Velan's Cuisine Extraordinaire

[mexicomeat]

i made some cabbage kadalai paruppu kottu and murungai kai karakozhambu yesterday.

today, i made pepper chicken and muttai kozhambu. both turned out really good. I made it less spicy so that my 5 year old could eat. Recipe and photos below.

Muttai Kozhambu

1. Take a pan, add oil. Add sliced onion (1), sliced ginger and garlic and 3 kashmiri red chillies (the ones that are not hot, but give good colour) and a little bit of kadalai paruppu to ensure you get a thick gravy
2. add a bit of salt to help the onion cook faster. add sliced tomatoes (2). saute for a while till the tomatos are slightly done. add some coconut (i had frozen) to this and continue cooking.
3. remove from flame, grind this into a paste by adding some water.
4. clean the same pan, add oil. add curry leaves, mustard seeds, methi seeds, hing and cumin. then add the paste, salt and water.
5. add some chilli powder and coriander powder, some more water.
6. leave the pan alone for 10 minutes. I wanted the gravy to be bit tangy, so i added two frozen pieces of raw mango into the pan and removed the raw mango after 10 minutes.
7. set a slow flame, break 6 eggs into the gravy (dont mix them for the next 10 minutes as you want the eggs to remain whole)
8. stir after 10 minutes, switch off flame, garnish with coriander and enjoy.

Pepper Chicken
1. I used 2 breast chicken (500gm approx) and 2 thigh pieces (250gm approx). cut them into thin slices (see pic), removed fat, put them in a bowl, applied salt on the chicken generously and put the pan in the fridge for 30 min.
2. in the mean time, i finely chopped onion, ginger and garlic. I didn't want to use the store bought pepper powder, so I also made some fresh pepper powder during this time.
3. after 30 min, take the chicken out, add some water to the bowl and cook the chicken in the salt solution for 3 min - until the chicken changes from pink to white. switch off the flame, take the chicken out and add cold water to the bowl to prevent it from cooking anymore.
4. take a pan, add oil, onion, ginger, garlic and curry leaves.
5. when the onions change colour, add salt and dessicated coconut (i had frozen) and cook for 2 minutes
6. now add chilly powder, cumin powder, salt, dark roasted curry powder (or any meat masala will do) and pepper powder to the onions and fry for 30 seconds.
7. add chopped capsicum, fry for 1 minutes
8. add chicken, make sure that the masala is now coated on both capsicum and chicken
9. use two spoons of yoghurt to bind the masala to the chicken and capsicum
10. cook until there is no water left on the pan. add some more pepper powder (if you wish).
11. garnish with coriander and enjoy.