hitchhiker's Palak Paneer

[cjsmith]

General guidelines:
--------------------
1. Mise en place. Srsly. Get everything assembled before you turn the fire on.
2. Cooking is way more forgiving than baking of quantity variations, so don't stress about getting everything exact.
3. A deep sided frying pan works best, I've found
4. Technically, you're supposed to pass the spinach through a blender, but I've done it using fine chopped frozen spinach and it's come out fine

Quantities:
-----------
I'm following the recipe that sounded closest to the one I usually make (I do it by feel, which is horrible for trying to tell other people quantities):

 15 oz Paneer (substitute ricotta)
     10 oz Spinach, frozen chopped
    1/4 lg Onion; finely chopped
    1/4 c  Sour cream (you could use yoghurt instead)
      1"   Ginger, fresh
      1    Garlic clove
      1 ts Cumin powder
    1/2 ts Coriander powder
    1/2 ts Turmeric powder
    1/2 ts Chili powder
    1/8 c  Oil
           Salt; to taste

Preparation
-----------
1. Grate the ginger
2. Chop the onion finely
3. Put the garlic through the press
4. Thaw the spinach, give it a few seconds in a blender if you have one otherwise just chop it up finely
5. Measure out the cumin, coriander, turmeric and chili powder into a small bowl or something (it's easier than frantically measuring out half-teaspoons into a sputtering pan)
6. Cut the paneer into cubes
7. Have a slotted spoon handy - you'll need this for the first bit

Cooking:
--------
1. Heat the oil in the pan. When it is hot, add the paneer and brown it lightly
2. Remove the paneer (see? told you you'd need the slotted spoon) to a holding container, sprinkle lightly with salt
3. Toss in the onion, garlic and ginger. Fry till the onions turn a translucent golden brown. Marvel at how good your kitchen smells
4. Add the spice powder mix to the onions. Turn heat down a bit, fry for 30-45 seconds, stirring continuously (basically don't let the spices stick to the pan and burn)
5. Add the sour cream and spinach, mix everything up thoroughly, fry stirring continuously for another 30s or so
6. Add the paneer, 1/2 cup of water and salt to taste
7. Cover and let simmer on low heat for 15 mins

Comments

[serenejournal.livejournal.com]

These directions are very cute.

Mise en place. Srsly.

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

*choke*

Was eating.

Now reading the rest.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

They're exactly what a newbie like me needs. "Have a slotted spoon handy" is just the kind of thing that would trip me up if I weren't told!

Re: Mise en place. Srsly.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Am I the only one who reads that word as if it rhymes with "tersely"? :)

Re: Mise en place. Srsly.

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

Doesn't everyone?

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

Do I see a little subjunctive mood there? *swoon*

[serenejournal.livejournal.com]

Way to geek the comment tag! FTW!

From the Wikipedia article

[psi-star-psi.livejournal.com]

Because I'm not aelfie, I had to look it up. I thought it was discussing the soundtrack by which to cook:

'"Mise en Place" is also the name of a post-punk band from Edina, Minnesota."

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

Re: From the Wikipedia article

[dawnd.livejournal.com]

'"Mise en Place" is also the name of a post-punk band from Edina, Minnesota."

Ahahahahah!

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Awww *bats eyelashes*. I bet you say that to all the girls. ;-)

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

Not all women know how to handle the subjunctive with such . . . finesse. :)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Awww!

Re: From the Wikipedia article

[aelfie.livejournal.com]

forehead to desk

[ladyqkat.livejournal.com]

This might be useful in a fairly new community - cheap_cookin. I think more and more of us are going to see how we can make good healthy food in this current economy.

[roseembolism.livejournal.com]

That sounds amazingly tasty.

And also a good reminder; even after all these years, I tend to add seasonings as i think of them.

[lkeele.livejournal.com]

Yay! Saved for later. Did you use ricotta or paneer? Delightful that you could one-up your co-workers in such a classy fashion. There is something to be said for cooking for oneself, after all...

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Paneer. I think it was about a week ago that hitchhiker came over to hang out for most of the afternoon, and one of the things we did was go to an Indian grocery. I have lentils, paneer, and many happy spices. Every time I open a drawer in my kitchen -- any of the drawers in the stack -- I smell cardamom. Mmmmm!

[hitchhiker.livejournal.com]

me too - it makes it hard to write down recipes for people!

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

You'd just leave yellow stains on the paper. :)

[renaissancedan.livejournal.com]

I must definitely thank you and hitchhiker for sharing this recipe! My wife was out of town for a few days and I let her know dinner was going to be waiting for her when she arrived home. Checked out what supplies we had at the house, ran to the store and bought everything for Palak Paneer and some nice indian rice (I combined two recipes I found online, it was kind of a spicy lemon rice).

She arrived home just as I was finishing frying the onions and had just dropped in the spices, smelled wonderful! She *loves* Indian food and had recently been teasing me a bit that I haven't cooked anything new for her lately. This pretty much blew her out of the water :-)

Thanks again! She said to me, "You're in trouble now! Now that I know you can make this, I'm going to call you up and ask for it!" hehe.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Oh excellent! Isn't it amazing how difficult it wasn't? That was so good. Now I have to find some time when I'm home and Rob's not, so I can cook it again.

[renaissancedan.livejournal.com]

Ellen asked, "Wow, that must have taken so much work!" to which of course I replied, "Yeah, it took a long time" and wiped the fake sweat from my brow ;-) Actually I did let her know it was pretty easy!

What we did miss was Naan or some kind of bread to go with it, next time!