Daring Cooks; nut butters
Almond nut butter
I am nuts about nuts… Love them all, although I have a slight allergy for them. Ever heard of the most common allergy which is apple, raisins and walnuts? Well, I have it.. Really nothing serious; but whenever I eat a raw apple or walnut (once used in something I’m fine) my throat, ears and chin start to itch and if I make the mistake of touching my eyes before I wash my hands…. the fluids in my eyes start to swell up making me look like something from outer space.. 
I’ve only had that once but it was not a pretty sight! Ever since I make double sure to wash my hands immediately after eating an apple. Yes, I still eat them. I like them too much and the itching is something that passes quickly.
Lately though I have noticed that the allergy seems to have spread to other nuts besides walnuts… Hmm…. I’ve always thought I wasn’t “made” properly.. too many weird allergies, but thankfully nothing all too serious. So… I was quite happy to read about the challenge for the Daring Cooks for this month.
The July 2010 Daring Cooks’ Challenge was hosted by Margie of More Please and Natashya of Living in the Kitchen with Puppies. They chose to challenge Daring Cooks to make their own nut butter from scratch, and use the nut butter in a recipe. Their sources include Better with Nut Butter by Cooking Light Magazine, Asian Noodles by Nina Simonds, and Food Network online.
Almonds
When I was reading through our various options for the recipes I really wanted to make the Asian salad as that just sounded perfectly for the current hot weather, but… Tom didn’t feel like eating any salad. For some weird reason he always feels that dinner should be positively warm. Even if the weather is +30°C, he still insists something should be served hot. He’s ok if it is only a sandwich, as long as it is one prepared in the oven and eaten hot… How weird is that??
So I do tend to eat my salads for lunch rather then dinner, although I do occasionally just ignore him and prepare a salad for dinner. I mean seriously; what is wrong with a salad??
But for this particular challenge I really liked all four of the options so I decided to please my guy and made the chicken with curried tomato almond sauce.
Making the butter is really a breeze. Just pop everything in the magimix and keep on grinding until it becomes smooth and buttery. I did add a bit more oil as almonds are by their nature rather dry. I did not roast them beforehand but I can imagine that it would be an enhancement to the flavor. The nuts were unsalted to begin with, so I just added salt to the final dish prior to eating it. Which worked fine for me as I felt it would be easier to adjust the levels of saltiness when doing it this way. The finished dish was also very flavorful.
I do tend to forgot to read recipes very thoroughly, so what happens is that I scan through it, check my ingredients and then just start cooking. I sure do check the recipe occasionally but as it turns out; I also forgot to do certain things that are spelled out. Simply because I do not read it thoroughly enough.
In this case I sort of forgot to make it a smooth sauce, as I just chopped the onion into fine bits and left them in the sauce. There was no way I would have been able to remove them anyway and I liked the final result. Not a smooth sauce by any means, but very tasty nonetheless. The almonds you could taste very well in the dish but not in an overpowering way. Really loved the dish!
Chicken tomato almond curry
Chicken with curried tomato almondsauce
Yield: 4
Recipe notes: Substitute the protein of your choice for the chicken. This is a smooth sauce, so the onion is removed before serving. If you prefer, dice the onion and leave it in the sauce or substitute a bit of onion powder.
Ingredients:
Ingredients:
1 Tablespoon (15 ml) olive oil
4 (6 oz / 170 g) boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
Salt to taste
Spice Blend:
1.5 tablespoons (20 ml) garam masala seasoning
1 teaspoon (5 ml) ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon (2 ml) ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon (1 ml) black pepper
Sauce:
4 tablespoons (60 ml) butter1 large onion, cut in half pole to pole
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 (15-ounce/425 g) can tomato sauce
⅓ cup (80 ml) almond butter
⅓ cup (80 ml) milk
½ to ¾ cup (120 to 180 ml) chicken broth or water, more as needed
1 cup (240 ml) frozen peas (optional)
Hot basmati rice for serving
Chopped parsley (optional garnish)
Sliced almonds (optional garnish)
Directions:
- Cook the chicken. If desired, pound chicken to ¼ inch (6 mm) thickness to promote even cooking. Sprinkle with a bit of salt and pepper to taste. Heat 1 teaspoon (5 ml) olive oil a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add half the chicken; sauté 3 to 5 minutes on each side or until cooked through. Cook the chicken in 2 batches, adding more oil if needed for second batch. Dice chicken into bite-sized pieces; set aside on clean plate and keep warm.
- Prepare spice blend. Stir garam masala, ginger, cinnamon, and pepper together in a small bowl. Set aside.
- Melt the butter in large nonstick skillet over medium-low heat. Add the onion and cook gently for several minutes to infuse the butter with onion flavor. Keep the heat low to avoid burning the butter; a little color is fine. Add the spice blend and garlic and cook for 1 minute or till fragrant, stirring constantly. Add the tomato sauce, stir well, and bring to boil. Reduce heat to simmer. Whisk in almond butter and milk until thoroughly combined with tomato sauce. The almond butter is thick so it takes a while to make a smooth sauce. Return to simmer. Add broth (or water) to sauce to reach desired consistency; return to simmer. Add more broth (or water) as needed to thin sauce as desired.
- Remove onion from sauce and discard. Stir frozen peas (if using) into sauce. Transfer sliced chicken to sauce. Simmer gently for a few minutes until peas and chicken are heated through.
- Serve chicken and sauce over rice. Garnish with chopped parsley and/or sliced almonds if desired.
Appetizer
Asian
Bread
Breakfast
Desserts & other sweets
Healthy
Oh I really love this recipe!! Almond butter in curry! Great idea/
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Most of my friends are like that also dinner MUST be hot while I can have it hot or cold or warm so long as it is food LOL LOL. What a lovely result you got it looks stunning (as always) I just love your photography and do try the Asian noddle salad everybody raved about it and do use all the garlic it is so delicious I used it for the rest of the week. Thanks for the kind words on my blog. Cheers from Audax in Sydney Australia.
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Great job on our challenge. The almond butter nut looks so delicious with this chicken dish. Love the clicks.
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Just saw Renee’s version of this and bookmarked it, now I am really thinking I need to make this sooner rather than later as yours looks wonderful also. Fun to read the post, and thanks for the recipe. I have never made a nut butter before so I am intrigued by getting to have a new experience.
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Everything look delicious. I also made almond butter but blanched them first and got rid of the skin.
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Your photos are just stunning! Great job on the challenge – everything looks amazing!
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Beautiful job! Your almond butter looks like it turned out perfectly, and I do think that is the best looking chicken with curried tomato almond sauce I have seen yet!
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Very beautiful meal and I love it!
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YAY!! you made Indian!!! how did you like it?? tell me tell mee!
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Simone (junglefrog) — July 15th, 2010 at 09:50
Haha! I loved it! But then I have always loved Indian food..
But this dish was very versatile and great in flavor!
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Great recipe. I love that you created a curry dish. For some reason, I don’t associate nuts with curry. This recipe is a perfect marriage between curry and nuts
.
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I have never made nut butter from almond or cooked anything that involves almond nuts. Your chicken with curried tomato almond sauce is itself a cooking invitation for me to try it for the first time since your photos are so convincingly delicious.
Sawadee from Bangkok,
Kris
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I have never made nut butter from almond or cooked anything that involves almond nuts. Your chicken with curried tomato almond sauce is itself a cooking invitation for me to try it for the first time since your photos are so convincingly delicious.
Sawadee from Bangkok
Kris
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Tomato+nut butter+curry=YUM!
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I always have to be careful when I come to your site because I can sit here and get lost in your pictures for way too long. You are so talented!
Your curry and nut butter looks delicious! What a great challenge.
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I’ve never made my own nut butter before but longing to give it a go now – looks wonerderful. Great idea to use it in a curry
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A very delicious choice!
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Dinners must be hot. That’s a new one on me. Sounds like you take it in stride! GREG
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The almond butter sauce sounds delicious! Looks like a must try. And, you’re right about salads. They’re definitely a good option for dinner during hot weather. (I live on salads during the summer!)
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It’s funny that Tom insists on having a hot dinner. In the winter, I insist on having at least one hot meal a day, but in the summer, I’m more than happy to live on salads, sandwiches, and cold soups. The thing about the noodle “salad”, though, is that it can easily be turned into a stir-fry (just take out the cucumbers), which would also be good. Maybe you could try that?
Anyway, your chicken looks very delicious, and I love your photos of the almonds!
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Simone (junglefrog) — July 16th, 2010 at 23:23
You’re absolutely right about that noodle salad being able to be turned into a stirfry! I think I can easily fool Tom that way… lol… I could eat salads or other cold stuff these days without any problem whatsoever!
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Great idea to use the nut butter in a curry dish Simone…clever! I’m mostly a salad eater in hot weather!
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Simone (junglefrog) — July 16th, 2010 at 23:21
Yep, me too… I am soooo gonna make that asian salad soon!
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Oh my gosh! That first picture of the nut butter makes me want to make it … AGAIN! So delicious and beautiful!
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Simone (junglefrog) — July 16th, 2010 at 23:21
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It’s so hard to pick a favorite nut butter, but almond is probably the one I buy most often. Your homemade version looks incredible- so much smoother than I can usually get mine!
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Simone, this looks like a wonderful dish. Do you think it could be made with cashew butter instead of almond? I’m wondering if the buttery flavor of cashew would go with these spices…
Gorgeous photos, as usual!
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Simone, this looks like a wonderful dish. Do you think it could be made with cashew butter instead of almond? I’m wondering if the buttery flavor of cashew would go with these spices…
Gorgeous photos, as usual!
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Simone..this dish I wanted to make so bad, but just didn’t have the time, mouths to feed, or energy. Seeing yours, I soo wish I did and now will. SO beautifully executed and photographed. I swear..if and when I get married, I want you to photograph it..along with the food (or just follow me around, you’ll get plenty of pictures of me gorging on the food) LOL
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What a great recipe. I love nuts in cooking and this looks absolutely delicious. Many people want something hot for dinner, but I like cold foods in general, even when it is not as hot! You should also have a bbq now that the weather is so good.
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As always, beautiful pictures!!!! I love the sounds of the almond butter in the curry! Fabulous idea!!! I make homemade almond butter weekly so its always on hand! Saving this! thanks!
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This looks great and yummy! I’m going to try this, my husband is kind of Indian (sounds stupid but his roots are from India) so he has to like it.
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my goodness! homemade almond butter sounds like the perfect pairing for lots of things, included that chicken, great combo!
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Wow! It looks delicious! I must try it! Thank you for sharing!
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I am nuts about nuts, too, but cannot imagine that the almonds would hold a balance of flavour in a curry, so I am not surprised they were not overpowering. I think the texture would be nicer with the nuts not being so smooth. I am surprised that they held their own within the flavours. Really. It looks lovely.
Valerie
Ps:
pistachios are my favourite nuts!
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