Creative Toppings for Fast Food: Ideas Needed

[chaoseverlasting]

No matter what you do with that chicken, DO NOT toss the carcass! If you don't already have a decent cleaver/ or a set of poultry shears, go get some (preferably the shears) tomorrow. When you have stripped the meat off the carcass, chop up the bones with your shears and boil the living heck out of it. You can either freeze this stock, or use it immediately to make casseroles or soups later. Please do this. It is the Pons Asinorum of cooking and you will be able to extend this to other concepts, like NEVER throwing away the juice from boiled vegetables!

You know, there's this curry my mom cooks that she uses in pretty much everything. Ill ask her how she does it, but you can put boiled egg in it, chicken, lightly sauteed veges of all kinds, and I think its the basis of Punjabi cooking. The slight variation in the ingredients makes such a huge difference to the final product, that its amazing.

 

[turbo]

I'd be interested in the curry recipe. There is such variation that it's staggering. It's like salsa here. My wife and I can several recipes of salsa each season - some relatively mild, and some that you need to warn people about if they are not used to very hot stuff. Anyway, my wife makes a curried chicken dish with green peppers and onions that is fantastic on a bed of basmati rice.

 

[hypatia]

My potato binge is carried over for another night with ...Un-stuffed peppers.

Diced green and red peppers,one hot pepper, sweet onion, garlic and a large can of tomato chunks{include the juice}. I'll add a 1/2 pound of browned venison and let the whole think cook for about a hour, covered.
I have some really big Red skin potatos that I'm cutting in half and brushing with olive oil and topping with black pepper and corse sea salt.
The unstuffed peppers will go in the bottom of a shallow bowl and the Potatos on top{keeping with the unstuffed idea}.

 

[turbo]

Wow! That sounds great! I may have to try that one.

 

[dontdisturbmycircles]

Yum, I just bought a bunch of potatoes and have to try out some of these ideas! So many ideas to try.

I need to try that. Last night I had no food in the house, so I had Frank's Red Hot on saltines for dinner.

mm, franks red hot is great.

 

[scorpa]

You know, there's this curry my mom cooks that she uses in pretty much everything. Ill ask her how she does it, but you can put boiled egg in it, chicken, lightly sauteed veges of all kinds, and I think its the basis of Punjabi cooking. The slight variation in the ingredients makes such a huge difference to the final product, that its amazing.

I've never had curry, ever. I don't even really know what it is although I hear about it all the time. Is it like a spice? Stupid question probably but oh well

 

[turbo]

Curry is a mixture of spices that at the very least can be added to lend character to rice or other bland foods. It is found across huge expanses of Asia and has infinite regional variability. Generally, it is designed to add "hotness" or what the Cajuns would call a "piquant" character to dishes. I do not have enough knowledge about curries to comment further, but some of the curried dish recipes that my wife and I have tried making have been all over the map in flavor, hotness, etc. It would be nice to have access to Indian/Pakistani specialty shops to try using some of their raw ingredients, but in north central Maine, you're not going to find a lot of that.

 

[chaoseverlasting]

Curry is like a mixture of spices, and herbs, cooked in a certain way to lend a special flavour to a certain dish. There are several variations as T1 mentioned, and even in India, the recipe varies from region to region.

If you go to the north, they have a characteristic way of cooking their food with or without curry, and the recipe for curry may vary depending on what you want to cook. Like fish curry is different from chicken curry (the preparation of the sauce). And if you have a certain dish in the north, the same dish may have a totally different taste in the south.

 

[chaoseverlasting]

Here's the quick version (mom was in a hurry):

Heat some oil in a large pan
Add one chopped onion along with some cloves of ginger and garlic (some)
Add some garam masala (I have no idea what the composition of that is)
Powdered black pepper
Powdered red chilli
Some haldi (tumeric I think)

Add some water to keep the mixture liquidey (no idea what that means)
2 tomatoes (puree them in a blender)
And cook till it bubbles a bit.
Then you can add your vegetables/chicken(boiled or lightly cooked) etc etc...