Michael and Jaspenelle

Nectarine Chutney

Labels aren’t attached yet because I ran out of glue…

Michael brought me 20lbs of nectarines home the other day from work. Half are still sitting out in the living room but I used some to make chutney. While I normally used peaches for this, I really like the way it turned out this nectarines.

In Indian cuisine, a chutney or chatni is a term for a variety of sweet and spicy condiments, originally from the Indo-Pakistani subcontinent. I use mine on meat as well as in pastas. Sometimes I just eat it on saltine crackers.

You’ll need:

• 8 cups of peeled and pitted nectarines (I think it was about 10lbs)
• 3 1/2 cups apple cider vinegar
• 2 1/2 cups brown sugar
• 1 medium onion
• 1 cup of seedless raisins
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 2 tbsp ginger
• 1 tbsp ground cayenne
• 1 tbsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp allspice

Instructions:

1. Cut up nectarines (I actually mashed them loosely with a potato masher since I like chunky chutney), onions and garlic and put in the large non-reactive pot (I use a big enameled camping pot.)
2. Add the rest of the ingredients and bring the pot to the boiling point (chutney is to thick to get to a boil like water does.) Stir until the sugar is dissolved.
3. Reduce heat and simmer, uncovered while stirring occasionally until the chutney is a desired consistency and is deep brown in colour. My nectarines this time where very juicy so it took 2 hours. It can be as little as one though.
4. Bottle in 6 sterilized pint jars. Process in boiling water for about 10 minutes.

Summer Solstice Pie

I love to make this pie for Summer Solstice because the nectarines remind me the sun and the blackberries of the longer nights that will now be returning. Besides that it just tastes really good.

Ingredients:

• A pie shell

Ingredients for the nectarine layer:

• 3 cups of nectarines or peaches (peeled and sliced)
• 2 Tbsp sugar
• 1 Tbsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp cornstarch
• 1 Tbsp butter or margarine

Ingredients for the nectarine layer

• 4 cups of blackberries or blueberries (I use 2 cups of each)
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 Tbsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp cornstarch
• A dash of cinnamon
• 1 Tbsp butter or margarine

Instructions:

1. Bake pie crust at 350ºF for about 15 to minutes. Let cool on rack.
2. Mash the peaches with sugar, lemon juice, and cornstarch and pour into a saucepan. Cook on medium for 5 minutes until it thickens.
3. Mash 2 cups of the berries with the sugar, cornstarch, lemon juice, and cinnamon. Cook in saucepan over medium heat for about 10 minutes. Add in the butter with the rest of the whole berries and stir. Cool and pour it over top of the peach layer.
4. Chill and serve.

Chapati (Indian Griddle Bread )

By popular demand, (or just Kim’s ;)), this is the griddle bread recipe I mentioned in the other entry. It is a simple (I like simple if you can’t tell by now) recipe I found in 1,000 Indian Recipes.

Ingredients:

• 3 cups stone-ground durum whole-wheat flour*
• 1 cup (approx) of water or nonfat plain yogurt
• 3 to 4 tbsp melted glee or butter for basting (optional)

* I cannot find durum flour here in Spokane, so I use organic kamut flour which is what durum flour was developed from. I have also used normal whole-wheat flour as well, but the durum and kamut flours have a much denser and richer taste then normal whole-wheat.

Instructions:

1. Put 2 cups of flour in a large bowl and add the water or yogurt (I use yogurt.) With your fingers stir lightly with circular motions until the flour starts to gather.
2. Knead for about a minute as you would normal bread until you have a soft pliable dough that does not stick to your fingers. If the dough sticks to your hands while kneading put a little oil on them.
3. Pat the dough into a ball and cover with plastic wrap and let rest for at least 1 hour (and no more then 4 hours) at room temperature. Doing this allows the guten in the flour to develop.
4. In a dish (like a pie plate) put remaining cup of dry flour, this will be used for coating later.
5. After the dough has rested, divide it with lightly oiled hands into 10 or 12 equal balls.
6. Heat your grill (I use a cast iron pan) over medium-high heat, you know it is heated right when by sprinkling a little flour over it, it immediately turns dark brown. Wipe of flour before proceeding.
7. Working with each ball seperately, place it in the dish of dry flour, flatten with your fingers and coatwill with flour. Then transfer to a clean surface and with a rolling pin, roll into a 6 to 7 inch circle. It dough sticks to rolling pin dust with some more flour.
8. Immediately put on hot grill and start rolling your next one (they are served hot.) You will know when it is ready to be turned over when little golden dots form on the bottom. The other side will be done when larger brown dots develop and the chapati starts to puff up (the puffing up part takes some practice but they are good either way.)
9. Transfer to a plate and baste with butter and crumble*.

To crumble chapati, baste it lightly in butter and place the chapati in a clean kitchen towel, crumple it like you would a piece of paper. The butter seeps into the cracks and further flavors the dough.