1 April - green coriander chicken

I wanted to make a chicken curry this evening, but thought I'd go for a new recipe. I flicked through Madhur Jaffrey's Ultimate Curry Bible and settled on a recipe for green coriander chicken. Apparently, it's a Kenyan recipe and it doesn't include any of the traditional curry spices - no ground cumin, coriander or turmeric here - but relies instead on just a basic combination of garlic, ginger, chilli and lots of fresh coriander. It came out wonderfully creamy and absolutely packed with flavour, definitely one to do again.

12 February - curry twice

For lunch, I used the giant parsnip from the vegbox to make some Thai-spiced parsnip soup. It's always a good recipe (from Sophie Grigson), but today it came out just spot-on - just the right consistency, the right blend of flavours, the right amount of chilli hum.

It was curry again for dinner, but this time of an Indian leaning. I did Madhur Jaffrey's chicken in red pepper sauce, which is always delicious and to go with it tried out her Gujerati cabbage with carrots - strips of cabbage and grated carrot, lightly stir-fried with subtle spices (asafetida, black mustard seeds and just a few chilli flakes), lemon and fresh coriander - crunchy and delicious.

5 October - meatballs and malay chicken korma

I used up the little bit of leftover turkey mince for lunch, making it into some Asian-influenced meatballs. I mixed the mince with some chopped lemongrass, red chilli, garlic and fresh coriander and fried it as little meatballs, which I then dropped into a bowl of broth (veg stock with the rest of the chilli, a couple of lime leaves and more herbs: mint, basil and coriander) with some noodles in the bottom. A yummy, fresh, tasty lunch:

My parents are coming to visit at the weekend, so I'm making up some curries for my Dad. He loves curry, but my Mum hates it, so periodically I make him a batch to put in the freezer. He can then take them out and heat them up when my Mum's not home, both satisfying his curry urge and getting round the fact that he's not much of a cook! This evening I made up a big batch of chicken curry - a recipe I hadn't tried before for Malay chicken korma (from Madhur Jaffrey) - so that we could have half for dinner and I could pop the rest in pots for my Dad.

It was quite a long-winded recipe - which is I why I'm not going to bother typing it up here! - but the result was probably worth it. It's a very mild creamy curry - with both yoghurt and coconut milk - and as it contains potatoes and carrots, we decided to have it as a meal on its own without any rice. I'm not sure how well it's going to freeze and whether it's going to curdle when it's heated up again, but I'll pass a couple of pots onto my Dad and see what he makes of it.

10 September - fresh figs and a lamb curry

I got some lovely big, fresh, Turkish figs in the supermarket this morning. So lunch involved some fresh bread from Hart's Bakery (@ Ruby & White) with the figs, some bresaola and a tomato and basil salad.

We fancied a curry, so I flicked through Madhur Jaffrey and cooked up some lamb do piaza with some spicy green beans and rice. As usual, the sauce rather curdled, but it was still tasty.

• Fry one and a half finely sliced onions until starting to brown. Remove and drain on kitchen paper.
• Put a cinnamon stick, 3 cardamom pods and 3 cloves in the same oil.
• Add about 250g cubed lamb to brown, then remove.
• Fry 1/2 finely chopped onion, then add some garlic and ginger paste (made from a couple of cloves of garlic and a lump of ginger, both grated and mixed with a little water).
• Add 1 tsp coriander and 1/2 tsp cumin and stir.
• Gradually add 2 tbsp yoghurt and stir to incorporate. I never manage this without it curdling, even taking the pan off the heat.
• Return the meat with a cup of water, a pinch of cayenne pepper and some salt. Then bubble away gently for an hour or so.
• Return the fried onions and half a tsp of garam masala.

21 August - nicoise light and creamy chicken curry

Back home, it was a nicoise "light" for lunch (no potatoes), after that huge breakfast, out in some beautiful afternoon sun.

Then in the evening, I went for an old favourite creamy chicken curry recipe from Madhur Jaffrey with spicy cabbage. Managed to get just the right balance of creaminess, spice and kick - always good.

16 July - scrambled eggs and lemon and coriander chicken

After a grey, drizzly start to a Saturday morning, a comforting brunch of scrambled eggs with a few chunks of hot-smoked salmon mixed in, piled on a delicious thick slice of toasted sourdough bread was just perfect.

For dinner I fancied a curry, but something light and fresh. I tried out a Madhur Jaffrey recipe for lemon and coriander chicken which fitted the bill just perfectly.

• Brown four boneless chicken thighs in oil and remove.
• Fry 3 finely chopped cloves of garlic and add a good dollop of grated ginger mixed with a tablespoon of water.
• Stir in a large bunch of chopped coriander (about 100g, which is a very large bunch), plus 1/2 a chopped green chilli, a pinch of cayenne pepper, 1tsp ground cumin, 1/2tsp ground coriander, 1/2tsp turmeric and some salt.
• Return the chicken to the pan with about 150ml water and a good squeeze of fresh lemon juice (c. 1-2 tbsp).
• Cover the pan, turn low and simmer for 30 minutes+, turning the chicken over halfway.

Served with some spiced rice and peas, it was delicious; tangy, green and with just the right amount of kick.

For pudding, I tried to recreate something like the fabulous 'savoury' dessert I had at Opus last weekend with some mini goats cheese and gooseberry cheesecakes. Sadly, the cheesecake mix came out slightly curdled and the (supermarket) gooseberries just weren't as tart as I'd hoped. All a bit disappointing, maybe one to come back to another time when better gooseberries are available.

15 June - chicken and spinach curry

The salad the other day doesn't seem to have made much of a dent in the spinach on the terrace, so this evening, I went for a chicken and spinach curry recipe from Madhur Jaffrey's Ultimate Curry Bible to use up more spinach and the chicken breast in the fridge. Tris is out for the evening, so the below is curry-for-one.

• Cook a big handful of spinach in a pan with a couple of tablespoons of water until wilted, then chop.
• Blend together a small chopped onion, a couple of cloves of garlic, about the same quantity of fresh ginger and a couple of tbsps of water to make a paste.
• Heat some oil in a frying pan, add a small cinnamon stick and a couple of cardamom pods, then add the onion mixture and stir and fry for a few minutes.
• Stir in 3/4 tsp ground coriander, 1/2 tsp ground cumin and a pinch of cayenne pepper.
• Add the chicken, cut into cubes and stir for a minute or two.
• Gradually add 2 tbsp natural yoghurt, a chopped tomato and the spinach.
• Add 75ml water and some salt. Cover, turn low and simmer for about 20 mins.

The result was really tasty and with no one else eating, I was able to play around a bit more than usual taking photos, playing with some lighting ideas from one of the tutors on my photography trip, Lone, who happens to be a professional food photographer. I've brought down my daylight lamp, that usually sits on my desk through the winter, to create a slightly more natural light in the evening rather than resorting to a flash. It's quite difficult to make a sludgy green curry look attractive, but I quite like the black background.

8 May - home-grown veg and a creamy chicken curry with a kick

Most of today was spent out on our roof terrace planting up this year's 'crops'! Last year, I made a rather tentative start at growing my own veg, but most things were a bit disappointing, I think partly just because I didn't grow enough of anything to yield enough worth eating. This year I'm being a bit more adventurous with French beans, mange touts, tomatoes, courgettes, spinach and a chilli plant, as well as all the herbs that are already thriving.

I think I'm a bit of a supertaster - that is, stronger flavours strike me as even more intense than for most. So I've never been good with anything very hot. I love 'spicy' Indian food, but I prefer it when I cook it myself and can control the amount of chilli that goes in. Today I cooked one of my favourite Madhur Jaffrey curry recipes which is usually relatively mild, with lots of flavour and just a bit of background hum from some cayenne pepper. A little while ago though, I got a new jar of cayenne pepper which is clearly much punchier than what I'd had before and which I haven't quite got used to yet. So today's gentle-looking creamy chicken curry had a bit more of a kick to it than I'd intended!

Madhur Jaffrey's Chicken with cream

• Sprinkle a couple of chicken breasts cut into chunks with some salt, 1/2 tsp cumin, 1/4 tsp coriander, 1/4 tsp turmeric and 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper - less with hindsight! Mix and leave for about an hour.
• Fry the chicken pieces in some vegetable oil to brown, then remove with a slotted spoon.
• In the same pan, fry a chopped onion, then add a paste comprised of two crushed garlic cloves, the same amount of grated fresh ginger and a splash of water.
• Stir in 1/2 tsp cumin, 1/2 tsp coriander, 1/4 tsp turmeric and 1/4 tsp (?) cayenne.
• Add a chopped tomato and stir and mush to a paste.
• Take the pan off the heat to stir in 2 tbsp natural yoghurt - too much heat at this point will make the yoghurt split. Then add 100ml water, some salt and the chicken.
• Bring back to the boil, turn low, cover and simmer for 20 mins.
• Remove the cover, add 1/2 tsp garam masala and 2 tbsp cream and bubble until the sauce is thick and creamy.