Such FUN !!!

We have eaten out for the last couple of nights so I couldn't play. A couple of days ago some Zorbit arrived and I mixed 1 part sesame oil with 3 parts Zorbit to produce an intense sesame oil flavoured powder that melts on the tongue but had nothing to use it on. Last night my wife was out so I got to play with 'The Beast' (pet name for the new chamber vacuum sealer) and the sous vide. Our local market has a fruit stall that has a 'British' front and a mysterious back shelf, behind the people serving frequented by the owners of the local Asian and Indian restaurant owners on a Saturday morning. The odd intrepid British adventurer like me takes an occasional expedition here to look at the wonderful fauna and wonder at what you do with it. Once in a while an ingredient looks familiar, such as the fenugreek leaves otherwise known as methi that I purchased this week. These slightly sad looking leaves, thrown into a food processor with garlic, a few birds eye green chilies and olive oil (plus a little salt and pepper) turn into a dark green sauce to compliment chicken or a meaty fish such as monk fish. This blended sauce was added to some filleted chicken thighs and cooked for 2 hours at 70C last night before being plunged into an ice bath and left in the fridge (BIG saving time as the next purchase is a second hand blast freezer)

Tonight, I took this cooked but cold chicken, cut it into 0.7cm slices, and stir fried it with some 'Instant Pickles' from the Beast . This let me pickle turnips in maple syrup and five spice and celery (julienne) and white onion in lime juice and olive oil. These were then added to the chicken and cooked through for about 5 minutes before I added some fresh baby spinach leaves and served the dish onto a basmati rice. The result was a popcorn of flavours, the spiced chicken, the piquant celery (took on more of the lime) and the olive oil pickled onions counterpointed by the sweet turnips. All crunchy and exciting to support the warm in both spice and heat chicken. Finally, I put a few pinches of the sesame oil powder over the dish. All in all it took less than 8 minutes from slice to serve (yes I know the chicken took 2 hours to cook yesterday but I was enjoying London Pride at the club at that time). No photographs, it wasn't an art work, stir fry and rice rarely is unless you spend 10 minutes arranging stuff with tweezers but the flavours .......