Ajuangs Kitchen

Thanks to pre-cooked lasagna noodles making lasagna is now a tad bit easier. The noodles have their instructions on how to get them ready but i like to put them in hot water 5 minutes before i use them and they are ready to go.

To make the sauce, fry onions and garlic in olive oil, add tomatoes and cook till soft. Add the ground beef, mix and cover and cook in medium to low heat until all the water evaporates. Pour in a mixture of warm water (about a quarter cup), tomato paste and desired spices(cayenne, paprika e.t.c). Bring to a boil and cover for 5 minutes under low heat then add fresh coriander(dhania).

For the cheese, place in a bowl one egg, ricotta and cottage cheese and mix.  Then in a casserole dish (or baking pan) place sauce on the bottom, add pasta then beef sauce then the cheese. Repeat for as many layers as desired. The final layer should be covered with sauce and then a layer of mozzarella cheese. Place in in the oven and cook at 200 degrees C covered for about 25 min, then uncovered for another 25 min.    

Place one cup of fresh juice in a blender, add one cup of spinach, two mangoes and 1/4 cup of mint in a blender and blend. The trick to making a good smoothie is to begin by putting the liquid in first, helps the motor's work a little easier and your blender last a little longer. The end result is really good.
You could also replace the mango with an avocado for variety and still get an amazing tasting smoothie.

There is something about trying a new complicated recipe that is exhausting, this is one of those recipes. The roulade has become my new dessert recipe because it requires no butter and little to no flour. The recipe is adapted from cooking channels recipe. Unlike the chocolate roulade my suggestion with this is that you begin with the lemon curd because the final product needs to be chilled for a while before it gets to the right consistency. Another thing that makes this recipe exhausting is the flour has to be sieved three times and then a fourth time into the mixture, this takes time. The jam is optional and I opted out of it but the contrast alone would make the presentation much prettier. This is a special occasions recipe because of the work involved, will not be making it on the regular, the result however is good, especially for those who do not love the black forest option. 

This recipe usually tastes good with with fried rice, but if your strapped for time like i was steamed rice will do. Into a hot pan with oil, place onions, garlic and ginger and let brown. Add tomatoes and stir until they soften. In a cup make a paste with salt, black pepper, cumin, turmeric, cinnamon, yogurt and mint leaves, add the paste to the pan. Add potatoes and fry for about about 5 then add the chicken and stir to ensure you have a good mixture, then cover and cook in low heat for about 30-35 minutes or until the chicken is tender. Serve with rice. The fried rice recipe for biryani is made with a mixture of garlic, turmeric, cinnamon stick and ginger. You can either fry onion's in a pan add the spices and the rice, add chicken stock, bring to a boil and cover; or you can fry onion's in the pan, make a paste with the spices and warm water, add it to the onions and add steamed rice. The first one is better because the spices really get infused in the rice.  

The original idea for this cake was to fuse the white forest cake and the passion cake and make a passion forest cake. I'd planned to make a sponge cake and a passion fruit syrup and put them together to make a 'passion forrest' cake. But the ingredients for the passion fruit cake were so interesting I could not resist just to see how the final cake would taste like. I used whipped cream dressing as opposed to the cream cheese dressing which is ideal for this type of cake.  The cake tasted authentically passion fruity, the lemon and sour cream idea i think was the trick.
I still intend to try the 'passion forest' with the sponge cake, passion fruit syrup and cream cheese dressing. This recipe however is really good if you want a fully passion fruit cake, especially if you retain the dressing recommended in the recipe.

Jollof is the West African version of pilau, I've seen this dish made with both beef and chicken influence. The first thing step was to blend together chicken stock, onions, tomatoes, garlic, tomato paste, paprika, chili pepper, garlic powder, ginger powder, salt and coconut powder.
In a pan place oil and rice and stir for about two minutes, add the paste and keep stirring, add the left over chicken stock and bring the rice to a boil. Overall you should use one cup of rice per two cups of chicken stock. Reduce to very low heat and let the rice cook slowly. Because of the thickness of the stew you want to monitor the rice because it tends to stick to the bottom.
You want to make enough for left overs because it tastes even better the next day.

The chicken curry recipe followed was from allrecipe. Given that it was the first time I was making the dish I used the recipe almost as is. I didn't use the bay leaf because I couldn't find any but I'm assuming it would have blended really well with the lemon. The most surprising thing about this recipe for me was the mixture of spices that I never would have thought to put together. On the one hand you have the cinnamon and sugar which is a recipe for something sweet, then you have your lemon and yogurt. The combination is however genius especially when paired with the naan.
The naan recipe of course is Aarti Party's from Food Networks recipe which i choose solely because she is Indian, I mean  who better to learn from than a native. I simplified the recipe a little, I omitted the fennel seeds and kalonj(nigella seeds) (which according to wiki is the same thing) because of access, but I'm informed that the spice is huge with the Ethiopian and Somali community and is commonly crushed into an oil where two drops can cure the flue overnight (I am yet to prove that theory). You could try a shop that carries Ethiopian or Somali spices for a more authentic feel. I prepared my dough in the morning and made the bread after work, gave it the whole day to rise. Once the dough is risen, the next step is a lot like preparing chapati, simpler actually.