Anyway I thought I'd try it out so I scoured my cookbooks for something with chicken and lemongrass. I found this really simple recipe in a little step-by-step Indonesian cookbook I acquired in Bali, or at least, after returning from Bali, where we went on a cooking day trip, about 10 years ago - and that was probably the last time I cooked Indonesian food...
Pandang Chicken
1 kg Chicken fillets, cut into 3 cm cubes
juice of 1 lime
tin of chopped tomatoes
3 red chillies
2 cm ginger
2 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon turmeric
1 10 cm stalk lemongrass (I used my dried grass stuff!)
half a block of creamed coconut
Combine the chicken and lime juice and marinade for about an hour (or in my case, about 10 minutes)
Put the tomatoes, chilli, garlic, ginger and turmeric in a blender and whizz to a nice smooth consistency.
Pour this in a wok and add the chicken and lime juice. Chuck in the lemongrass. If you have proper lemongrass, give it a bash first. If not, just carry on. Bring to the boil, cover, and simmer for about half an hour.
Then add the creamed coconut (and some water, to get the consistency you prefer) and simmer, uncovered for 10 minutes.
During this last bit I re-fried some cooked rice, with an egg and some soy sauce.
 |
| Chicken Pandang... |
 |
| ... with egg-fried rice. |
It was quite nice! I think it could have been less thick, maybe, a bit more thai curry-ish. But still really nice and easy and quick. I did have to pick out the bits of lemon grass though. That's lemon grass, as opposed to lemongrass.
I love that lime/ginger/lemon grass (or is that lemongrass) type flavour - do you think using coconut milk instead of the creamed coconut might thin it out abot - or half and half with some stock?
ReplyDeleteI know, me too, it's one of my favourites. I'd say you are right about the milk instead of cream, I was tempted to add more water but didn't want to water the flavour either.
DeleteI usually put stock in when making a thai curry as well, so that could also work.
Thanks for reading!