Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Feeding the heart

I am seldom as consistent in the kitchen as I am (or try to be) with running. I do spend an hour in the kitchen every week, cooking up dishes to last for a few days, while DH and I plod through our work week. But they are the same few recipes, repeated over and over to the point of boredom. When I increase my weekly running mileage however, I tend to get hungrier, which leads me to furious recipe-hunting on interesting foodie blogs, followed by a dedicated hour of cooking. The result is usually of a far superior quality than the normal fare. Like anything else, when you put your heart into cooking, the result is delicious. I had one of these moments of perfection yesterday. I soared to the absolute heights of culinary glory, even if I say so myself (pausing to take a bow).

I borrowed this Kerala Chicken Fry recipe from So I married a Meat-a-holic. I must admit, the name was what attracted me to this blog in the first place; but I found out the recipes are just as alluring. I added a bit more gravy, pressure cooked the chicken for a couple of minutes and changed the recipe to Kerala Chicken curry. (Kerala is a state in Southern India, home to some of my favorite dishes). The recipe called for a small quantity of different ground spices and coriander leaves. As the chicken was stewing in its juices and the gravy was getting cooked, the aroma that arose from it made my kitchen smell like a classy Indian restaurant. Though the picture I hurriedly clicked before I dug my teeth into the end product is nowhere near as appealing as the original, the taste more than made up for it. In fact, I discovered that whoever said The way to a man's heart is through his stomach (the shortest road to a man's heart is down his throat?) was not kidding. DH was the most doting husband in the world last night.

Today, I followed it up with Brown rice and Garlic Asparagus with Lemon. As you can probably see from both pics, I am a big fan of the red onion. If the recipe calls for yellow onions, I use red onions. If the recipe calls for shallots, I substitute red onions for the shallots. If the recipe calls for anything resembling an onion, I throw in a red onion instead.
Directions
Melt butter (1 teaspoon) with olive oil (1 tablespoon) in a large skillet over medium heat. Stir in garlic (1 clove) and onion (1 medium), and cook for 1 to 2 minutes. Stir in asparagus spears
(1 bunch); cook until tender, about 5 minutes. Squeeze lemon (1/2) over hot asparagus, and season with salt and pepper.

The result, while not as dramatic as the chicken curry, is also excellent for the heart.
My foot was throbbing just a little last night, so instead of a 6-mile run, I worked out at the gym this morning (20 minutes on the elliptical, 20 minutes swimming and 5 minutes at the rowing machine). I couldn't spend more time at the gym because I had to get to work. I can never figure out how 45 minutes at the gym eats up 3 hours out of my day!

13 comments:

chris mcpeake said...

Nice to see someone else has problems with time magically disappearing during gym visits and here I thought it was only me.

joyRuN said...

Oooh those dishes look gooood...

zzz said...

Kerala chicken curry looks amazing and sounds delicious. I just love Kerala Cuisines.I would love to try this sometime soon. Thanks for sharing your recipe.

Heather said...

Nice job on the kitchen experimentation. I've been trying to get more creative in the kitchen as well instead of just always making the same old standbys.

Aileen said...

That asparagus recipe sounds AMAZING, and perhaps easy enough for me to do...

Irene said...

That recipe is right up my alley! Yum!

Mica said...

Yum! Kerala chicken curry looks amazing! I want to make it so that my apartment will smell like a classy Indian restaurant too!

Abby said...

This is great! I get into ruts, too, where I cook a the same couple things over the weekend to last through the week. The blogs are always good inspiration to try something different.

Marlene said...

Mmm, both dishes look yummy!

I tend to be pretty boring in the kitchen, often making the same things over and over. I'm hoping to try some news recipes this weekend.

Thanks for the good luck and speedy vibes for my DH. :)

Beth said...

I am jealous of your talent in the kitchen. I have never made anything that was as complicated or as tasty looking. I hope your foot is better soon. Keep up the good work in the kitchen!

Anonymous said...

I second Beth up there! I usually stick to the simple stuff - this looks So tasty :)

Emily said...

Those dishes look absolutely delicious. I'm a huge fan of red onion, too. :-)

Mel-2nd Chances said...

i wish i took more time to cook... looks delicious!!