Food Network Star Episode 2 Dish: Yellow Chicken Curry with Spaghetti Squash

The challenge: make a dish in the shades of your spatula. The options were: red, yellow, purple, green, and red. Which one would you want?

As I mentioned in my Episode 2 recap, I was pretty happy with yellow. You can go sweet: mango, pineapple, oranges. You can go savory: curry, turmeric, spaghetti squash, corn, yellow squash, endives…

the dish as it appeared on Food Network Star

In the end, my teammate Adam and I chose to go savory and made a chicken meatball in a coconut curry with crunchy spaghetti squash and pickled corn. What I love about this dish is the different textures. Oftentimes, curries or stews suffer from sameness syndrome -- an unexciting monotony because everything kind of blends into each other. We tried to avoid that, building flavors and textures from top to bottom, including an al dente spaghetti squash, a creamy curry with bell peppers, a pillowy flavor-packed chicken meatball, bright and fresh pickled corn, and toasty coconut.

I’ve slightly adapted the recipe from what we did during the competition, and made it more suitable for a single person to cook in a home kitchen. For example, here the meatballs are smaller and simmered in the curry, rather than pressure cooked. On the show, I used a method of blanching, salting and squeezing the spaghetti squash (described here), but that’s a bit labor intensive with all the other components so I left that out here.

Also, since this was a team challenge, I’m not exactly sure what Adam did. So… I filled in the blanks with what I know and love.

RECIPE
Yellow Chicken Curry with Spaghetti Squash

1 2-lb spaghetti squash

Curry
1-inch knob of ginger
1 large onion
3 cloves garlic
2 yellow bell peppers
1 lemongrass stalk
1 can coconut milk (reduced fat or full, whatever your preference)
2 oz yellow curry paste

Meatball
1 lb ground chicken or turkey
1 tsp salt
1 tsp garlic powder
3 tbsp dried chopped onion
1 tsp black pepper

Pickled Corn
½ cup water
½ cup white vinegar
2 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
3 ears of corn
½ tsp grated ginger

¼ cup grated coconut

Slice the spaghetti squash and remove all the seeds. Microwave for 15 minutes.

Prepare your curry ingredients. Mince the garlic and ginger and dice the onions and bell peppers. Heat a large pot to medium-high and add olive oil. Add all the ingredients and season with salt. Sweat until onions are semi-translucent, about 7-10 minutes. Add the coconut milk and curry paste. Slice lemongrass into three large pieces and add to pot. Simmer for 5 minutes.

To make meatballs, mix all ingredients until just incorporated. Do not overmix or else the meatballs will be too dense. After the curry has simmered, make small, loosely-packed meatballs and gently place them into the curry. Simmer with the lid on for 10 minutes.

To make the pickled corn, add the water, white vinegar, sugar and salt to a small saucepan. Heat on medium-high until sugar and salt have dissolved. Take off heat. Slice the corn kernels off the corn and add to pickling brine. Add grated ginger. Let sit for at least 10 minutes -- the more time, the better!

Toast the coconut in the oven using the broiler, or use the toast setting on your toaster oven. Remove when golden brown.  

Scrape the strands out of the spaghetti squash. The interior strands should still be crisp, like biting an apple. Remove the lemongrass from the curry. Place the spaghetti squash on the bottom of the plate, then add curry and meatballs, pickled corn, and toasted coconut.

We got some flack for our plating, so if you have a better presentation idea, let me know :P.  

TIPS & TRICKS

• Don’t worry about browning the meat or onions. The curry has so much flavor, that it would overpower any browning flavors anyway. Plus, brown would ruin the yellow look!

• The microwave can be your friend! I love it for vegetables because it heats the existing water in the plant -- unlike steaming or blanching which *adds* water, resulting in a potentially waterlogged or diluted end-product.

• I’m a fan of adding chopped dried onions into my meatballs. They act like bread crumbs -- absorbing the meat juices, adding texture and lightness -- but also bring a lot of flavor.

Miso Ginger Slow Cooker Chicken

It’s that time of year again. The sun has a kiss of heat. The birds are singing. The flowers are blooming. And your nose can’t. Stop. Running.

For about a week a year, I’m knocked out by allergies and the last thing I want to do is cook. You might think of slow cookers as a winter tool -- stews and casseroles and all that. But I find the slow cooker useful when I’m sick, too.

Slow cookers have a tendency to create murky flavors, but not so with the savory miso, sharp ginger, and assertive garlic. Between the three, they’re enough to make you forget about your stuffed nose and make you feel normal again.

Miso ginger slow cooker chicken is actually the most popular recipe on my blog. Here's the original post. It doesn’t even have real measurements! So this time around, I’m getting more detailed but keeping the same spirit. No cheffy flourishes. No pre-heating or fussing. Just a quick make-ahead dinner you can prepare in the time it takes to make your coffee.

8am

12pm

3pm

4pm - done!

RECIPE

2 lbs air-chilled chicken thighs and/or drumsticks
1 to 3 inch ginger knob (less if you want a milder flavor, more if you want to bring the heat)
1 head of garlic
3 tablespoons miso

Peel and finely chop ginger. Peel and finely chop garlic. Mix miso with enough hot water to loosen it up, about 3 tablespoons. Add chopped ginger and garlic and mix.

Add chicken to slow cooker. Coat with miso mixture. Cook on low for 8 hours. 

Taste the sauce. Depending on how watery your chicken was, you may want to reduce and concentrate the sauce. To do so, place the chicken in a separate bowl and add the sauce to a saucepan. Simmer on low until reduced.  Re-mix sauce with chicken and serve. 

TIPS & TRICKS

• Why air-chilled? Unless otherwise noted, all chicken is water-chilled, meaning it was dunked in cold vats of water, resulting in diluted, watery meat. Air-chilling uses no additional liquid, meaning a stronger flavor and better textured meat. Air-chilled is a great way to go all the time, but especially for slow cooking. When sauteing or roasting, excess liquid can escape as steam. But in a slow cooker, the steam is trapped, so a water-chilled chicken will quickly go from water-logged to water-drowned.

• For a complete meal, add some veg to the sauce as you reduce it. I like enoki mushrooms, bok choy, or even broccoli. You can also do this if your sauce is too salty. Noodles (or zoodles) would also make a great addition. 

• Boneless dark meat is okay. I accidentally bought boneless chicken thighs, even though the “rule” is to only slow-cook meat on the bone because the bone helps keep the meat moist. Well, you know what? The sauce and moisture from the chicken kept the chicken moist. It all worked out, so don’t sweat bone/boneless -- as long as you use dark meat.