BlauPause and Seahorse Cookies - Part 1

Next Sunday is BlauPause (which literally means "blueprint"). It is an event to celebrate the Ruhr University's 50th Anniversary. The plan is to block of the main road that passes by the university which by no mistake is called "Universität Straße". A similar stunt was done a few years ago when they blocked off one of the local highways, the A40. There will be tables along the road with a lot of them featuring the universities work. Kind of like a big PR, or an outreach, event.

Ref: http://www.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/rub50/_content-docs/faq-anreise/RUB50_BlauPause_Streckenplan.pdf

Hubby dear has had to organize a table too. It is somewhere by the Uni Brücke which is at the subway station "Universität". You're getting the picture here, right?

We've spent a long time brain storming what should be done and how to reach out to regular people and educate them about memory and the brain. My husband specifically studies the hippocampus and "hippocampus", coming from the Greek word "seahorse", led us to the decision to make Seahorse cookies for the kids who pass by. And to make it really cute they get to play a specially made game of memory with our kids. Of course only those who play get a cookie. Needless to say we are hoping for clear, sunny skies and temperatures which are more representative of summer than those we had this weekend.

I haven't made the cookies yet but I wanted to do a bit of a PR stunt so that more people come out to visit us!!

What I do have for you is an amazing cookie recipe that I got this one from the Bochumer Kinderchor after my kids participated in their Christmas concert with the Bochum symphony. It is finally the sugar cookie recipe that I have always been looking for. It keeps it's shape, it tastes great and it keeps fresh and crisp literally for ever. My husband was still eating the ones we made over Christmas in February!!

Here are our Christmas cookies:

Never been quite happy with the icing though. This time I will try royal icing, the one I've been using kind of makes the cookies soggy (but they still taste good). 

But now it is time to go to bed so I think I'll post the cookie recipe some other time :)

Sri Lankan Dahl. Red Lentils. A Staple.

My husband has been finding this blog very useful. A quick call from me to tell him that I'm stuck in the worst back up ever and am not going to make it in time to make dinner, sets the ball rolling. He checks the app we share to see whats on the menu, opens up this blog and cooks us dinner. Sometimes adding his own ingredients in to the mix.

Because of this I really had to get my act together so that he can cook one of our main staples - red lentils, dahl, parippu. What ever you may call it we can't have Sri Lankan food without it. It's marvellously healthy and terribly popular with the kids. It seems to be one of those universal foods kind of like fries and chips. We've never had a kid who does not like it, neither in the USA nor in Germany!

Serves 4; Preparation time 30 min.

Ingredients

1 cup	Red lentils, Mysore dahl
2 cups	Water (approx.)
1/2	Large red onion
1 sprig	Curry leaves
1/2 tsp.	Dill seeds
1 inch	Rampe (pandan)
1/4 tsp.	Turmeric
1/2 tsp.	Salt
1/2 tsp.	Chili powder
2 tsp.	Sri Lankan curry powder (unroasted)
3 tbsp.	Coconut milk powder
1 tsp.	Sri Lankan roasted curry powder
1 tbsp.	Lemon or lime juice

Method:

First of all I wash the lentils twice or thrice just like one washes rice. From there on there are several different options: temper first, temper in the middle etc. But I've been using a much simpler way for many years, cutting out the tempering and thus the oil!

I add water to cover the lentils (around 2 cups) and then put in all the ingredients except the coconut milk, the roasted curry powder and the lime juice. Then I simply put the lid on, put the cooker on high and let it boil. Putting the lid on is very, very important. It also helps to use a heavy bottomed saucepan.

Once the curry boils, I whip of the lid, give it a stir and put the lid back on again. The heat now is turned down to an amazing very low (2 on my cooker) and I allow the lentils to cook. I also check every now and then to see if there is always enough water in the pot. If there is not enough water the lentils will stick to the bottom of the pan and burn. Very yucky! Once most of the water is absorbed I add in the coconut milk, either from a can or powdered coconut milk powder. If I'm using the powdered sort (3 tablespoons) then I stir it in to the lentils and then add some water. This helps prevent any lumps forming. However, if this is the first time you are making this I suggest dissolving the coconut milk powder in 2 tablespoons of lukewarm water and then adding it. If using canned coconut milk the amount will depend totally on how thick the coconut milk is. The stuff I've been getting here in Germany is so thick that I add 2 heaped tablespoons in and some water (a few tablespoons). You can adjust the amount of water depending on how liquid you want your resulting curry to be. If you don't have coconut milk you can use regular full fat milk.

Then let the whole thing come to the boil and it should be done. If some of the lentils are not yet done, just give it a stir and let it cook for longer on very low (with the lid closed). You may need to add water to the curry to prevent it from burning.

Once everything is cooked remove from the heat add the roasted curry powder and the lime juice (you can use lemon juice instead) and cover until needed. Stir and then serve.

Garnished with coriander leaves and chilli flakes

This curry is totally forgiving. I've made it without onions, without curry leaves or rampe and it's still great. You can add tomatoes to it and/or garlic. If your a fish eater some Maldive fish tastes great too. Another favourite Sri Lankan variation is to add spinach to it (careful though, the spinach adds a lot of water to the curry). I've added coriander leaves to it and my cousin makes it with mustard seeds instead of dill. Everyone has their own variation. The one really important ingredient is the turmeric, without this it looks a bit weird. Having said that, my mother always makes it without turmeric and it tastes fine to me!

And finally, my little one loves it when I sprinkle fried onions on top. Try it out and add your own little twist to it. Tastes great with any kind of rice or with thick chunky bread. Kids love it in a sandwich too.

(Well not quite finally... you can also use any other lentil to make this curry, but from my experience it doesn't taste as good).

Fried Eggplant Quiche

Today is Ascension Day, which means it is a public holiday. And as always, this means that all the shops are closed in Germany. Of course I didn't have time to check the cupboards and go out and stock up! I always have the basics like flour, sugar, eggs and rice so I can always put something together.
Today I had an eggplant. A single, lonely eggplant sitting in my fridge. Not enough to make a curry from or enough to make any thing really special. After all today is fathers day in Germany so we needed something special. The tradition being to get a cart, fill it up with bottles of beer and to head out to the nearest wood to get drunk with all the other fathers. However, something a bit more subtle was necessary since not many people follow the tradition any more. Especially not the fathers! So I decided to put the eggplant in a quiche along with some garlic and fresh, organic peppermint from my planter. I used the caramelized leek quiche recipe to help me along.

Preparation time: 1.5 - 2 hours. Serves 4

Ingredients:

Pastry:
	6 oz	Four
	3 oz	Butter, cold
	1/4 tsp.	Salt
Filling:
	5 tbsp.	Oil
	325 g	Eggplant
	1 tbsp.	Fresh peppermint leaves
	2 cloves	Garlic
		Salt and pepper to taste
	2 tbsp.	Parmesan, grated
	3	Eggs
	125 ml	Whipping cream

Method:

First of all I made the pastry for the crust. You can find instructions here. I discovered that I had some whole wheat flour when I was going through the cupboards this morning so I decided to use this for the pastry. I used half white and half whole wheat flour. Once the pastry was done I stuck it in the fridge to rest for a bit. While it was resting I put the frying pan on the cooker on high and tipped in 3 table spoons of oil. While it was heating I chopped up the eggplant just like one would do for an eggplant curry. They looked like this:

Once the oil was hot I fried them until they were golden brown. Eggplant is the most funny vegetable ever (at least to me it is). Initially it absorbs all the oil in the pan and then when it is fried enough it lets a lot of the oil out again. This is why I always fry my eggplant nice and brown otherwise it is just too oily to eat. I actually had to divide my eggplant into 4 batches to fry it. After two batches I added in another 2 tablespoons of oil and that was enough for the rest.

After finishing 2 batches I put on the oven (180 C fan, 200 C/400 F conventional), took out the pastry and rolled it to fit my all time favourite, almost 9 inch, flan pan. Once the oven was hot I baked it blind for 15 minutes (if you missed this you can find it in this blog). While it was baking I finished frying the eggplant. On the side I cleaned the peppermint and chopped it and peeled the garlic and grated it. I also mixed together the eggs and cream in a large bowl and added the salt, pepper, garlic and peppermint.

After 15 minutes of baking blind I took out my beans and put the crust back in the oven for another 10 minutes or so. Then I took out the crust and arranged the eggplant in the bottom of the pie shell.

Next step was to pour over the egg and cream mixture and sprinkle the top with some finely grated Parmesan cheese. It was all very simple. It then went in the oven for .... sorry about that I forgot to look at the clock! So I'm going to have to say "until it was golden brown". Probably was about 20 minutes or so.

The result was consumed with a salad of lettuce and tomatoes and was "a keeper" according to my husband. And that is basically why I am sharing it with you all. My oldest was not too keen on it, she didn't like the peppermint :(

Sri Lankan Bean Curry

Oh I have been away for too long again! The last week of work at ISR was busy and thus I just cooked a lot of curry so that it would last for a few meals. Each day topping it up with a new curry or two.

Green beans are one of our all time favourites. Everyone in our home loves bean curry. I've been trying for years to replicate my aunts curries and have never been successful, but I think I've found the trick. Read on to find out the secret to an awesome curry!

Ingredients:

500 g	Green beans
2 tbsp.	Oil
2 medium	Onions
1/2 tsp.	Dill seeds
1 sprig	Curry leaves
1/4 tsp.	Turmeric
1/2 tsp.	Salt
1/2 tsp.	Chili powder
2 tsp.	Curry powder (unroasted)
3 heaped tbsp.	Coconut milk powder
1 tsp.	Roasted curry powder

Method:

One of the biggest secrets is how you actually cut the beans. I always thought the beans were cut on a diagonal, so I spent years trying to cut them thinner and more slanted but never achieving the right effect. It sounds kind of silly, why did I just not ask? Well usually when I go to any of my aunt's places I'm so busy stuffing my face with delicious food that I forget about asking how everything was made. But my mother finally discovered the trick, quite by accident, and conveyed it to me (quite by accident!)

Not so long ago my mum visited my aunt and they were preparing a bean curry for a lot of people. So they asked all the womenfolk around for their help to prepare the beans. My mother found an almost blunt knife (her story, not mine!) thrust into her hands with the instructions to split the beans down the middle. My mother was so horrified by the task (complete exaggeration!) that she told me all about it during our next skype call. And BINGO, I got the secret to the perfect curry, split the beans down the middle. Here is a picture of what I mean:

Needless to say, since receiving this wonderful news I've only made one perfect bean curry. The way mine eat beans I just don't have the time to split them. Here are few done especially for you:

Once you've split them you just cut them diagonally.

For the most part I cut mine diagonally. It's just the only way to go when you have 500 g of beans and at most an hour to cook a meal with at least 3 curries (this is the standard in our house, 3 or more).

But once you've got them cut the procedure is pretty simple. 

Take two smallish onions and thinly slice them. Then heat some oil in a saucepan and once it is hot add the onions, dill seeds and curry leaves. Fry these until the onions start to colour and then put in the cut beans.

Here is trick number two for the perfect bean curry. DO NOT close the lid of the saucepan. I learnt this trick from a friend of my parents who has since left us. She always told me "never close the lid on the beans, they will lose their lovely green colour.", and I have followed her instructions to this day.

Stir fry the beans and add the tumeric, curry powder, salt and chili powder. Continue to fry and stir. Don't let anything burn. I fry like this for as long as I can get away with. But it is not very long. The worst thing is a burnt bean curry. I have bad memories of burnt bean curry cooked by my sister when she was very young. Not her fault of course and I was probably exaggerating. Oh! so I fry this for about 1-2 minutes on high heat. 

Next step is to add in a cup of water. I don't add too much water because I really want the curry to be dry. I could cook off the water at the end but then I would end up with over cooked beans. Which we are not very fond of. Later you can add water as necessary. Let the beans simmer until they are just cooked and there is almost no water left. The time this takes depends on how tough your beans are. I know for sure they take forever to cook in Sri Lanka and here in Germany I can cook them within about 20 minutes. It also depends on how you cut them so you just have to keep adding water as necessary and checking them every now and then. 

Then add in the coconut milk. I add very thick coconut milk, so either the cream on the top of the can or some coconut milk powder directly into the pan (be careful though, if the water is too hot the powder will form lumps). Then cook off the moisture, sprinkle with roasted coconut powder and you are done. 

Enjoy with some other fabulous Sri Lankan curries and of course some steamed rice.

Sri Lankan Roasted Curry Powder

We've just come back from a week's road trip in Northern Germany. Actually we didn't go very far but we did see a lot of cool things. But a week on the road creates a craving for rice and curry when we get home. We did have some really good Indian food in Bremen but Indian is not the same as Sri Lankan and definitely not the same as home cooked.

As I was cooking up some beans and dahl for lunch I realized that I was out of Sri Lankan roasted curry powder! Now this is a bit of a disaster since although we have plenty of Sri Lankan stores for some reason they don't stock Sri Lankan curry powders. So I figured I was going to have to make it from scratch. I dived into my cookery book from Kandalama Hotel because their food is so great so must be their curry powder. Plus the editor of the book and I used to go to school together and her mum made superb curries. But unfortunately there was no recipe to be found.
My second choice was a recipe book that my mother received as a wedding present from my fathers cousin. My mum being Swiss needed all the help she could get with curries! Here's what I found and let me tell you this recipe is super easy to make. I don't know what I've been afraid of all these years. Nothing beats fresh curry powder.

Ingredients:

1 tbsp.	Raw rice
2 inch	Cinnamon
3	Cloves
2 tbsp.	Coriander seeds
2 sprigs	Curry leaves
1 tsp.	Pepper seeds
3	Cardamoms
1 tbsp.	Cumin seeds (suduru)
1 tsp.	Mustard seeds

Method:

Frying up the stuff was super easy. I pulled out my favourite frying pan which is a heavy Calphalon anodized aluminium one. I love this pan. I thought it was dying so I bought a new regular aluminium one that came highly recommended and cost an arm and a leg. But that sits at the bottom of the cupboard and is only used in emergencies. My old one hasn't crapped out yet and is wonderful. 

With the pan on medium heat (do not use a non-stick pan and no oil) I tipped in the rice and let it cook for about 1 minute. It had to be stirred all the time but this wasn't a problem since it only took a little bit. Then I added in the cinnamon, cloves, coriander, pepper seeds and cardamoms. Looks like I forgot to put the curry leaves in, Oops!! But if you do use them now would be the time to put them in. I let these fry for another minute (stirring all the time) and then added in the rest of the ingredients. Again keeping stirring. At some point I think my pan got too hot so I just took it off the stove and kept stirring. 

Oh did it smell delicious. I must admit not as delicious as my aunts curry power but pretty good none the less. Once everything was roasted (about 3-4 minutes later) I turned the spices out into a bowl. If you keep them in the pan they will keep on roasting and most likely burn so it makes sense to tip them into another container. 

Finally, the moment of truth, can I grind them as fine as I would like. Usually I'm not successful but this time my Sumeet managed to grind the spices into a fine powder. I ended up with about 4 tablespoons full of curry powder. To be used shortly in my egg plant curry (the egg plant is currently frying hence I have time to write this!), dahl and TVP curries which we will enjoy with some string hoppers and kiri hodi this evening.

Fried Bitter Gourd Curry (Karavila)

Here's an all time favourite of ours. The kids have loved this ever since they could eat it, which has many people amazed. Bitter gourd is really bitter if you don't cook it properly. In fact even with this method they are slightly bitter but that's what makes them so good! Never seen a bitter gourd? Here is what they look like:

In San Francisco we always bought them in the Chinese stores. Here in Germany we get them at the local Sri Lankan store. An old family friend of my parents taught me how to cook these (or maybe I should put that correctly: her cook/maid taught me how to cook them!). She would always deep fry a whole bunch of them, put them in a jar for emergencies. They last quite a long time if you fry them long enough and your jar is air tight.

Without further adieu here is how to prepare them.

Ingredients:

4	Bitter gourds (about 25 cm long)
1 l	Oil
2	Onions
2	Tomatoes
1/2 tsp.	Dill seeds
1 sprig	Curry leaves
1/4 tsp.	Turmeric
2 tbsp.	Tomato ketchup
1/2 tsp.	Salt

Method:

The first step is to slice them as thinly as possible. If the seeds are hard then you can try and take them out. If they are soft enough to cut through then just save yourself some work and leave them in. Once they are fried you won't notice the seeds and I'm sure they must be just as healthy as the meat. 

 Once they are sliced you now have to extract the bitterness. It is quite simple to do. Put the bitter gourd in a large bowl, boil a kettle of water and pour the boiling water over the gourd. Let it sit for a few minutes then drain the water and rinse in cold water. Repeat this procedure. You  will be able to smell the bitterness in the water vapour. Pat the vegetable dry with paper towels.

Heat your oil to around the same temperature you would to fry chips (fries) and deep fry the gourd until brown. Careful not to burn them but they should be pretty dark.

While you are frying you can get the rest of the ingredients ready i.e. slice the onions finely, dice the tomato (1 cm). You also need a sprig of curry leaves and half a teaspoon of dill seeds.

Add a teaspoon of oil into a wok and heat on high. Once the oil is hot add the onions, curry leaves and dill seeds and fry until the onions are soft. Then add the tomatoes and the turmeric and keep stirring! Once everything is a soggy mess you can add in the fried bitter gourd and mix everything up.

I like to add some ketchup at the end, a couple of tablespoons would do. Add some salt to taste then it is ready to go! Of course you can add chili powder at any time.

Makhouda D'Aubergine (or Batu Quiche)

After spending the whole day in the kitchen I must say I'm relieved to be able to sit down and type instead. It's not like a whole lot of cooking was going on. No, I was stacking away all the groceries from last nights run and decided to clean out one of my drawers. Then my kids decided to clean out my baking drawer, now that was like opening up a can of worms. But it was finally clean and the girls were very proud of themselves. Except that the counter tops had all kinds of stuff that had to be washed or trashed, that was of course left up to me!

For dinner tonight we are having an eggplant quiche. It's the kind of quiche that has everyone in the house salivating when I just mention that it's on the menu for dinner. Well worth the time it takes to make it and very forgiving.

Preparation time: 45 min. + 45 min. baking; Serves 6

Ingredients:

1 ~500g	Eggplant (large)
	Salt for sprinkling
3 tbsp.	Oil
1	Onion, finely diced
1	Red bell pepper, finely diced
8	Eggs (L)
1/4 cup	Minced fresh parsley
1 tbsp.	Minced garlic
250 g	Emmental cheese
1/2 cup	Bread crumbs
1/4 tsp.	Ground rose buds
1/4 tsp.	Ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp.	Salt
1/2 tsp.	Chili powder
1/4 tsp.	Coriander powder

Method:

The tough part about this recipe (and the main reason why I don't cook it more often) is the dicing. It does take a bit of time to get everything cut to the right size. Today I spent about 30 minutes just dicing the eggplant, onion and peppers! I dice everything to around 5 mm.

If you are using Asian eggplants then you should use at least 2 of them and maybe even 3. What is wonderful about this recipe is that you can have more or less eggplant and it doesn't change the taste all that much. If you have the time, once you've diced the eggplant sprinkle it with salt and let it sit for at least 30 minutes. Then wash it and pat it dry. Needless to say I usually skip this step.

Instead of red bell pepper you can use other peppers. I've used green bell peppers and capsicums as substitutes and the quiche still tastes great.

Heat the oil in a large skillet, add the eggplant, onion and pepper and cook until they are golden brown. Stir the vegetables occasionally.

While this is cooking you can get the rest of the ingredients ready. Chop the parsley, mince the garlic and dice the cheese into 7 mm cubes. Sometimes when I cook this dish I don't have all the proper ingredients. Instead of parsley I've used coriander leaves and the cheese varies according to what is around. In Sri Lanka I use the local Gouda, in the USA Swiss. If I want to be fancy I use some Gruyere.

Then lightly beat the eggs in a large bowl and add ALL the ingredients to it. Make sure that the vegetables have cooled down a little bit before you add them. If they are too hot the egg will get cooked and the quiche will not be as tasty.

Turn the mixture into a 2-quart souffle dish or into ramekins or muffin pans and bake at 180 C in a fan oven (200 C/400 F conventional). A 2-quart souffle dish will take around 45 minutes to bake, while the smaller dishes take less time. You'll know that it's done when the top is golden brown and puffed and when you insert a knife it comes out clean. Be careful if your knife hits a melted piece of cheese it won't come out clean even if the quiche is done!

It can be served pipping hot with a fresh green salad and bread or just by itself. Wonderful to use to fill sandwiches the next day! Can also be cubed up and served with cocktail sticks as an appetizer or snack.

This recipe was adapted from "The Vegetarian Table North Africa" by Kitty Morse

And here is a Chef friendly version