Morocco

How many of you have actually eaten Moroccan food? We had a great restaurant here in Indy that closed about a year ago. One of the belly dancers was actually a physics professor in her real life. We've enjoyed the food every time we've had it, so I decided to try a bit of Moroccan cooking. Sunday evening was actually a mixed bag of Moroccan, Asian and American influence. The chicken breasts were rubbed with a brown sugar spice rub, the carrots were cooked with a spice mix, the eggplant was brushed with and Asian sauce and the potatoes were just plain American sinful!

For each chicken breast, I mixed about a tablespoon of brown sugar, 1/4 teaspoon of ground coriander and garlic powder and some salt and pepper. I used skinless breasts but left the bones in because they stay more moist when they're cooked that way. They were baked at 400 for about 50 minutes. A couple of the bigger breasts weren't quite done at that point and needed a few minutes more. The breasts wound up with a hint of spiciness and a lovely almost crust. We rated these a "four" and have enjoyed the leftovers for lunches this week.

The carrots were inspired by Melissa D'Arabian's spiced carrots on foodtv.com. I used the same brown sugar blend that I used for the chicken and mixed it with chicken broth, water and some cumin. Once the sauce cooked down to a glaze, they were ready. Her recipe called for adding lemon juice and parsely at the end but we skipped that step because we rated the recipe a "five" as it was.

Nota Bene:  We've made the carrots half a dozen times since then and I've used a really easy version. 

1 c carrot pieces
1 t cumin
1 T butter
1 T brown sugar

Cook the carrots in water til they're done.  Drain them and plop in the butter.  Once it's about melted, add the cumin and brown sugar.  Mix well and serve.

The eggplant was brushed with olive oil, sesame oil and grated ginger. It was relatively bland. I'd not make it again this way.

Melissa came through again with the potatoes. She made a potato torte on her first show. Instead of the double crust, I merely layered the potatoes in a pie plate and covered the "torte" with foil for the first 30 minutes of baking time. Then, the last 20 minutes I uncovered it to allow the top to brown. We rated this a "four."

The only dish that didn't "go" with the others was the potatoes. I just wanted to 1)try the recipe and 2)use up the rest of the CSA potatoes that looked so good.

Last evening was Devour Downtown at Dunaway's with some good friends. It was our first visit there and won't be our last. The food was very good and the service was also. Their building is on the National Register of Historic Places. Connie and I usually order two different dishes so we can split and share. But, he doesn't care for salmon and we've been eating chicken for several meals, so that left us with the beef on the Devour Downtown menu. Grilled shrimp over a mango salsa, caesar salad, grilled beef over corn salsa and a dessert sampler of creme brulee, caramel flan and chocolate souflee.