. I just put everything, including the oil in my little processor and whizzed away. It turned out just fine. 



Now you can assemble all your other ingredients for the soup.



4-6 button mushrooms, thinly sliced

1 tablespoon peanut or rice bran oil

1 1/2 cups of  fish stock

2 kaffir lime leaves , thinly sliced

400ml coconut milk

2 teaspoons fish sauce

2 tablespoons lime juice

1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger

Pepper and salt

115gm rice noodles

12 large raw prawns, peeled

100gm firm fleshed fish, cut into bite sized pieces

1/2 cup bean sprouts

Fresh coriander sprigs to garnish

In a medium saucepan over a low heat, gently cook the sliced mushrooms in the oil for one minute. Add the fresh laksa paste and cook for another minute or until it smells fragrant.





Add stock, kaffir lime leaves, coconut milk, fish sauce, lime juice and ginger. Gently simmer for 7-10 minutes , then taste and season if needed with sea salt and black pepper.



While the soup is cooking, soak the rice noodles in hot water as per packet instructions. I soaked the vermicelli rice noodles I used for no more than five minutes. Drain thoroughly.

Add prawns and fish pieces to soup and cook till the fish is opaque. Drop in the sprouts and remove from heat.



Divide the noodles between serving bowls. Ladle the soup over noodles and garnish with coriander.



This was such a satisfying dish to make and eat. I’m sure you will all enjoy it as much as we did. 

Bon appetit! 

Gluten free Madras Curry Pie.

I made this lovely spicy pie for my hubby Jason’s birthday last week as he loves a nice curry and pie combined into one. Since discovering the gluten free pastry of my dreams, I have become all enthused again about pies and their fillings.
Make the pastry first as it loves a long spell in the refrigerator to rest. This recipe can be found, plus many more mouth watering GF recipes on the blog gfandme.com and is called Mary’s Magnificent Pastry. I don’t have any photos of me making it as I thought of this blog just as I parcelled it up for the fridge resting time😊.

Pastry ingredients
2 cups GF gluten free flour, I used Bobs Redmill all purpose GF flour
2 teaspoons xanthan gum
1 cup of butter, chilled and cut into cubes
1/2 cup sour cream
Beaten egg and dash of milk to brush over pie before baking.

Pulse the flour and xanthan gum powder in a food processor, add the butter and pulse till the dough forms pea sized lumps. Add sour cream and pulse till dough comes together. If you don’t have a food processor just rub the cold butter into the combined flour and xanthan gum with your fingertips and mix in sour cream then get in there with your hands and gently work it all together into a ball 😄.
When combined into a nice ball split into 2 smaller balls, pat down into a thick discus shape and wrap in plastic wrap and place in fridge for at least 4 hours, overnight is even better.

Now for the Madras curry which has to be about the easiest one I’ve ever made from scratch.

Ingredients for curry
2 tablespoons ground coriander
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon chilli powder (recipe says this is optional)
2 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons grated ginger
2 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 kilogram chuck steak (I used a whole bolar blade roast I cut up) cut into 2.5 cm cubes
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 cup of beef stock

Combine the coriander, cumin, turmeric, pepper, chilli, garlic, ginger and lemon juice in a bowl to form a paste. Set aside.

Heat the oil in a large saucepan over high heat, add half the beef and cook, stirring, for 2-3 minutes or until browned. Transfer to a bowl and repeat process with the rest of the beef.
Reduce heat to medium. Add spice paste and cook for 1 minute. Return beef and accumulated juices and stir till well coated with spice paste. Add tomato paste and stock.

Bring to the boil, reduce heat to low and cover. Cook for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until beef is tender.
Remove lid and cook uncovered for a further 15 minutes or until sauce has reduced and thickened slightly.
Put aside to cool completely.

To make the pie.
Take your pastry out of the refrigerator and roll one disc out to about five millimetres in thickness to the size of your pie dish. It rolls out really well from cold without much difficulty.

Add your cold curry to your pastry base and distribute evenly. Roll out your second disc of pastry to the same 5 millimetre thickness and place on top. Glaze with the beaten egg and milk mix, or just beaten egg white if you like.

Bake pie in a pre heated oven at 180 degrees Celsius till nicely browned.

Yes, this looks rather too browned but I can assure you it wasn’t burnt and it tasted so good 😄. We like our curry pie with a nice fruity sauce on top and I reckon a fruity chutney would go down a treat with this.
The curry would be lovely on its own as well with some rice and roti or butter naan. Hmmm I think I need curry for tea!
Bon apetit!

Machchi Kari , Fish Curry.

This yummy recipe is my favourite curry. I found it in my huge old Charmaine Solomon Complete Asian cookbook. It takes roughly twenty minutes to make and probably five or ten to eat it’s that delicious 😄. It is also gluten free and lactose free for anybody like my husband who is allergic to both.
First get your ingredients to hand.

Ingredients,
500gm firm fish fillets
2 tablespoons oil
6-8 curry leaves (I could not get any this time so left them out)
1 medium onion, finely sliced
2 garlic cloves, finely sliced
1 tablespoon finely grated fresh ginger
1 tablespoon ground coriander
2 teaspoons ground cummin
1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/2-1 teaspoon chilli powder
1/2 teaspoon ground fenugreek
2 cups coconut milk
1 1/2 teaspoons salt or to taste (I forgot to put this in and didn’t miss it 😄)
Lemon juice to taste.

Make sure your fish fillets are fairly uniform in size so they cook evenly. Heat oil in a wok or pan and fry curry leaves if using them till slightly brown. Beware, they spatter! Add the onion, ginger and garlic and fry until onion is soft and golden.

Add all the ground spices and fry, stirring until they smell aromatic. I fried mine for about a minute.

Add coconut milk and salt (if using) and bring to the boil, stirring.

Lower the heat and simmer uncovered for ten minutes, then put in the fish, ladle the liquid over it and simmer until the fish is cooked through.

Remove from heat and stir in lemon juice to taste. I forgot this step as well and found it didn’t matter for us. Serve on rice or even a nice potato mash if you like.

This is a very tasty and quick meal and well worth the effort.
Bon apetit!