A Taste of the World: Curried chicken & fried plantains

You may have seen me out in the quad last week with a sign saying "Come talk to me about food!" You may have even walked right passed me as I yelled, "Cook with me! Give me your recipes!" And you probably thought I was totally insane. 

I'm not actually insane, rather, like many students at SMC, I'm just hungry.

I love food so much, I think I might be capable of eating more than my actual body weight.

The only thing I love as much as food is cooking it. Sure, I could walk down the street and buy something for cheap, but where's the fun in that?

This semester, with inspiration from SMC's Global Citizenship Food Theme, I am going to cook a new ethnic recipe each week, reporting back to you on my success or even failure.

Do you want to cook with me? Great, I'm buying! Do you have an incredible traditional family dish that will make me weep it's so delicious? Come find me in the newsroom, I'll bring the tissues.

To start this series off, I went Jamaican this week, with an excellent Curried Chicken and Fried Plantains recipe from SMC student Nahalia Samuels.

This traditional Jamaican dish took about an hour to make and had an awesome kick of spice when it was finished. The recipe may seem complicated, but aside from a lot of chopping, its fairly easy to make. So sharpen your knives and get out your measuring cups, its time to cook!

INGREDIENTS

Curried Chicken:

6 pieces of skinless chicken

1 lemon

1 sweet white onion

1 sweet brown onion

1 green pepper (core to remove seeds)

3 garlic cloves

1 cup of white flour

2 tbsp curry powder

1/4 tsp white pepper

1/4 tsp seasoning salt

2 cups of water

1/2 cup vegetable oil

Plantains:

2 ripe plantains

1/4 cup vegetable oil

PREPARATION

Curried Chicken:

Peel & coarsely chop onions and garlic

Core green pepper, remove seeds and coarsely chop pepper

Cut lemon in half

Mix 2 tbsp of curry powder in 2 cups of water in a bowl

In the sink, wash meat with half a lemon by squeezing the juice onto meat and rubbing it in

Rinse meat with cold water

Place the meat in a large mixing bowl

Rub seasoning salt and white pepper onto the meat

Gently massage onions, garlic and green pepper into the meat

Squeeze half a lemon over the meat

Coat all chicken pieces with the flour

Place a frying pan on a stove-top over medium heat with a 1/2 cup of oil

Fry the chicken in the pan for about 8-10 minutes or till the chicken has a brown color

Keep chicken in frying pan while draining off excess oil into a waste bowl

Clean any oil that may have spilled on the outside of pan before placing back onto the flame

Pour water and curry powder mix over the meat, cover the pan, reduce the heat to simmer and cook for 30-45 mins

Plantains:

In a frying pan heat the oil over a medium flame

Cut both ends off of plantains and remove entire outer skin

Slice the banana like stacked poker chips or like strips of bacon

Place plantains in the hot frying pan with oil and cook both sides until golden brown

Place cooked banana on a paper towel or on a flat strainer to drain excess oil