Malaysian-Style Chicken Curry (Page 359)

• Date: Friday, November 3, 2006 --9pm
• Location: Somerville, MA
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B

I made this one for dinner a couple Fridays ago because I wanted something that would freeze well and I suspected that this one would. I like to make big Friday dinners and freeze most of it for lunches throughout the coming week. This curry was not bad. The flavor of the sauce was nice -- the coconut milk contributed a nice richness, and the scallion paste complemented the flavor of the curry nicely. The dish would have been better though had it had something in the curry besides just the hunks of chicken. Matt and I agreed that this dish could have been great if there were vegetables added and the skin was removed from the chicken and the chicken was shredded and added back in to the sauce. As it was, the flavor penetrated very little to the middle of the pieces of meat, and the skin was soggy (as chicken skin always is when cooked in sauce). Before I froze it I removed all the chicken skin, cut up the chicken and stirred it in to the sauce, and that was a HUGE improvement.

I am finally feeling healthy again and I made it safely to Chicago! After a wonderfully uneventful flight yesterday, I managed to drive to Vigleik and Shihchi's place without getting lost (a minor miracle since i am pretty much chronically lost!). They have a beautiful apartment, with a really incredible kitchen. I brought The Book with me, so we picked some recipes and headed to the grocery store. We cooked a small feast, and Bridget and Kari joined us for dinner. It was really fun.

I realized on the flight out here that I don't think I have left the Boston areas since August! That's a long time for me. It's nice to get away and be somewhere different for a few days. I rented a car yesterday for the first time in my life. It's funny because they gave me this tiny little American car (that's what you get when you choose the cheapest one available). It's comforting in a way because it drives even worse than my not-so-tiny American car. I love my car, but it's not exactly a performance vehicle -- however, I learned yesterday that some cars are even worse!