Tofu Curry with Cucumber Salad

Cooking in a little galley has been the hardest transition for me. I am used to spreading out, making a mess, taking my sweet time, and forgetting what I went to look for in the fridge. Being in our boat has forced me to focus, to plan my cooking strategy ahead of time, and GASP, prep my food ahead.

One dish that I love putting together (and often crave) is curry and rice. It changes depending on my mood, but the main ingredients are there: rice, coconut milk, red curry paste. Sometimes there’s peanut butter, and often a veggie and/or protein of some kind.

Today it’s fried tofu and brown rice in doused in delicious curry. Curried stuff is great for cooking aboard, because the ingredients are easy and you just warm it up until it’s yummy. You can add whatever is in need of being eaten, and it’s great for leftovers. Perfect meal, if you ask me!!

Now.

I am going to show you my galley (though I still call it a kitchen ), and how crazy my cooking looks like in it.

Yeah. There’s a lot going on there. AND! there’s a sleeping kid nearby You just gotta make it work.

Here are some old standbys I like to keep around (even when I lived in a ‘regular’ home):

Chili paste, red curry paste from the Indian market (this one even has curry leaves mixed in!!), rice wine vinegar, coconut milk. The bases of many awesome meals.

I have had a hard time with fried tofu in the past (looking up recipes for it is absolutely ridiculous; everyone has ‘their own way’). I think I got it down. I get the extra firm, slice it up about 1/4 inch thick, heat up the oil, and throw a few of those bad boys in there. Let it fry for about 1-2 minutes per side. Definitely don’t get them too brown or else it will be crunchy and hard (one recipe told me to fry it for 6 minutes on one side – yeah. You know how that turned out).

I’ve been cooking my brown rice in my pressure cooker (YAY!), and it’s awesomeness that way. Fast, yummy, efficient with the propane.

Here’s what I did with that:

2 & 3/4 c water

1 & 1/4 c brown rice (I have a jiggle top so I have to use more water)

1 t oil, butter, something to lube it up

2-3t of something salty (I like bouillon!)

Bring water, butter, salty stuff to a boil. Add rice. Stir. Secure the lid and bring to pressure. Lower heat to low, and cook 17 minutes. Take off heat and let sit 10. Open up, stir and be satisfied.

So, that’s done, and now all you gotta do is open up that can of coconut milk and add it to a small saucepan. Add about 2-3 T of red curry paste, and heat on low until it tastes done.

Oh, and the cucumber salad was prepped ahead of all this so that it could marinate in it’s loveliness.

Here’s a basic rundown of what I did:

Peeled one cucumber. Slice very thinly. In bowl add: about 1 tsp chili paste, large pinch of salt, 2 t of rice wine vinegar, 1 tsp sugar. Stir and add in cucumber. Let chill for a bit, and then nosh away!

All this tasted great together. I also like sweet slaw with the curry and rice, but the cucumber totally took it to a different level of amazing. It’s tangy and spicy. My taste buds are happy

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Oh, and if you’re not reading the series of family posts on Women and Cruising, you should get on that! I love this particularly from the latest installment:

When talking about how others thought their family was foolish to choose to live aboard and cruise -

Eight years later, most have come around to realizing this was not a seat-of-our-pants whim, but a way of life which we wholly embraced then and now. They see by now that the choices we’ve made fit into our fundamental philosophy on life, love, commitment, adventure, child-raising, education, partnership, environmentalism, politics — on everything we ever stood for in the first place.

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