Lobster Curry - Virgin Gorda (BVIs)

I have been away from the cookbook for a while, traveling in Western Kenya and getting ready for a long trip back to the Colorado at the end of June. I have tried a couple of other recipes from "The Book". I have never had lobster other than boiled or steamer with garlic and butter, so the recipe for Lobster Curry from Chez Bamboo Restaurant in Vigin Gorda sounded like it was worth a try. The curry sauce was typical of the other curry sauces I have already used, even here in Kenya for Swahili seafood dishes. The sauce uses white wine, curry powder, heavy cream (I substituted milk and thickened with corn starch to get down on the calories), coconut cream, salt and pepper. I also used half garam masala and half curry powder for the spices. Actually, we found that the sauce was a little too strong for our taste and subdued the succulent flavor of the fresh lobster. I would probably stick with broiled grilled lobster with butter and lemon next go round. However, it was a nice to try lobster done in a different way. I would try the same recipe next time with a red snapper or sole.

Outside the book with my own recipe based on traditional Swahili style.

This recipe inspired me to try a Swahili Chicken Masala dish, which was prepared for us by "our chef" during a 5 day stay on the coast of Kenya earlier this month. We had rented a wonderful house on Kilifi Creek, and a cook came with the house. He prepared the most wonderful seafood and other dishes during our stay, mostly in the traditional swahili style of cooking, which complements fresh seafood and meats with a light sauce using onions, garlic, garam masali spice, salt, pepper, a few hot peppers, green and red sweet peppers, tomatoes, a little tomato paste, and a little coconut milk (a dash of wine is optional). We had this for three dinners using chicken, prawns, and fish on different nights. They were all yummy!! I tried to recreate the chicken masala dish at home the other night and it turned out great! Very simple and quick to prepare!!! Try it and I am sure you'll like it!

Back in the Kitchen for Jerk Lamb Chops and Coconut French Toast

It 's Sunday and we I tried two other dishes from "Morgan Freeman and Friends' on Thursday and Saturday.

Thursday, I was a little more ambitious and I tried a recipe from St. Croix, US Virgin Islands, from Chef Conny Anderson of Los Angeles. The meal consisted of Jerk Lamb Chops, red beans, coconut rice, with tamarind glaze, and fried plantains (page 112 of the book). See photo on the outcome. As I noted the other day, the meal was served to Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins. I served this same meals to the Dr. Mayling Simpson-Hebert, renowned anthropologist and global health advisor (and my wife).

The word jerk refers to the seasoning blend, the cooking method (not to the cook), and to the meat that has been treated to the jerk seasoning and cooking processes.

Jerk was first created by the Arawak Indians, the original natives of Jamaica and other Caribbean Islands. The liberal amounts of spices and peppers helped preserve meats in the island heat, as did drying them over an open fire. The term "jerk" is thought to derive from the Spanish term charqui, which means dried meat. The word can also refer to the jerking motion of turning the meat as it roasts over the fire.

There are any number of recipes for jerk seasoning, and many have an ingredient list a mile long. Jamaican food lovers agree that there are three jerk spice ingredients that are key: allspice, Scotch bonnet peppers, and thyme.

This recipe uses the typical jerk spices, in a marinade for the pork chops. The marinade was incredible and serves as the best barbecue sauce I have ever tried. I had to substitute local (kenyan) hot peppers for the scotch bonnet peppers, but all other fresh and dried ingredients were available. "Prime Cuts" specially cut double rib lamb chops for me, and I was able to find plantains, which in Kenya are used mainly for making "Matoke", a traditional dish where the plantains are cooked, smashed and served like mashed potatoes with meat. I made a tamarind glaze, which was the most challenging of all to prepare. No problem finding tamarind sauce, which with dice shallot, dark rum, vinegar and sugar, were the main ingredients. Trying to strain the cooked glaze through a strainer was the biggest challenge.

The meal turned out great, but we could have used a couple more chops as the meat was a bit scarce on the ribs. I would buy single ribbed chops next time as they are easier to judge in getting them cooked throughout.

I stayed out of the kitchen on Friday, since I met Mayling for lunch and we couldn't even comtemplate having a full dinner.

On Saturday, I decided to try Coconut French Toast

from Ludo Jarland, Executive Chef of the Restaurant at the Cove, Eluthera, Bahamas (page 27 of the Book). This was a simple though very heavy on the calories. I did substitute low fat milk for heavy cream, which probably reduced the calories per slice from 500 to 450. The recipe is fairly standard for French toast, but calls for shredded coconut in the egg, milk, cinnamon, sugar dip for the bread. I also used homemade whole wheat bread instead of white bread. After cooking on a skillet, the french toast is served with toasted shredded coconut sprinkled on top with maple syrup. Delicious!

Picadillo Outcome

Picadillo, a Cuban staple, was simple, consisting of ground beef sauteed in olive oil with chopped onions, green bell peppers (I added some sweet red pepper as well), fresh minced garlic, and chile pepper. Tomato sauce is added along with a little red wine, black pepper and finally sliced green olives and some raisons. I served this with rice and garnished with slices of yellow sweet pepper and parsley.

Another surprising success for this reluctant chef. We finished the leftovers for lunch today.

Happiness can be a simple Picadillo for dinner!!! Mayling digging in!

Today (Thursday, 10 June) is a little more challenging. No Golf or tennis. I am skipping down the Island chain to St Croix, US Virgin Islands, for Jerk Lamb Chops with two kinds of Plantain (I am using Kenyan green banana, called Matoka), red beans and coconut rice with Tamarind Glaze. This recipe comes from Chef Conny Andersson, of the Beverly Wilshire, Beverly Hills, California. Not quite in the islands, but the dish is!! This was a meal served to Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins as Morgan interviewed Tim for the book in Los Angelos. St. Croix was where the final scene of The Shawshank Redemption was filmed and apparently holds good memories for the both of them.

Chicken Roti - Bermuda and starting Picadillo

Well, we are still in Bermuda and yesterday, with a little, actually a lot, of help from Ruth our house helper, I put together another great recipe from Aqua Restaurant in Bermuda. Chicken Roti consist of a wonderful curry recipe (onion, garlic, spices of ginger, ground coriander, turmeric, cumin and black pepper). After heating these in oil in a large skillet, a little water and tomato is added, followed by bite-sized pieces of chicken and cut up potatoes. After thoroughly cooked, the curry is then spooned onto hot rotis (or chapatis), garnished with cilantro, rolled up and served hot. Mayling thought it was a super recipe and unique in being served with chapatis instead of rice. It was like an Indian style burrito. Ruth put the recipe in her own book. I was able to get it prepared by noon and placed both the curry and the chapatis in the frig. I just heated up the curry and heated the chapatis on a large skillet before putting the two together. A mixed salad completed the meal. I even had time to sneak out and play tennis with a friend at five in the afternoon, got back at 6:45 and after a "sundowner", we ate about 8pm. Mayling came home from work for lunch today and finished off the remaining curry and chapatis. It was just as good as a leftover, but we had eaten up most of the chicken yesterday. I'll add a little more next time.

A taste of Cuba in Miami

Today (Wednesday), I am skipping the Burmuda Island Coconut Cheesecake, the third Burmuda recipe, until we have some guest over. We really don't need the 3 zillion calories, but it sounds wonderful. Instead I am moving on to Cuban from the Kitchen of the grandmother of Daisy Fuentes, TV Host, resident of Miami with strong family ties to Cuba.

I have really been away from the US for a long time (19 out of the last 21 years), so I am extremely challenged to know any US TV personalities, and I have to admit, I had never heard of Daisy Fuentes. I am probably one of only a few Americans who has never seen "24" or "Lost". We do have a TV at home when we visit, but we don't have cable or satellite. I do remember seeing "Howdy Doody" when I was a kid and the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. Well, Daisy provided a couple of her grandmother's Cuban specialities provided for "Caribbean Cooking for a Cause". By he way, the 'Cause' in the title denotes that the proceeds from the book have gone to the Granada Relief Fund to help with recovery from Hurricane Ivan, which struck the island in 2004.

Daisy describes Picadillo as one of her favorites and this is one of the two Cuban recipes included in the book. So, I am starting in a few minutes with dish. I will take a photo of the outcome and download to the blog tomorrow. No help today from Ruth. I sneaked out this morning and played a round of golf with my British friend Ian at the Limuru Golf Club, and Ruth went home at noon to prepare for her boys arrival from school.

In the Bush recipe for Tahini - sidetracked

Yesterday in addition to making the Bouillabaise, we needed to make hummus, but we had no Tahini (sesame paste), the essential ingredient. All the recipes call for using a food processor to make the paste of sesame seeds and oil, which we don't have at our house here in Kenya. All you really need is a mortar and pestle and a lot of effort, but not a lot of time. To make just enough tahini for a cup or so of hummus, take a 1/2 cup of sesame seeds, roast them for about 15 minutes in a 350 degree fahrenheit oven on a cookie sheet. Don't let it brown. Then grind until you get a fairly fine powder using the mortar and pestle. We ground and smashed for about 10 minutes, and it was still somewhat course, but we didn't have any energy left. Then add about 1/8 cup or so of olive oil, blend and that's it. Use this with your favorite hummus recipe. It doesn't come out as smooth as the store bought tahini, but fresher and I think much more tasty. If you have a spice mill, you can grind the roasted sesame seeds in the spice mill and then mix with the olive oil in a separate bowl. This recipe is not in "the book".

Bermuda Bouillabaisse - with a Kentucky Twist

Yesterday, I tested the first recipe from "Caribbean Cooking for a Cause" by Wendy Wilkenson and Donna Lee. As I did not explain much about the book itself, I will start today's blog with some explanation of the book's layout and how I plan to cook my way through it. The book, which is available from a variety of on-line outlets, including Amazon.com, presents a variety of recipes from the various Caribbean Islands, moving from north to south. In all, 18 islands or island groups provide the inspiration for the dishes included in the book. The recipes come from chefs of top restaurants of the islands and some from the celebrities who are featured in the book. I will start from the beginning (Burmuda) and work my way down the Caribbean chain, finishing with Granada, the part-time home of Morgan Freeman.

The first chapter, following the introduction by Morgan Freeman, contains several recipes from Bermuda. This chapter features Michael Douglas, whose maternal side of the family have roots in Burmuda; Michael's grandfather was an attorney general of Burmuda. The recipe for Burmuda Bouillabaisse comes from Chef John Watson of Aqua Restaurant, Ariel Sands Resort.

Well, when I left off yesterday, I was on my way to the local supermarket, located in a wonderful courtyard shopping complex, Village Market, on the western fringe of Nairobi, not very far from the US Embassy and United Nations compounds. In Village Market, the place to get your meat and seafood is "Prime Cuts Butchery and Bistro". They bring in fresh seafood every Friday from the Kenya coast, and they also stock a wonderful variety of cheeses and sausages imported from Europe, as well as high quality locally available meats.

I went there looking for mussels and lobster, two key staples for the recipe. Unfortunately, the only mussels were frozen green mussels on the half shell, which were very pricey, and I didn't think they would work well. Reluctantly, I decided that my recipe would have to do without the mussels. I did buy two Indian Ocean Lobsters, about 1/4 pound each. This variety of lobster has no claws and looks more like a southern USA Crayfish, but larger. Off the coast of Kenya, they can grow to be several pounds. I chose two small ones as I was cutting the recipe in half to serve Mayling and myself. I had a shopping list, but forgot to include butternut squash and rum. I only realized this upon returning home about 4pm. I quickly decided that this recipe was going be a little off course from the one in the book. I had the prawns, lobster and Malindi Sole, which substituted for the Rock Fish. No V-8 juice, so I added a little more tomato paste instead. No rum, so why not try a jigger of John Lee, Kentucky Straight Bourbon. No Sherry pepper sauce either, so I added a little cayenne pepper. I substituted peeled chopped zuchinni for butternut squash. I had all the other spices. While these substitutions probably did little justice to the recipe, the result was mouth watering, at least I thought so. We ate about 8 pm on our covered patio with a fire going in our chiminea (Nairobi at more than 5,000 feet elevation can get very chilly at night). A little was left that I intended for lunch today. I just checked the frig. Gone!! Mayling took the last bit to her office for her lunch. No wonder she said she wouldn't be coming home to join me.

Tonight it will be chicken Roti, also from the Aqua Restaurant. I had better get Ruth, our household helper and excellent cook herself, to make the homemade chapatis (close to the Caribbean Roti). For this recipe, it seems I have all the ingredients.

The Start of Cooking with Morgan Freeman and Friends - Bermuda Bouillabaissse

This is the first post of my blog. I will be reporting on my experience with the recipes in "Cooking with Morgan Freeman and Friends". The challenge is I am not a great cook, but I can read reasonably well, am fearless around the kitchen, and hopefully, the recipes will pull me through. I will report on my wife's reaction to the results and comments from others who will be my tasters.

I readily admit that this was really the idea of my wife, Mayling, maybe something to keep me busy, off the golf course, and out of trouble until she retires next fall. Now that I have begun the blog, I am excited to get into the book, the recipes and writing about the experience. Before starting, a little background about how this started.

Mayling and I live in Nairobi, Kenya, and recently, in April 2010, we made a trip to the Virgin Islands, mainly to hone our sailing skills after about a 10 year absence from the water. We passed basic, cruising and bareboat courses offered through the American Sailing Association, using FairWinds Sailing School out of St. Thomas, USVI. We passed the courses and immediately afterwards, chartered a 34 foot Beneteau in Road Town BVI. We were hooked again.

Having owned two boats in the 1990's, a 27 foot Coronada sloop on the Chesapeake Bay and a nimble 22 foot French built weekender sloop on Lake Geneva. The two weeks of sailing was enough for us to form a vision of at least part of our retirement life. Since April, we have been researching and planning to buy our 3rd boat (the other two are long gone). We plan to live aboard and sale in the Caribbean for at least part of the year.

Following our charter with SunSail, and on leaving St. Thomas, we found this wonderful book and I am now starting to cook my way through from cover to cover. I hope to do every recipe during the next 7 months, prior to embarking on our new sailing adventures in the Caribbean. I hope those who encounter this blog will find it interesting and fun.

Bermuda Bouillabaisse

Today, I start with Bermuda Bouillabaisse (tough spelling), and I am now off to buy some lobster and garlic, the only two ingredients that I lack. We are lucky in that seafood is plentiful in Kenya as we get fresh everything from the Indian Ocean only a few hundred kilometers from Nairobi.