Spicy Lamb Burger

Think of this recipe as a more refined, Moroccan-tinged, companion to my Spiced Turkey Burger. The fattier lamb can stand up to aggressive seasoning, so I use generous amounts of garlic, cumin, cinnamon, and dried mint to ground the recipe in North Africa, and add ginger, coriander and cardamom to bring it back to India. It’s a perfect exemplar of how I blend various ad hoc flavours and culinary influences into my own, personal, multi-culti offering.

Ingredients

For the burgers: 
1 small Red Onion (quartered)
6 cloves Garlic
2-inch piece Ginger (peeled)
2 tbsp dried Mint
2 tbsp ground Coriander
1 tsp ground Cumin
2 tsp Cinnamon
½ tsp ground Cardamom
½ tsp freshly ground Black Pepper
1 tsp Chilli powder
Salt (to taste)
2 lbs [1 kg] ground Lamb

1 tbsp vegetable oil
8 oz [225 gms] Feta cheese (crumbled)
8 round buns (cut in half and lightly toasted)

1. Put onion, garlic, and ginger in a food processor and grind to a smooth paste. Transfer paste to a large mixing bowl, add remaining burger ingredients, and mix well. Form meat mixture into eight patties, cover with plastic wrap and let sit for 30-45 mins. You can make the patties up to a day in advance and store in the fridge. 
2. Heat vegetable oil in a grill-pan or heavy skillet. Add lamb patties and sear on each side for about 4 mins. Alternately, you can also grill the patties over direct heat on a gas or charcoal grill. 
3. Set the broiler in the oven to medium. Sprinkle a generous amount of crumbled feta cheese on each burger and cook in the top rack of the oven for 2 mins, or until the cheese starts to melt. 
4. Place burger on a toasted bun and serve immediately.

Stewed Bok Choy and Potatoes with Caramelised Red Onions

This quick and easy side dish pairs the sweetness of caramelised red onions with pungent hing (asafoetida), to flavour mild and tender baby bok choy and potatoes. It is a great accompaniment to steamed or grilled fish, and equally delicious as a cold, day-old salad.

Ingredients
2 tbsp Vegetable Oil
4 whole Dried Red Chillis
1 tsp Hing (Asafoetida)
1 small Red Onion, thinly sliced
1 lb [700gms] Potatoes, washed and cut lengthwise, skin-on, into 8 pieces each
Salt (to taste)
½ cup Water
1 lb [700 gms] Bok Choy, washed and with the ends of the stalks trimmed off

1. Heat oil in a large skillet or frying pan over high heat until smoking. Add dried red chillis and stir briskly for about a minute until the chillis start to blacken. 
2. Lower heat to medium, add hing, and sputter for about a minute. Add red onion and fry for 3–4 mins till well caramelised.
3. Add potatoes and stir fry for 2–3 mins until lightly golden. Add salt and water, and continue cooking, covered, for another 5 mins, until the potatoes are fork tender. Add bok choy and stir briskly till the leaves are wilted. Turn off heat and let sit for 5 mins before serving.

Crispy Potatoes with Spicy Pesto

Pesto is one of those versatile sauces that is great to keep on hand for a quick meal—tossed with pasta or as a fragrant topping for fish or meat. Over the years I’ve always sworn by Marcella Hazan’s classic pesto recipe, which is, frankly, infallible.

But recently, when a friend offered me basil from his over-abundant kitchen garden, I felt the urge to tweak Marcella’s recipe for a little extra punch. So I spiked the glistening, emerald pesto with green chillies, and added ginger for additional heat.

I spooned the spicy pesto over golden, crispy oven-roasted potatoes, for a perfectly irresistible finger food.

Ingredients

2 lbs [1 kg] Potatoes, washed and cut lengthwise, skin-on, into 8 pieces each
1 tsp freshly ground Black Pepper
Sea Salt (to taste)
4 tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Spicy Pesto: 

2 cups tightly packed Basil leaves
½ cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
3 tbsp Pine nuts
2 cloves Garlic, finely chopped
2-inch piece Ginger, peeled and minced
4 fresh Green Chillies
Sea Salt (to taste)
¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese

[Please note that this yields double the pesto needed for this potato dish. So use half of the pesto with the potatoes, and freeze the rest for later use.] 

1. Pre-heat oven to 450º F (230ºC). Arrange potatoes in one layer in a baking dish. Sprinkle black pepper and sea salt, drizzle with olive oil, and using your hands, toss well to mix. 
2. Roast in the oven for 30 mins, then stir the potatoes to ensure that they caramelise evenly on all sides. Continue roasting for another 15 mins until golden brown and crispy. 
3. While the potatoes are roasting, put basil, extra virgin olive oil, pine nuts, garlic, ginger, green chillies, and sea salt in a food processor, and pulse 4–6 times until a smooth paste is formed. Remove pesto into a bowl and gently fold in parmesan. Set aside half the pesto for the potatoes, and freeze the rest for later use. 
4. Remove potatoes from oven and let sit for 2–3 mins. Spoon pesto onto the potatoes, and toss gently so they are well coated. Serve immediately.

Grilled Parsley-Lime Chicken Skewers

Just like my lamb kebabs, the secret of these succulent and fragrant chicken skewers is the marinade—a glorious, tangy and green flavour base with parsley for its grassy, herbaceous note, and lime for acidity, all rounded out with jalapeños for heat. The trick is to let the chicken sit bathed in the marinade for as long as possible—ideally 2–4 hours. But if you are pressed for time, then set aside ¼ cup of marinade and brush it on while the skewers grill.

Ingredients

4 lbs [1½ kg] boneless, skinless Chicken breasts and thighs, cut into 2-inch-thich pieces
Twelve 10-inch-long Skewers*

Marinade: 

1 cup flat-leaf Parsley (leaves and stalks)
Grated rind of 1 Lime
Juice of 1 Lime
½ small Onion, peeled and roughly chopped
4–5 cloves Garlic, peeled
1-inch piece Ginger, peeled
1 medium Jalapeño
Salt (to taste)
¼ tsp freshly ground Black Pepper
1 tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1. Put parsley, lime rind and juice, onion, garlic, ginger, and jalapeño in a food processor and grind to a smooth paste. Transfer paste to a mixing bowl, large enough to accommodate the marinade and chicken. 
2. Add remaining marinade ingredients to bowl and stir to incorporate. Add chicken and mix well with marinade. Cover the bowl will plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 2 hrs, or up to 1 day. Prior to cooking, remove bowl from fridge, thread chicken pieces onto skewers, and bring to room temperature. 
3. Pre-heat a charcoal/gas grill or grill-pan on medium for 25 mins. Turn the heat to high 5 mins before cooking. When the grill surface is smoking hot, add skewers, and let grill on their first side for 3 mins, or until well charred. Then gently turn every 2 mins until the remaining sides are well caramelised. 
4. Remove skewers onto a platter and let sit for 5 mins. Serve drizzled with olive oil and lime juice.

*TIP: If you are using wooden skewers, soak them in water for ½ hour prior to cooking, to prevent them from singeing on the grill.

Cardamom-Scented Roasted Peaches

The first crop of sweet and tender Georgia peaches are hitting the fruit stands now. I buy them by the armful, and their heady scent perfumes the whole kitchen for days. But when they ripen faster than you can eat them, I roast the excess fruit in the oven, and serve as a simple and elegant summer dessert.

The prep-work is hassle-free—top the peach halves with sugar, brown sugar, and butter, which caramelise with the fruit juices into a sticky sauce, and sprinkle with cardamom to enhance the luscious flowery notes of the ripe fruit. Serve straight out of the oven with a dollop of crème fraîche or vanilla ice cream—summer in a mouthful!

Ingredients
2 Peaches, cut in half lengthwise, with the pits removed.
¼ tsp ground Cardamom
Pinch of freshly ground Black Pepper
1 tbsp Butter, cut into four pieces
½ tsp Sugar
1 tsp Brown Sugar

1. Pre-heat oven to 425º F (220ºC). 
2. Arrange peaches in a parchment paper-lined baking dish with the cut-side up, and sprinkle with cardamom and black pepper. Place butter in the indents in the middle of the fruit, and sprinkle sugar and brown sugar. 
3. Roast in the oven for 20 mins until the tops are golden and well caramelised. Serve warm topped with crème fraîche or vanilla ice cream, and garnished with mint. 

TIP: This recipe works just as well with any other stone fruit like apricot, nectarine or plum. 

Roasted Cumin Potatoes

This recipe is my take on a classic north Indian jeera aaloo—cumin potatoes. Unlike the traditional version, which is cooked stovetop, I use the customary ingredients called for, but roast the potatoes in the oven for a crisp and dry finish.

Ingredients 

2 lbs [1 kg] Potatoes, washed and cut, skin-on, into 1-inch-thick pieces
1 tbsp Vegetable Oil
1 tsp whole Cumin
1 tsp Turmeric powder
½ tsp Chilli powder
1/4 tsp freshly ground Black Pepper
Sea Salt (to taste)
2 tbsp Olive Oil

1. Pre-heat oven to 450º F (230ºC). Arrange potatoes in one layer in a baking dish. 
2. Heat vegetable oil in a small skillet or frying pan over high heat. Add cumin and let sputter for about 1 min. Remove from heat and pour the spice and oil over the potatoes. 
3. Sprinkle turmeric, chilli powder, black pepper, and sea salt, drizzle with olive oil, and using your hands, toss well to mix. 
4. Roast in the oven for 30 mins, then stir the potatoes with a large spoon to ensure that they caramelise evenly. Continue roasting for another 15 mins. Remove from oven and serve immediately.

Quick-Cooked Prawns with Three Chillies

This fragrant and fiery recipe is perfect for the summer—fast on prep time and a breeze to cook—so you don’t have to hover around a hot stove for long. It’s also a supremely noshable dish, so the biggest challenge is to prevent Tastey Boy from swiping half the platter before it even reaches the dining table!

Ingredients 

3 tbsp Vegetable Oil
4–6 whole Dried Red Chillies
1 tsp Black Mustard seeds
4–6 fresh Green Chillies, cut into half lengthwise
2 Shallots, sliced
2-inch piece Ginger, peeled and cut into thin slivers
4 cloves Garlic, thinly sliced
2 lbs [1 kg] Prawns, peeled, de-veined, and washed
1 tbsp ground Coriander
½ tbsp ground Cumin
1 tsp Chilli powder
¼ tsp freshly ground Black Pepper
Salt (to taste)
1 tbsp Fish Sauce or Soy Sauce
Juice of ½ lemon

1. Heat 1 tbsp vegetable oil in a large skillet or frying pan over high heat. When the oil is smoking, add dried red chillies and sauté briskly for 1 min until they are blackened. Set aside chillies in a small bowl, crush half of them roughly into small pieces and leave the others whole. 
2. Add remaining oil to pan and heat until it is smoking. Add black mustard seeds and sputter for a few seconds until they start to pop. Add green chillies, shallots, ginger and garlic, and cook for 2–3 mins, until lightly golden. 
3. Add prawns, coriander, cumin, chilli powder, dried red chilli, black pepper, salt and fish sauce, and stir so the prawns are well coated with the spices. Continue stirring briskly for 4–5 mins, until the prawns are pink and cooked through. Remove from heat, sprinkle with lemon juice, and serve immediately.