Fall Diaries, Edition 1 - Butternut Squash

Hello readers!! The sporadic blogger is back with a brand new post going ga-ga over her favorite season. We’re almost into winter here but let me say it….I love fall!! The weather is just right – yeah spring is nice too, but fall is better. And oh the gorgeous leaves! As much as I love flowers, I can’t get over the red, orange and yellow leaves all around.

Anyway, since this space is all about food let’s get to the best thing about fall – all the glorious vegetables! Fall is the time to bring home an assortment of pumpkins and squashes – and it’s really difficult to not find something you like. Oh well, as long as you like vegetables, you should find something you like. So what’s on top of my list? Undoubtedly has to be butternut squash and that is what this edition is going to be all about.

For the uninitiated, butternut squash is a sibling of the pumpkin and has a mildly sweet taste. It is wonderfully adaptable since it blends seamlessly into various cuisines. You can steam, roast or pan fry the squash, use your choice of cooking fat, add meat or keep it meatless and season with all the spices you care (or dare) to throw in.

What I have in this post  is a much loved Moroccan inspired Butternut Squash and Chickpea Stew. It is a little sweet, a little spice and immensely flavorful. The stew is pretty much a one pot meal and all it needs is a little bit of cous cous (or rice) on the side to make a hearty and healthy meal. And if the meat lover in you is skeptical about this one, I’d urge you to go ahead and try it once. You won’t regret it. If you really just have to have some meat, I’d suggest leaving the chickpeas aside and adding some lamb instead. The recipe and cooking time will need some tweaking though.

Disclaimer – This one is definitely not original. I first found something similar in Sally Schneider’s ‘A New Way to Cook’. Additional inspiration came from one of my favorite food blogs – Smitten Kitchen.

Butternut Squash and Chickpea Stew

1.5 tablespoons olive oil

1 large yellow or white onion, cut into ½ inch cubes

18 ounces butternut squash peeled, seeded and cut into ½ inch cubes

1 cup chickpea cooking liquid + ½ cup apple juice + water as required 

1.5 cups cooked chickpeas or canned chickpeas (drained and rinsed)

1-2 tablespoons raisins

1 inch piece fresh ginger, finely chopped

2 large cloves of garlic, minced 

1 medium tomato, diced small

1 inch cinnamon stick

1 teaspoon cumin seeds

Ground black pepper, to taste

Red pepper flakes, as required

A pinch of saffron, crumbled

Salt to taste

¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro

In a large pot, combine the oil, onions cumin, cinnamon, ginger, garlic and black pepper. Cook until onions turn translucent. Add squash and saute for 2-3 minutes. Then add the remaining ingredients, except salt and cilantro. Cover and cook till squash is about 2/3rds done (about 12-15 minutes) . Then add salt and some of the cilantro. Uncover and cook till squash is tender and liquid has reduced enough to make a thick stew. Garnish with the remaining cilantro. 

Notes : 

1. 18 ounces of diced squash is about 1.2 pounds. Butternut squash is hard as a brick when it's raw so buying it pre-diced may be a good idea.

2. If you're using canned chickpeas, use vegetable stock instead of the chickpea cooking liquid.

3. Cilantro hater alert - Use parsley instead of cilantro. It's not the same, but it's better than nothing.

When zucchini meets Indian food....

Hello world! We’re halfway through October and I suddenly realized that it has been a month since my first holler. For all my rant about the ‘food I love’, I haven’t shared a thing yet and that’s certainly an oops moment for a (wannabe?) blogger. So it’s time to get started on the food trip readers! Fasten your seat belts and let the journey begin…..

Since I’m taking you through the A to Z of the food I love, let’s start with Z for zucchini. As I type ‘zucchini’ I can already feel some of you losing interesting and thinking of better things to eat and read about. If I still have you hooked to this post, I promise this will get interesting…….and if you eat this you won’t even believe there’s zucchini in it. The vegetable lover in me rediscovered zucchini this summer and the versatility of this green squash is simply amazing. Roast it, saute it or combine it with chocolate in a freshly baked bread…..there’s something for everyone. And if none of these ideas are appealing enough, zucchini and Indian food is a match made in heaven. I did say this would get interesting…….

So there I was one fine evening with cabbage and zucchini in the refrigerator and the desire to whip up something fun. And thus was born ‘Zucchini Cabbage Kofta Curry’. A vegetarian kofta curry is by no means an innovation and is quite the staple in Indian restaurants all over the world. For the uninitiated, ‘koftas’ are dumplings made from vegetables or meat and the curry bit comes from the koftas being simmered in a spiced sauce. Vegetarian koftas are usually made with cabbage, carrots and/or cottage cheese. Now zucchini is not typically found in India or used in Indian cooking. Well maybe it’s available in the new and fancy grocery stores in big cities, but it’s definitely not used in traditional cooking. So the creative genius in me decided to throw zucchini into the koftas and the rest, as they say, is history......

By the way, the picture is not that great because my camera decided to die on me just I was about to take a picture and I had to let my phone do the honors. 

Zucchini Cabbage Kofta Curry

For the koftas / dumplings :

2 cups shredded cabbage

1 cup shredded zucchini

1/2 cup chickpea flour (a.k.a besan)

2 small slices of whole wheat bread ground into breadcrumbs

1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder

1/2 teaspoon powdered cumin

1/2 teaspoon powdered coriander (powdered cilantro seeds)

1/2 teaspoon red chilli powder (ground cayenne pepper)

salt 

Mix all the ingredients together and divide the mixture into 12-13 equal sized portions. Make sure the portions are reasonably round shaped and space them evenly on a greased cookie sheet. Spoon a drop of oil over each portion if you'd like to. (You don't need to think 'oil rig' here....just a drop). Preheat the oven to 400 F and bake for 15-20 minutes. 

For the curry :

1 tablespoon oil (I use canola)

1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds

2 pods of green cardamom

1 pod of black cardamom

a tiny bit of mace (skip it if you can't find it)

1 teaspoon ginger-garlic paste

1 tablespoon tomato paste

1/2 teaspoon sugar 

1/4 teaspoon powdered cumin

1/2 teaspoon powdered coriander 

1/2 teaspoon red chilli powder

3/4 teaspoon garam masala (store bought spice mix)

1/2 teaspoon cornstarch

1.5 cups water

salt, as preferred

Heat the oil in a pan on medium heat and add the whole spices (ingredients 2 through 5). Fry the spices for about 10-15 seconds and then take the pan OFF the heat. Mix the tomato and ginger garlic pastes and add them to the pan with a few teaspoons of water. Mix well and return the pan to the heat source. (DISASTER ALERT : Refer to the note below). Let the pastes cook together for 3-5 minutes. Then add the sugar, salt and spices and mix well. Add water, cover the pot and let the sauce come to a boil. Add the koftas to the curry (SLOWLY) and simmer for 6-7 minutes. Combine the cornstarch with a teaspoon of water and add it to the curry. Stir gently until it begins to thicken. Voila!! Serve over rice or with bread.

Notes :

1. Adding any kind of paste to hot oil has all sorts of disastrous potential. Stuff may splatter all over you and your stove. So make sure the pan is off the heat source for a few seconds before throwing the pastes in and have a lid handy to cover the pot and contain the splatter.

2. Cornstarch acts like slow relief medication in my experience. It takes a little bit of time (in single digit minutes) for the curry to become really thick. Remember that before dumping half the box into the sauce.

3. The quantities of sugar and spices are indicative. Adjust them to your spice tolerance levels.

And so I bite the bullet....

My tryst with planning meals, buying groceries and cooking started in full force when I moved out of my parents' home to go to graduate school. Gradually, cooking became a hobby and a stress buster....a sort of 'me time' where I can forget everything and focus on the beauty that is food. After reading and enjoying numerous food blogs and starting a food photo blog of sorts on my Facebook page, I decided it was time to take the plunge. That is the not so fascinating story of how 'Citrus and Cardamom' was born.

So world, this is going to be a little window into my kitchen. My own little corner on the www where I offer a glimpse of the food I love. I hope you'll enjoy reading along....and maybe even cooking some. And before I sign off, I need to say something about the name of this blog. It comes from two of my most favorite ingredients - citrus fruits and cardamom. These two go wonderfully well with everything from spicy curries to melt in your mouth desserts. That is all the name really symbolizes.....oh and the two words sound really cute together too. :)