samedi, janvier 16, 2010

Sayur Lodeh (Vegetables in Coconut Curry)

Sayur Lodeh

Our friend came back from the States with a T-shirt (it says "Chicago") for each child while their mother as usual had nothing. But she will be patient, the longer she waits, the more long-suffering she will appear. And we went shopping again as a family today, this time the breadwinner needed a few new suits and shirts. And shopping with the Hub meant no shopping for me, as he's incapable of shopping on his own, I had to hang around him all the time, from helping him figure out which shops to go to, decide which suits to try on, find the right sizes, hold on to the hangers or his coat/sweater, mumble the "right" comments...Once his shopping done, it would be time to leave because Monsieur couldn't take it anymore.

The rest of the family had a pizza at Spizzico while I waited patiently to return home to finish up this morning's Sayur Lodeh. This is a Malay/Indonesian Vegetable Curry that I grew up on. I especially love eating cabbage, jicama and French beans in the spicy coconut broth.

I thought of making this today as the Rendang Roast Chicken was dry as was the Nasi Kuning. Besides, I had a beautiful head of cabbage waiting for me in the fridge and this weekend's vegetable to use up was French bean. Tomorrow we would have Thai Fish Cakes for dinner and that would use up some of the French beans. I know, I know...


Sayur Lodeh :

1 Onion
2-3 Garlic cloves
1 piece Ginger
1 Lemongrass stalk
1 piece Galangal
1 Tsp ground Turmeric
1 Tsp ground Coriander
1 Tsp ground Cumin
2 Tsp curry paste (e.g. Thai green curry; or grind shallots, garlic, ginger, chilli and belachan into a paste)
1 fresh Chilli
2 Kaffir lime leaves
1 Bay leaf
French beans
Potatoes
Red Bell Pepper
Carrots
Cabbage
Jicama
Zucchini
Plum or Cherry Tomatoes
1 piece Firm Tofu
Hard-boiled Eggs
400ml Coconut milk
200ml hot water
1 1/2 Tsp Salt
1 Tbsp Palm sugar or white sugar
Fresh Coriander leaves
Roast grated Coconut

To prepare this dish, get all the ingredients ready first. Chop and dice the onion, garlic and ginger, slice the lemongrass and galangal, shred the kaffir lime leaves. Chop the vegetables so that the longest-cooking among them will need maximum 20 minutes to cook. Boil the eggs and peel them.


In a wok, fry the onion, ginger, garlic, lemongrass and galangal till fragrant. Add the dry spices followed by the curry paste.

Start with the vegetables that would require a longer cooking time e.g. French beans and potatoes. Sautée them in the spice paste.

Followed by the bell peppers and carrots.

At this point, add the chilli, lime and bay leaves. Then stir in the hot water. And the coconut milk.

Cover and simmer for 15 minutes. Add the cabbage and jicama and simmer for another 10 minutes. Finally add in the zucchini, eggs, tofu and tomatoes. Stir in the salt, pepper and sugar.

Roast grated coconut

I always eat my Sayur Lodeh with roast grated coconut. Here we do not have it fresh, but I have some dessicated grated coconut in the pantry. Just heat up a frying pan on the fire and roast the grated coconut in it till it turns brown (keep an eye on it, stirring from time to time with a pair of chopsticks, as it can be very fast). Garnish the vegetable curry with fresh coriander leaves and the roast grated coconut.

It doesn't have to be vegetarian, of course. A few nice big peeled prawns would make the dish more complete.

13 commentaires:

Pris a dit…

Looks sooo great! Might try it out, if I can persuade the hubby to eat Thai curry. What´s jicama?

Beau Lotus 涟 a dit…

Jicama is Chinese turnip.

sohcool a dit…

Hi Beau Lotus,
Your recent posts got me so excited. All about good food I miss. But I am kinda lazy to do them. How to get only one bay leaf and 2 Kaffir lime leaves? And my little kitchen could not stock up stuff.
Still, my mom is coming and I will get her to make these goodies for me based on your recipes!
BTW, how can we roast coconut? Using oven or pan?
Thank you.

Beau Lotus 涟 a dit…

Lucky you to have your mom come over to cook.

I don't have space in my kitchen too but I keep a small ziplock of lime leaves in the tiny freezer and one little packet of dried bay leaves outside.

Roast the coconut in a non-stick pan over the fire. You need to keep an eye on it and stir it from time to time to make sure it roasts evenly.

Beau Lotus 涟 a dit…

Forgot to say that you could skip the bay leaf but it'll be nice to have the lime leaves.

SIG a dit…

Wow, you even had the roasted coconut to complete the meal. Very nice.

sohcool a dit…

OK. Thanks for the tips. Er.. how is it possible that you have no space in the kitchen when you have a big house. ;)

Beau Lotus 涟 a dit…

My fridge (the owner's) is very small leh. We were thinking of buying a frigo américain but couldn't think of where to put it as we also have Hub's wine cellar. Though it's true that the kitchen is probably around 25m2.

Since we do not have a separate room for our pantry I also have cupboards here and there for my WW3 food stock. And we also have a dining table in it. You may have seen a picture of it somewhere in my blog.

A kitchen is never too big anyway. I am still disppointed I do not have a chef's kitchen.

viagra online a dit…

Thanks ... delicious recipe, my family loved it, the only thing I get was the Jicama cost, making getting online.

Cialis a dit…

That looks absolutely fabulous!

Buy Generic Viagra a dit…

It's always my pleasure to read this type of stuff.I am very much interested in these types of topics and it's my habit to read this.

Buy Generic Viagra a dit…

Great info! I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don’t know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.

Elliott Broidy a dit…

I always love a new recipe. Thanks for sharing.