Beef in tomatoes

Serves One

Preparation time:

Cutting/Chopping – 10mins

Preparing the marinade & marinating time – 24hrs

Cooking time – 30mins

Ingredients:

Indian Beef – 100gms

Tomatoes (large size) – 3nos

Onion (large size) – 1/2

Ginger chopped – 1tbsp

Garlic chopped – 1tbsp

Green Chilli – 2nos

Curry Leaves – 20nos petals

Drambuie – 2tbsp

Whole Black Pepper – 1tbsp

Ground Black Pepper – 1½tsp

Cinnamon powder – 1tsp

Cumin seeds – 1tsp

Dried red chillies – 2nos

Cardamom – 3nos

Clove pods – 3nos

Desiccated Coconut slices – 5nos

Coconut Oil – 2tbsp

Salt

How I cut them:

I cut the beef into small pieces.

I chopped the onion, green chillies, garlic and ginger into small sized pieces.

How I cooked it:

Cooking this dish is a two day process, and on the first day I had just cut the beef, chopped the green chillies, garlic and ginger. I mixed all of these along with the whole black peppers.

I then poured in the Drambuie liquer over it to tenderise the meat.

I then mixed all of them well and covered the bowl with a plastic wrap and left the mix to marinate for 24hrs.

Next day by around the same time, I stir fried the whole tomatoes in a wok glazed with ½ table spoon of Coconut oil over a high flame tossing them till they appeared generally cooked on the outer. I used a kitchen tong to ensure that all the sides were done well too.

I cut the tomatoes from the top and then scooped out the entire fleshy interior and took it aside, leaving the bottom shell as a bowl.

I then mixed the fleshy interior and the top parts of the tomato into a mixer and made it into a puree.

On a small bowl I mixed all the dry spices (Ground Black Pepper, Cinnamon powder, Cumin seeds, dried red chillies, Cardamom, Clove seeds, chopped desiccated Coconut slices) and the curry leaves.

In the same wok, I in which I had earlier fried the tomatoes, I added the remaining Coconut oil and when the oil was hot, added the chopped onions. After stirring the onion for some 5-6secs and without waiting for the onion to cook thoroughly, I added the dry masala.

After mixing the masala, I added the beef and stir fried it for 5-7minutes.

When it seemed like the beef had cooked up to 60-70%, I added the tomato puree to the wok and reduced the flame to low.

I then cooked the beef in this tomato puree on this low flame for some 20mins with a lid on and intermittently checking and stirring the mix every 5-7mins.

By the end of 20mins the beef was done and the mix was dry and thick.

I then arranged it in the tomato bowls and garnished with onions, lemon, cilantro and desiccated coconut.

 

The experience:

Awesome taste and an equally awesome aroma!! I knew this one was going to taste great when I opened the lid after the first 10mins of the covered cooking. The aroma that engulfed my kitchen was so awesomely fantastic, that I just can’t find the right words to describe it. In no time my salivary glands got into action and my mouth was all watery. I was so hungry and eager to have it that I forgot to take the last pic (the final pic of how it should look when it is cooked) of this dish in the wok. Sorry for that.

I had it with a glass of my favourite white wine, Chardonnay.

I did not cook any rotis today and had to settle for the very bland and basic Arabic Khubz. But the dish itself was so good, that the bread didn’t matter.

It had a very authentic Kerala taste and, I sure am going to cook this dish again and again.

This one will definitely go very well with any hard drink. And is there any dish that can beat the Kerala Beef fry + Kerala Parotta combination!! I think none!

Try it.