Chicken Jalfrezi

About once a fortnight, we indulge in Indian food. There is an Indian restaurant - possibly more than one - here in Pisa, but we've been firmly warned off going there by the Paoli, who know of what they speak when it comes to Indian food. And so, the only option is to roll up one's sleeves and get on with preparing it oneself. I have several reliable books by Madhur Jaffrey (The Ultimate Curry Bible, in particular, is extremely good), but her recipes tend to be quite esoteric, and are certainly not reminiscent of all those many years of cheap-and-cheerful Indian  restaurants over the decades (from student dives onwards) which are occasionally what one hankers after. Chicken Jalfrezi has long been a favourite,  from the period after my earliest experiences of Indian food, when it was generally a question of choosing Madras or Vindaloo, with an option of Hot, Medium Hot, or Very Hot (depending on how many spoonfuls of curry power the kitchen had stirred into the mixture, just before serving).
This version of Chicken Jalfrezi is largely taken from The Thousand Best Indian Recipes, with the difference that butter is used instead of oil, for a much 'creamier' result, and the meat used is thigh rather than breast meat, since it remains more succulent after cooking.If you're being energetic, you can combine it with Aloo Ghobi, but in general I serve it just with plain basmati rice.

For Two.

Ingredients: 2 tbs butter; 1 medium onion, finely chopped; 2 cloves garlic, pressed; half a green chili, de-seeded and finely chopped; approx 3 cm fresh ginger root, peeled and finely chopped; meat cut from three chicken thighs, diced into approx 2 cm cubes; 2 tsp curry powder; quarter tsp salt; 1 tsp tomato paste; 120 ml water; half a red pepper.

Method:

1. Melt the butter in a heavy pan, add the onion, garlic and chili, and cook for about four minutes, until the onion has wilted.

2. Add curry powder, salt and tomato paste, and stir over heat for about 30 seconds.

3. Add the diced chicken, and cook stirring constantly for about three minutes, until the chicken looks cooked.

4. Add the water, bring just to the boil, then lower the heat so that the mixture just simmers for about  five minutes.

5. Add grated ginger and chopped pepper, and cook for a further minute.

Either serve immediately, or else keep warm over a gentle heat for five or ten minutes (but ensure that it doesn't get too thick in the process).

Spring flowers...

The Big Picture

Ajuga, behind Churchill Narcissi

A four-footed, trying to remember what it was he was thinking about

Allium Triquetrum (and friends)

Muscari

 

Looking across the South Lawn

Peach and Nectarine blossom

Roses on the Church pergola, limbering up to do their stuff

Vista behind the Church

Tonight's dinner: we're dining up in Forte dei Marmi, so the menu is as yet a mystery.

Hathersage

The remains of melted snow on the platform of the country station; a backdrop of lowering Peaks. The air crisp and biting. Clipped yews in the churchyard, and white lilies within; just one arrangement. The wheeze of the organ; three hymns... good, solid, traditional...taken at a rousing pace, with no risk of the congregation dragging raggedly (although some  voices failed, all the same, from time to time...). The sun broke through, just as we emerged - wintry, but strong and clear - and there was laughter, walking downhill through sunlit fields, back toward the village. Tears. Happy memories. A poignant day.

The Condominial Assemblea...

is a facet of italian life which is universally loathed, but apparently impossible to eradicate from the system. One of those many make-work positions that the Italian authorities have dreamed up (along with that of geometra and, to a significant degree, bookkeeper) is that of condominial administrator. These people do nothing - apart from endlessly seeking opportunities to line their own pockets at the expense of condominial members - and charge significant amounts of money for the privilege. In any building where there are more than four seperate households, any one of the householders is legally entitled to register the building as a condominium, which then requires the services of an administator to jump through all sorts of unnecessary bureaucratic hoops on behalf of the condominium, at the end of which process nobody is any the better off (apart from the administrator, who is smiling all the way to the bank). And the annual meeting of the condominial members with their administrator is the aforementioned and deeply disliked assemblea.

When we first bought the property in Via Fucini, it seemed a good idea to register it as a condominium, since there was one other householder in the building at that time, and it seemed a practical means of getting them to pay their share of the buildng costs such as connecting the house to the town drainage system, and stripping out the baroque accumulation of gas, water and electricity pipes which festooned the walls of all the common parts, as the result of many previous decades of uncontrolled installations. The first administator we appointed was lousy beyond description - there was no sign of her actually having done anything, not even summon a condominial assemblea, after more than five years! -  but her existence did at least serve the purpose intended, and all of the condominial upgrade programme went through more or less without a hitch. When the Technical Dept then pointed out to her that for her to submit an annual bill in these circumstances was nothing short of a joke, she took umbrage and resigned. Which you would have thought would have been the end of it, and the condominium concept could have been allowed to sink into nothingness. Nope. Not a bit of it. Once a condominium has been conjured into existence, there it is......for ever. Administrator No 1 had to keep on maintaining the books until a replacement had been found and appointed.....or is it annointed?...in her place, and she could pass on the baton of grasping incompetence to her eager successor.

Who in this instance was Signora A, a dumpy woman with badly dyed hair and a voice that suggests she is the crossbreed offspring of a corncrake and a Black and Decker drill. At high volume. Entering into the spirit of things with gusto, her first action as administrator was to declare that the condominial electrics  were not up to code, and lo-and-behold she just happened to have an electrician who would be able to re-do the entire system.....for a price which was only slightly more than double that which the TD then managed to get from a competitive supplier. To the annoyance of Signora A's tame electrician, and I imagine also to the increasing pangs of hunger knawing in Signora A's back pocket (but, never mind - the next time the drains needed cleaning, she was there in a flash with a plumber she 'happened to know', whose subsequent bill was sufficient to keep both himself and Signora A's back pocket happy for quite some time...) For four years now, there has been a constant fight between her and the TD about payment for condominial cleaning....which we organise, pay for, and charge back to the condominium  - but which the ghastly Signora A sees as an unexploited back-pocket opportunity, into which she hasn't yet managed to get her grappling hooks. Once a year, she charges for submitting a tax return for the condominium....400 euros (ker-ching!)....and another 600 euros, merely for existing (ker-ching!); in the most recent accounts, she included one charge for maintaining a register of the names and details of all members of the condominium, and another charge for putting a label with her own details on the back of the front door to the building (ker-ching! ker-ching!) ...not one centesimo of which translates into value for anybody who actually lives there. Does she circulate the accounts for the condominium every quarter, as it was agreed several assemblea ago that she would do? Nope. Does she submit competitive quotes for consideration by condominial members whenever work is to be done? Nope. Does she actually do anything at all which is for the practical benefit of the people who pay her? You tell me......!

So, why do we put all put up with this dreadful woman, and subject ourselves once a year to the painful process of a condominial assemblea? For the simple reason that it removes - or at least reduces - the opportunity for conflict with the neighbours. Any sensible group of intelligent adults ought to be able to sort out condominial issues amongst themselves. You'd think. But, on the ground floor in Via Fucini, is a resident .....well, in italian, the word would be stronzo.It isn't a polite term, and it isn't a complimentary one, either. But I can't really think of a better one - and any of the english equivalents are more or less unprintable.  Our fellow condominial members go in fear and loathing of this man, and would do anything in order not to have to deal with him directly. On occasion, they have independently or together come to ask if TD would deal with 'him-downstairs' for them in relation to some issue or other where some degree of agreement was necessary...or else they engage in the most complicated acrobatics in order to have rushed through an announcement, followed swiftly by the commencement and completion of some work to their own property all  while they know that 'him-downstairs' is away on holiday, and that the work can already have been finished before he will have returned.

And we aren't alone, it seems, in having a 'him-downstairs'. The Paoli have one in their own building, where the presence of their own administrator serves the same purpose (with exactly the same collateral damage along the way - for example, a construction of relatively bog-standard mail boxes in their condominial hallway, the cost of which was an eye-watering 2,000 euros!). It appears conceivable that the length and breadth of Italy, the extensive existence of a tribe of 'him-downstairs'es is behind an entire industry of Signora A's and their hungry back-pockets. And a parallel tribe of condomial members, whose occasional passing references to the fact that they have to attend an assemblea sometime soon are met without fail with sympathetic faces and possibly a reassuring and encouraging pat on the shoulder. There are no words sufficient for the occasion.

At our latest assemblea, last week (held in the apartment we still own in Via Fucini, but where nobody lives...so there is no heating even in winter, and the assemblea generally finishes quickly as the threat of hypothermia becomes ever stronger), I did suggest that we hold off reappointing the appalling Signora A, and that we have a competitive vote for administrator appointment in say, six weeks' time. It got nowhere, of course, as that would have involved having another assemblea - which nobody in their right minds would choose to do - and anyway, as Margharetta put it, before she fled to her own central-heating upstairs (and in the full hearing of Signora A, glowering in the shadows), she has never heard of an administrator that anybody is actually enthusiastic about, and so we might as well have this one as any other.

Which leaves it open to have another candidate in place for the next assemblea, this time next year. And we have in fact heard of an administrator who works out of Cascina, of whom good things are actually apoken. 

It may be counting chickens, but I like to imagine that the dying cries of a Black-and-Decker-corncrake can be heard, however distantly, coming in on a westerly breeze.

One can but hope...

The Garden...

is full of neat (ish) piles of branches, as the result of much progress this past week in the annual tree-pruning programme. The small fruit trees were all done weeks ago, and in fact generally get polished-off in the course of a single day. As with all more complicated tasks, the larger trees, I tend to put off...and put off....and put off - to the extent that some of them were not done at all, last winter. Ergo, all the more need to get at them properly, this time round. Thus far, the large pear tree, and both of the large plums have been sorted out, and now resemble oversized bonsai.

The large pear tree, with severed branches piled up in the background, beneath the pergola

I moved onto the Old Orchard, yesterday afternoon, and have now dealt with one of the large cherry trees, as well as the apricots, one of the greengages, and two of the apple trees. Assuming tomorrow's weather is clear, I hope to finish off the remaining apple and greengage trees, and try and make sense of the two remaining (and somewhat punk) large cherry trees.

The yellow plum tree - not quite finished, since I haven't yet worked out how to get at the last difficult bits, above the vine pergola

And that will then be job-done, until this time next year...and on Monday I can then move on to pruning the wisterias, the jasmines, climbing roses, solanums, and grape vines...before sorting out the last of the transplant programme for this winter of roses, libertias, germanicas, tulbarghias, and that tall nameless grass that resembles a lightweight Pampas Grass, and which I would never have chosen but since it snuck in in the pot along with another plant from Noaro, I haven't had the heart to chuck it out (and in fact don't now dislike it - but it is in the wrong place, and has to be moved.)

Fig tree pruning, beside the romitorio

In so far as it can in winter, the garden is looking good. Many of the camellias are dripping with flowers - with many more still to get going - the hellebores are just starting to open, likewise the chaenomeles; one rather confused azalea is in full bloom...odora aureomarginata is about to break into scented flower, and the wintersweet and lonicera fragrantissima are both working away - the latter so much so, that every time I go anywhere near it, am assailed by the fruity perfume like one of those rather effete flavoured teas favoured by those who find the real thing too much of a challenge.

Pulcherrima Striata

Lonicera Fragrantissima

And the citrus crop is currently pretty impressive - the sweet oranges we've just about finished for this season (half a dozen each morning, squeezed for juice, lasts us just over a month), but the bitter oranges and lemons are producing at an industrial rate, and marmalade production will be on the cards any time now.

Lemon Tree, just outside the tinello door

Bitter Oranges, in abundance

And, now, I'm off to soak in my post gardening bath...with attendant four-footed curled up beneath the towel rail, and another chapter or so of Siri Hustvedt's deeply excellent 'The Blazing World' .

Tonight's dinner:

Courgette Tarts

Roast Beef, with Pheasant Gravy; Yorkshire puddings (winter fare!)

Vanilla soufflés, with marmalade centres.

Partridge Pastries with Pear and Spinach

Adapted from a recipe of Alain Senderens, this was a splendid first course for dinner on Christmas Day, with the added benefit of being Partridge-and-Pear christmas themed (which hadn't occurred to me in advance, and so was entirely fortuitous). Although the dish has a number of steps, nothing is very complicated, and it is largely an assembly-job immediately prior to serving - as such,  it lends itself well to entertaining.

For four.

Ingredients: 1 quantity puff pastry, made with 500g flour, 75g butter, 2 tsp salt, 1 cup water, 500g chilled butter; egg wash, made with 1 egg and a little cream; 4 generous tbs cooked spinach (frozen spinach is fine); 1 onion, finely chopped; 3 oz butter; pinch nutmeg; 1 pear; half tsp sugar; 50 ml cream; 2 tbs cognac; 1 partridge; zest of 1 orange; 5 juniper berries; half tsp dried thyme; quarter cup marsala; 1 tsp arrowroot; salt & pepper.

Method:

1. Roll out the pastry to a thickness of 2mm. Cut out 8 discs of 10 cm diameter each. Put four of them on a greased or lined baking tray, and brush with egg wash. From the remaining four discs, use an 8 cm cutter to remove the centres, then place the outer rings on top of the four bases; put the 8 cm 'inners' also onto the baking tray, brush with egg wash, and mark with cross-hatched lines with the tip of a sharp knife. Place the baking tray in the fridge for 30 minutes, then bake in a 200 degreeC oven for fifteen minutes or so, until risen and browned. Set to one side.

2. Bone the partridge. Put the bones in a small saucepan, cover with water, and simmer for half an hour or so to make stock. Free the partridge skin from the flesh beneath, and stuff under the skin with a mixture of 1 oz butter, the thyme, half of the onion, orange zest, crushed juniper berries, and a little salt (retain enough of the stuffing mixture to make a poultice on top of the bird). Place the prepared bird - with its poultice in place -  to one side, for half an hour at least, then heat the oven to 220 degrees C and roast the bird (it should only take about ten minutes)

3.  Melt half the remaining butter in a small pan, and sauté the remaining onion; when softened, add the spinach, nutmeg and half a tsp salt; stir to combine, and keep warm.

4. Peel, quarter, and core the pear. Cut each quarter into two slices. Melt the remaining butter in a small frying pan, and in this sauté the pear slices briefly, sprinkled with the sugar. Turn the slices over in the sugar-butter mixture, then add the cognac and boil to evaporate, then add the cream and boil for two minutes to thicken. Keep warm.

5. Strain the partridge stock, and boil to reduce. Mix a tsp of Marsala with the arrowroot, and then add this, along with the rest of the marsala, to the stock; it will take five minutes or so to thicken, and at that point check and adjust seasoning as necessary (if you want a more complicated flavour, add a little soy sauce, but in this case be careful not to add too much salt). If you prefer a lighter colourd sauce, add a spoonful or so of cream at the end of cooking.

6. If necessary, re-heat the pastry shells in a warm oven or warming drawer, before putting one each onto a heated late for serving. Divide the warm spinach between the shells, and then place the pear slices in their cream on top of the spinach; take from the partridge four good slices, and place one each on top of the pears. Spoon a little of the sauce over each slice of partridge, and another spoonful on the plate beside the pastry shell, on which place the cooked pastry 'inner'. 

Serve.

Poulet au Vin Jaune

is the name this dish would go by, if I hadn't, in cavalier fashion, changed two of the three central ingredients from the original version. One from the early days of Nico Ladenis, you would have to be either extremely rich or merely deeply stupid were you to follow the recipe as NL describes it (and, what's more, insists that it should be made whilst respecting without question the ingredients as listed). Vin Jaune, an obscure wine from the Jura, retails at around £110 a bottle, these days, and morels - even dried - can rarely be found for less than around £25 for a small jar. Forget it! A perfectly serviceable Gewurtztraminer and a handful of dried porcini work quite acceptably, and all without venturing into the territory of a second mortgage*. For obvious reasons, I can't state precisely to what extent these variations take the end result away from what Mr Ladenis had in mind, but this dish is extremely good as described, and has the advantage of leaving plenty of excellent sauce for other and subsequent uses. The first time I tried the dish was several days before I was responsible for the main course as part of our Masterchef Weekend 2014, and I used the leftover sauce to very good effect on spit-roast rabbit wrapped in prosciutto, which had been stuffed with pancetta and fennel seed. And the reason I'm prompted to post it now is because a variation on the same rabbit recipe (except this time, also stuffed inside a suckling pig) will be taking centre-stage for Christmas dinner, later this week. That being so, and with 'programmed eating' in mind, we'll be having Poulet au Gewurztraminer tomorrow evening....and leaving plenty of sauce at the end!

* since first writing this...I have found the source of this recipe, from which NL originally took it - a book edited by Francis Amanutegui, published in 1970; the author is much less inflexible than NL, and states that in the absence of 'Vin Jaune' 'any dry white wine will do'...  

For Four.

Ingredients: 1 chicken, cut into eight pieces: generous handful of dried porcini; 8 oz butter; half a pint Gewurztraminer; 1 pint cream; flour (to sift); seasoning (to taste)

Method:

1. Generously cover the porcini with boiling water and leave to sit for forty minutes or so; then, strain the mushrooms from the soaking liquid, and filter the soaking liquid through kitchen paper. Retain the strained liquid and the porcini. Heat the oven to 180 degrees C.

2. Melt the butter in a heavy ovenproof casserole. Dredge the chicken pieces with flour, and season them with salt and pepper. Sauté the chicken in the butter, enough that they lose their raw appearance, but try to avoid letting them brown.

3. Ensure all the pieces are in one layer in the casserole; cover it, and place into the oven, for about twenty minutes. At the end of this time, drain as much of the melted butter as you can from the pan.

4. Put the casserole back on the hob, without lid, and add to it the mushrooms and their soaking liquid (perhaps half a cup of the liquid, not more). Over medium heat, add to this the wine and the cream, and cook at a gentle simmer until the sauce has thickened slightly to become uniformly velvet in texture. Serve as soon as possible once the sauce has reached this point - if left to sit while you get through other courses, it might risk misbehaving!