What's cooking Wednesday

As I was glancing over my large cookbook collection just before Christmas, I had one of those moments I occasionally have, an angst moment, when I wish I spent more time in more of my cookbooks. There are good recipes there but I get into ruts like everyone else, not breaking the spines of many of my books except to make the one or two recipes I've made several times before. Often I pull the same five or six books off the shelf over the month and the others are sadly ignored. Well, no longer! In this latest moment of angst, I had an idea. For the next year I'm going to choose one cookbook per month, a cookbook I don't often use but want to get to know or get to know anew, and pull my WCW recipes for that month from that cookbook. The following month, I'll move onto another. As you can see, I certainly have enough to get me through twelve months and probably twelve more after that without hitting the same neglected cookbook twice (this is only part of my collection; the most neglected books are kept on another bookshelf in the basement):


I love my cookbooks and I love spending an evening reading them. They are all good and deserve their day in the sun so I'm going to choose books I don't cook from often, a few of them will be classics such as Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking or Madame Benoit Cooks at Home; others will be favourites of mine that I simply haven't used in a long time; some will be sentimental favourites such as The Frugal Gourmet Cooks Three Ancient Cuisines (the first cookbook I bought). This month I will be cooking from my newest cookbook: Just One Pot. John bought it for me for Christmas and I'm really excited about trying some of the recipes in there.

Tonight we wanted something vegetarian so I chose Eggs Masala. The flavour was excellent. It was fairly easy and quick to prepare. If you don't like curries, don't make this. Emily wasn't keen. We deemed it a "grown-up meal." But, I like to throw a curry at her once in a while to get her used to the flavours so that hopefully she will eventually see the light and we can start eating curries again on a more regular basis. John and I both agreed that the eggs were "interesting" and "different." I don't know if I would make it with the eggs again. I think I might substitute eggplant or chicken instead.



Eggs Masala

4 cloves garlic, minced
1 inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and grated
2 cardamom pods
1 tsp coriander seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
1/2 tsp whole cloves
1/2 tsp black peppercorns
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
400g canned chopped tomatoes
6 hard boiled eggs, peeled and sliced in half lengthwise
2 large onions, finely diced
olive oil
lemon juice
2 tbsp chopped cilantro leaves
salt

1. Remove seeds from cardamom pods. Grind the cardamom, coriander seeds, cumin, cloves and peppercorns to a powder in food processor or spice grinder and then add the garlic, ginger and 2 tbsp of water. Blitz to make a stiff masala paste and stir in the cayenne pepper.

2. Heat the oil in a large pan over medium heat and cook the onions until they turn caramel brown. Stir the masala paste into the onions and stir-fry for a couple of minutes. Add the tomatoes and some salt. Simmer for 10-15 minutes, or until sauce begins to thicken. Taste and adjust seasoning with more salt and lemon juice. If you need to cut the acidity a bit, add a touch of sugar or a dollop of ketchup.

3. Get the sauce very hot, then stir in the cilantro and place the eggs, sunny-side up, in the sauce. Continue simmering until the eggs are warmed through. Serve with rice.