Coconut Chicken Curry

I had a taste for curry tonight. Coconut curry to be exact. But my favorite recipe site didn't have what I was looking for. I didn't have any curry paste on hand, only powder. So I went searching. I ended up blending this recipe with this one and came up with my own. Here it is if you want to give it a try. I don't want to forget what I did so I'm going to Pin It in order to be able to make it again! Below is the recipe, the way I made it.

Ingredients:

Olive oil (about 1 T)
1/2 onion, chopped
1-2 cups cauliflower florets
2 T grated fresh ginger
2 garlic cloves, pressed through a garlic press
1-2 thai chilis or 1 large pinch cayenne pepper
2 t cumin seed
1T curry powder
2 tomatoes, chopped (can use canned with some juice)
green, red or yellow pepper, diced
1/4 - 1/2 cup water (depending on how juicy the tomatoes are)
salt to taste
1-2 lbs boneless skinless chicken, cut into 1/4 in cubes
1/2 can (14 oz) coconut milk
2 T sugar

1. Heat oil in a 12 in skillet.

2. Add onion, garlic, ginger and chilis. Cook until it begins to brown, about 5 mins.

3. Add cumin seed and curry. Stir to combine, 30 seconds.

4. Add cauliflower and cook for 1 minute, stirring constantly about 1 min.
5. Add chopped tomatoes with juice, water, salt and peppers.

At this point, I decided to cook the chicken in a separate skillet as I wanted to brown it first and not just boil it in the sauce. Then I added the cooked chicken to the pan with the veggies. After a few minutes I added the 1/2 can of coconut milk and sugar and let it simmer on very low until the rice was finished cooking.

I served it over jasmine rice. This would be great with some cilantro, but since I didn't have any I had to leave it out. It's still very yummy!

Resolutions

The new year is slipping past and I haven't made my goals for this year official yet! Part of setting new goals is reviewing old ones. In looking over my list from last year, I find that, as usual, I did some things well and others not as, complete as I'd hoped. As I've said before, we are creatures who are always growing, always improving, and since I am still a work-in-progress, so I must progress in the work I have set before me. Here are last year's goals and how I did with them.

Physical

Get fixed. I had been complaining of a hurt left shoulder and right ankle. I went to physical therapy and got those issues resolved. It took a while and quite some $$ but it happened. YAY!
Train for a race. Last year I wanted to run the Donna half marathon, then the Gate River Run. Neither one of those happened. I joined a Jeff Galloway group in September and am now training for the FULL Donna marathon! It's been a great experience so far!
Log food and water. I fell off the bandwagon of daily logging with My Fitness Pal. Then I climbed back on. Then fell off. On. Off. You get the picture. My verse for this year regarding this was Gal 6:9.


Spiritual

Live the 10 Second Rule. Eh. It's not that I DIDN'T live it. I didn't feel any nudges for a while then forgot about it.
Read through the New Testament in One Year. I got to 2 Corinthians before I lost track, etc. Maybe this year I'll finish this one!
Read 4 Spiritual Books. The books I had planned were One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp, Made to Crave by Lysa TerKeurst,  Out of the Saltshaker by Rebecca Manley Pippert, and Walking in the Dust of Rabbi Jesus by Lois Tverberg and Jesus Calling as my devotional. What actually happened was One Thousand Gifts and Walking... as well as Kelly Minter's Nehemiah, and half of Mark Buchanan's Things Unseen. Oh and Touching Wonder for Advent. Really? It seemed like I had read more. Huh.

Mental/Personal

Blog. I did NOT hit my goal is to write something weekly. But I did write. So that's better than nothing.
Photography. I took the photography class with Annie and learned a few things. But because I didn't put them immediately into practice I forgot most of it.
Pursue hobbies. That sweater...I doubt I'll ever finish it! I started to crochet a hat because I took a class but haven't gotten very far. Got most of the way through Tommy's quilt but still need to finish it. Haven't started one for Timothy yet. I do still love my (still new to me) Bernina though and want to sew more! Maybe next year when Tommy is off and college and I can set up the machine in his room...(gotta look at the  silver lining of his leaving...can't dwell on the subject too much...waaaaahhhhh!!!!)
Read with Timothy and Annie. Read most of 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens with Timothy but none of  Beautiful Girlhood with Annie. She lost interest. I've started Purpose Driven Life with Timothy. Need to figure something out with Annie.


And there you have them. The good, the bad and the ugly of last year's resolutions. Now on to this year's.


Physical

Run the Donna and the Gate RR. Since I'll be nice and trained up for the Donna marathon, I hope to beat my Gate River Run PR using the Galloway method. It's been such a great experience running with friends and running injury free (so far)!
Strength train. Last year I started meeting a friend at the YMCA for accountability. In November we upped the challenge and started working out with a trainer. It's been good, both having an accountability partner and a trainer to push us. I want to keep it up.
Log food and water. This will probably be a lifetime goal. I tend to fall off the bandwagon of daily logging with My Fitness Pal. So I just need to keep climbing back on. I cannot grow weary of doing good. This is doing good for my body so I can do good for others (Gal 6:9).

Spiritual/Ministry
Keep up with YouVersion's Daily Reading Plan. I did one for advent last year and really enjoyed it. This year I signed up for Rick Warren's YouVersion plan. I like it. Now if I can just keep up with it for 365 days. I also am following the 21 day Made to Crave one since I never read that book last year.
Finish reading through the New Testament this  year. Starting with 2 Corinthians, I will keep at it.
Read 4 Spiritual Books. This is that reoccurring goal. I'm picking Out of the Saltshaker by Rebecca Manley Pippert (again) since I didn't read it last year. I will finish  Mark Buchanan's Things Unseen and also read his other books In Plain Sight and The Holy Wild. I must be on a Mark Buchanan kick.
Meet with young married (with children) couples group. We used to meet with a small group of newly (less than 5 years) married couples a few years back. It was wonderful. We were the older couple giving advice to younger couples in how to build a great marriage. We loved it. Loved the people, loved the subject. We met for a year and then were done. Now all those couples have had babies and we thought it would be good to "get the band together again" and go through what it's like to work on your marriage while raising children. We feel a lot less confident in this area. It's a little more painful sharing our not-quite-as-successful stories. A good lesson in humility :) The upside is my mentor has joined us and she can give the RIGHT suggestions when we can't (since we are still in the trenches).
Meet with my mentor. One of the outcomes of the 10 Second Rule goal was to pursue having a mentor. My mentor is wonderful and has all the answers :) I fully expected to be a drain on her with all my questions and lack of depth but I was pleasantly surprised to find out that I could pester encourage her to pursue writing a book. "Iron sharpens iron" as the Proverb says...

Mental/Personal
Blog. More blogging. Just more of it. Maybe 2 posts per month rather than one per week. That would be 24 in one year. That seems doable. Right?
Pursue hobbies. Keep on that sweater...and hat... and Tommy's quilt... and *maybe* start Timothy's. Or maybe not. I really want to have time to do some projects on my Pinterest board so that I can use my beloved Berrnina!
Scripture memory with Timothy and Annie. I started the year off with a bang. I set up a method of scripture memory. And then life got busy. And then we stopped. I'm renewing my efforts! Starting this week. Oops. It's already mid-week. Better get started quick!

Time to put this into practice. Thank you Jackie for the Facebook call out today so that I would sit down and do this! Better late than never...