Wednesday, September 30, 2009

One More Indonesian Ginger Chicken and the Curried Couscous













Turns out that Janice and I cooked the exact same recipes this week! Tonight, I made the Indonesian Ginger Chicken and I paired it with the Curried Couscous. Like Janice, I made the marinade for the chicken the night before and popped it in the refrigerator for a little over 24 hours. I cheated and used already minced ginger and garlic (so much easier and no smelly fingers from the garlic!), so it only took a few minutes to throw together the marinade. Also, I stepped outside of my comfort zone and used BONE-IN chicken breasts!!! Shocking! I'm kidding around, but I really do have an aversion to cooking with bone-in chicken - I can't fully explain it, but I have an irrational fear that I won't cook it correctly. Anyway, it turned out great and everyone in the Johnson clan liked it. My only problem with it was that the skin wasn't crispy enough. Anyone have any tips on how to get crispy skin without overcooking the meat? Is that possible?

Moving on to the couscous, I had procured some curry powder earlier this week, and by some small miracle I had turmeric in the spice rack already, so I was able to make the curry/yogurt mixture as directed. IT WAS AWESOME. I liked it so much that I think I'm going to experiment with it in different recipes - I could see it going really well with chicken in particular. Not much else to note from the preparation of the couscous except that I decided to dice the carrots and steam them a bit instead of grating them and serving them raw. Turns out that I preferred them to be a bit soft, so I would probably do this again. As you can see from the pictures above, both my kiddos had fun helping me make and eat the couscous. :) I agree with Janice that this dish tastes wonderful at room temperature.

Overall, we loved both recipes and will definitely make them again!

1 comment:

Janice Johnson said...

Yea! More grandkid's pictures!! Food looks good too.
--the Grandmother