I've been running a curry train more-or-less continuously since my mom left. Reiver was about ready for a break from non-stop curries though and we'd hit a point where we were getting slightly low on leftovers anyway, so I decided to change it up for a bit. And, given that we're trying to be a bit more budget-conscious right now, I figured it might be a good time to revisit the Budget Byte$ blog. We had everything but the sausages on hand for this Dublin coddle already and it sounded tasty, so it seemed as good a place to start as any.

It was a great success! Everyone loved it. Everything was nicely cooked and the flavour was excellent.

And relatively affordable as well. Not as cheap as a dal, but not terrible either. I wanted to check since the Budget Byte$ recipes aren't always quite as affordable as one might like. At least not here in NZ. I was shocked to see pound cake come up on the blog and intrigued to see how they'd made it more budget-friendly. The answer? They hadn't. Apparently pound cake is still an affordable dessert in the US. They'd figured the 4 eggs you'd need for it would only cost $0.68. That's $0.68 total, not each! And the 240g of butter was supposedly only another $0.98. I think they figured the whole cake would have cost just over $5 to make. Meanwhile, here, the butter alone would run nearly $5! So, when they said that the coddle should cost a bit over $11 to make, I was skeptical... But it's not too bad! I think you'd struggle to do it for under $15 here, but that's still not terrible when you get anywhere between 3-6 servings out of it (depending on how big your portions are).

Running the numbers based on grocery prices here, I figured it should probably cost somewhere between $15 and $20 to make this coddle, depending on how you buy your groceries. If you're willing to get a 10kg bag of potatoes, use 1kg for this, and find another use for the other 9kg, then that helps bring the price down through economy of scale. Same deal with the onions. If you just buy the 2 onions you need for the stew, it'll cost you a bit more per onion than if you're willing to buy a 2kg bag of onions and use the others somewhere else. I think this would also be a good place to use bacon pieces rather than the streaky bacon called for in the recipe as you're just chopping it up anyway and you can get bacon pieces for ~$10/kg, while it can be tricky to find streaky bacon for much under $20/kg. So, if you're willing to buy in bulk, you can probably make this for $15. If you're just buying exactly as much of each ingredient as you need for this particular recipe, then it'd probably come out closer to $20 for the pot. So, definitely not the cheapest meal ever, but, as noted, not ridiculous either.

Dublin Coddle

Slightly adapted from Budget Byte$"

Ingredients

• 250g bacon pieces (or chopped streaky bacon)
• 450g sausages (I like beef, but any will work)
• 2 onions, halved and sliced
• 4 tsp. minced/crushed garlic
• 1 tsp. black pepper, ground
• 1kg potatoes, cut into 3-4cm pieces
• 2 c. chicken broth
• 1 tsp. dried parsley
• 1/2 tsp. dried thyme

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 150°C (300°F).
2. Cook of the bacon in a Dutch oven over medium heat.
3. Add the sausages and sear on all sides.
4. Remove sausages and bacon from the pan (leaving any grease behind).
5. Bacon pieces are less fatty than streaky bacon, so you might need to add an extra splash of oil at this point depending on what you used.
6. Add the onion and garlic and cook until softened and beginning to colour.
7. Add pepper, potatoes, chicken stock, parsley, and thyme and stir to combine.
8. Place sausages and bacon on top.
9. Cover and bake at 150°C (300°F) for 90 minutes.
10. Remove lid and continue baking for another 30 minutes.

---

Variants

InstantPot Version

I think this recipe would lend itself particularly well to an InstantPot/multi-cooker, I just need to figure out how to adjust the seasonings and liquid for it.

Masaaledar Phool Gobhi (Spicy Cauliflower)

I really liked this curry. I accidentally made it with twice as much onion, garlic, and ginger as it was supposed to have, but I would absolutely do it that way again. I loved the sweetness of the onion with the acidity of the tomato and the spiciness of the cayenne.

Masaaledar Phool Gobhi

Slightly adapted from 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer

Ingredients

• 1-2 Tbsp. oil
• 2 onions, halved and sliced
• 12 cloves garlic, sliced
• 4 tsp. ginger paste
• 2 tsp. cumin seeds, ground
• 2 tsp. coriander seeds, ground
• 1 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 tsp. ground cayenne
• 1/2 tsp. ground turmeric
• 1 small (400mL) tin diced tomatoes
• 450g cauliflower florets
• 1 c. water
• 2 Tbsp. chickpea flour (besan)
• 1/4 c. chopped fresh cilantro

Directions

1. Heat the oil over medium heat.
2. Add the onion, garlic, and ginger and cook, stirring often, until well-browned (12-15 minutes).
3. Add the cumin, coriander, salt, cayenne, and turmeric, stir to combine, and cook for another 30-60 seconds.
4. Add the tomatoes, water, and cauliflower, reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until cauliflower is tender (~12 minutes).
5. Stir in the chickpea flour and cook until sauce is slightly thickened (1-2 minutes).
6. Sprinkle with cilantro and serve.

This is a very brothy curry. Basically a soup. Which would normally feature "drumsticks" as the vegetable component. I'm not a huge fan of drumsticks, so I swapped in asparagus since it's now in season here. I also reduced the water quite a bit to make a thicker curry. While I found the results acceptable, neither of us were blown away by it and I probably won't be revisiting this one. It wasn't bad, just not good enough to get excited over either.

Palidu

Slightly adapted from 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer

Ingredients

• 1/4 c. skinned split pigeon peas (toor dal)
• 2-4 c. water, divided
• 1-2 Tbsp. ghee
• 1 tsp. cumin seeds
• 1 tsp. fenugreek seeds
• 2 Tbsp. garlic paste
• 1 Tbsp. chickpea flour (besan)
• 2 tsp. dhania-jeera masala
• 1 tsp. ground Kashmiri chiles (or 1/4 tsp. ground cayenne + 3/4 tsp. sweet paprika)
• 1 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 bunch asparagus, ends snapped and cut into 5cm pieces
• 4 pieces kokum¹
• 2 Tbsp. chopped fresh cilantro

Directions

1. Rinse the pigeon peas, then place in a pot with 2 c. of the water.
2. Bring to a boil, skim off any foam, cover, reduce heat to medium-low, and simmer until peas are tender (20-25 minutes).
3. Meanwhile, heat ghee over medium heat.
4. Add cumin seeds and fenugreek seeds and sizzle for 10-20 seconds.
5. Add garlic paste and cook for another minute or so.
6. Add chickpea flour and cook for another 2-3 minutes.
7. Once peas are tender, blitz with a blender.
8. Add the chickpea flour mixture and stir to combine.
9. If you want a thinner broth, add up to 2 c. of additional water.
10. Stir in masala, ground chilies, and salt.
11. Add asparagus and kokum and bring to a boil.
12. Cook for a minute, remove from heat, stir in cilantro, and serve.

---

¹ I didn't have any kokum, so I tossed in a tsp. of tamarind concentrate in its place. ^Back

The grocery store has had discount pork ribs available for the last few weeks, but I've resisted buying any because I was worried that I wouldn't have the wherewithal to get them cooked. I was finally feeling up to the task this weekend, so I grabbed a pack and decided to try this somewhat unusual curry-inspired rib recipe.

They were very tasty! They looked beautiful and the glaze was delicious. I thought that the sauce might be superfluous on top of the glaze and the marinade, but it was fantastic and really added a lot. The ribs were good without the sauce, but even better with it.

While the flavour was excellent, they weren't quite as tender and juicy as I would've liked. I think that could be down to the cooking method. The instructions for charcoal said to cook them over indirect heat. But the gas grill instructions had you putting them over low, direct heat. I think that next time I might try indirect heat, even if I am using a gas grill. And I might try wrapping them for the initial cooking time as well.

Because I haven't dialed in the cooking time and technique yet, I've just written up the instructions for what I actually did first. Below that I'll put suggestions for what I'd like to try next time.

Indian Fusion Pork Ribs

Slightly adapted from 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer

Ingredients

Ribs

• 2 Tbsp. ginger paste
• 1 Tbsp. garlic paste
• 1 tsp. coarse salt
• 1/2 tsp. ground turmeric
• 1.8-2kg pork ribs

Glaze

• 1/4 c. tomato paste
• 1/4 c. jaggery or brown
• 1 Tbsp. cider vinegar
• 1 Tbsp. oil
• 2 tsp. ground Kashmiri chilies (or 1/2 tsp. cayenne + 1/2 Tbsp. sweet paprika)
• 2 tsp. balti masala
• 1 tsp. coarse sea salt

Sauce

• 4-5 cloves garlic
• 1-3 fresh green Thai, finger, or serrano chilies
• 1-2 Tbsp. oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 Tbsp. tomato paste
• 2 Tbsp. cider vinegar
• 2 tsp. sugar
• 1/2 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1/2 tsp. ground turmeric
• 1 c. water
• 2 Tbsp. chopped fresh cilantro (optional)

Directions

1. Combine the ginger paste, garlic paste, salt, and turmeric and mix well.
2. Slather the mixture onto the meat side of the ribs and chill for at least 4 hours, but preferably overnight.
3. Preheat barbecue to high.
4. Reduce heat to low, then add the ribs, meat side down. Cover the grill and cook for 35-45 minutes.
5. Meanwhile, combine the tomato paste, jaggery, vinegar, oil, ground chilies, balti masala, and salt to make the glaze. Set aside.
6. Flip the ribs meat side up, cover the grill, and cook for another 20-25 minutes.
7. Meanwhile, combine the garlic and chilies and mash to a pulp with a mortar as pestle.
8. Heat the oil over medium heat.
9. Add the onion and cook until edges start to brown (~5 minutes).
10. Add the garlic-chile mixture and cook for another 2-3 minutes.
11. Add the tomato paste, vinegar, sugar, salt, and turmeric and cook until vinegar has mostly evaporated.
12. Add the water, bring to a boil, reduce heat to medium-low, and simmer, stirring occasionally, until thickened (~10 minutes).
13. If you desire a smooth sauce, blitz it with a blender.
14. Once ribs are cooked through, brush all over with the glaze.
15. Return to grill, meat side up, cover grill, and cook for another 10-15 minutes.
16. Remove from grill and rest for ~5 minutes before serving.
17. Meanwhile, rewarm the sauce (if necessary) and sprinkle in the cilantro (if using).
18. Cut the ribs apart and serve with the sauce (either pour it over or serve it along side for dipping).

Suggested Improved Cooking

1. Prepare and use marinade as directed above.
2. Preheat one side of grill to 150°C (300°F).
3. Wrap ribs in foil or place on a baking sheet and cover with foil.
4. Place over indirect heat, cover grill, and cook for 1.5-2 hours.
5. Meanwhile, make the glaze and sauce as directed above.
6. Increase the grill temperature to 190°C (375°F).
7. Transfer the ribs to direct heat and baste top side with glaze.
8. Cover grill and cook for 5 minutes.
9. Flip and baste other side with glaze, cover grill, and cook for another five minutes.
10. Repeat, glazing each side once more with 5 minutes of covered cooking between each.
11. Cut ribs apart and serve with sauce.

This recipe didn't really work. I actually found it quite tasty, but it was excessively wet. And Reiver found it too wet and walnut-y to be properly tasty. I think this one is salvagable, but it doesn't quite work as written. The recipe below reflects my recommended fix rather than the original.

Apple-Carrot Loaf

Adapted from CakeLove in the Morning by Warren Brown

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 c. carrots, peeled and grated
• 1/2 c. apple, peeled and grated
• 1/2 c. brown sugar
• 1 Tbsp. ginger paste
• 1/4 c. oil
• 2 large eggs
• 2 Tbsp. honey
• 1 1/4 c. whole wheat flour
• 1/2 Tbsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1/2 c. chopped walnuts
• 1/2 c. sultanas

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F) and grease and flour a 23x13cm (9x5") loaf pan.
2. Combine the carrots, apple, brown sugar, ginger, oil, eggs, and honey and mix well.
3. Sift the baking powder into the flour.
4. Mix in the cinnamon, salt, walnuts, and sultanas.
5. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir to combine.
6. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake at 180°C (350°F) until done (45-55 minutes).
7. Cool in pan for 5-10 minutes, then turn out onto wire rack to finish cooling.

I wanted to make something a bit special for dessert last night. These not only fit the bill, but had a pleasingly short bake time. I didn't have enough ramekins, so I used some extra-large muffin tins instead. I suspected that the cakes might cook a bit faster in the muffin tins than in the ramekins, so I shaved a minute of the baking time. It turns out that I should've gone with my original instinct and shaved a full three minutes off the baking time! The resulting cakes were soft in the middle, but decidedly not "molten". Oh well... now I'll know for next time.

I also used 72% dark chocolate because that's what I had on hand, but I think that was actually a bit too dark for this recipe. If I do it again, I'll use 50% dark chocolate instead. They weren't bad as-is, but they were a bit darker and more bitter than I would've liked. But with a slightly less dark chocolate and baked for just a couple minutes less, I think they would've been perfect.

Photo goes here.

Molten Chocolate Cakes

Slightly adapted from Dessert of the Day by Kim Laidlaw

Ingredients

• 250g dark chocolate (pref. 50%)
• 55g butter
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 4 large egg yolks
• 6 Tbsp. sugar, divided
• 2 Tbsp. cocoa powder, sifted
• 3 large egg whites

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 200°C (400°F) and grease six ramekins or a 6-well jumbo muffin tin. Dust generously with cocoa powder.
2. Gently melt the cocolate with the butter.
3. Mix in the vanilla and set aside to cool.
4. Beat the egg yolks with 3 Tbsp. of the sugar and the cocoa powder.
5. Drizzle in the chocolate mixture while beating. (Resulting batter will be very thick.)
6. In a clean bowl with a clean whisk, beat the egg whites until frothy.
7. Gradually beat in the remaining 3 Tbsp. of sugar and continue beating until stiff peaks form.
8. Stir half of the meringue into the batter to loosen it.
9. Gently fold in the remaning half of the meringue.
10. Spoon the batter into the prepared ramekins/muffin tins.
11. Bake at 200°C (400°F) for 10-13 minutes. (10 minutes for muffin tins, 12-13 for ramekins.)
12. Turn cakes out onto plates and serve warm with ice cream, whipped cream, and/or raspberry coulis.

Sirka Paneer (Vinegar Paneer)

This is a really interesting curry. It has a lot of elements to it, both in the bulk and the flavour elements. It's full of potato and cauliflower in a tomato-y sauce (like aloo gobhi). But the sauce is also full of vinegar and chilies (like a vindaloo). But then it also has the bouncy paneer and creamy coconut milk added at the end. It's almost like you're getting three curries in one!

I do find the vinegar with the coconut milk slightly confusing to my palate. I'm used to a curry either having the sharpness of the vinegar or the creaminess of the coconut milk, not both. It is a tasty curry, but I think it's a bit too confusing to ever be a favourite for me. That said, I do appreciate how hearty it is with the paneer, cauliflower, and potatoes.

Sirka Paneer

Slightly adapted from 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 c. water, divided
• 1/4 c. malt or cider vinegar
• 1/4 c. tomato paste
• 1 Tbsp. coriander seeds
• 1 tsp. cumin seeds
• 1-2 fresh green Thai, finger, or serrano chilies
• 1-2 dried red Thai or cayenne/arbol chilies
• 2-3 cloves garlic
• 2 tsp. ginger paste
• 1-2 Tbsp. oil
• 1 onion, halved and sliced
• 2 c. cauliflower florets
• 2 medium-sized potatoes, cut into 2cm cubes
• 1 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 250g paneer, cut into 2cm cubes and fried¹
• 1 c. coconut milk
• 1/4 c. chopped fresh cilantro

Directions

1. Combine 1/4 c. of the water with the vinegar, tomato paste, coriander seeds, cumin seeds, fresh and dried chilies, garlic, and ginger in a blender and purée.
2. Heat the oil over medium heat.
3. Add the onion and cook until just starting to brown (3-5 minutes).
4. Add the paste and cook for another 3 minutes.
5. Add the remaining 1 c. of water to the blender and swish it out. Add this to the pan.
6. Add the cauliflower, potatoes, and salt to the pan and bring to a boil.
7. Cover, reduce heat to medium-low, and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 20 minutes.
8. Add the paneer and coconut milk and simmer for another 10 minutes.
9. Stir in the cilantro and serve.

---

¹ Tossing the paneer cubes with a little oil and air-frying at 200°C (400°F) for 10 minutes works very well and saves a lot of time and effort. Alternatively, you can sometimes find bags of pre-fried paneer cubes in the frozen section of Indian grocery stores... ^Back