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Saturday, July 25, 2009




Light asian summer chicken 

Asian flavours like fresh lime, lemongrass, lemon basil, coriander and ginger always remind me on my journeys to asian countries. It only needs one of these tastes and all asian travel images, food aromas and colours emerge. They than take me to a marvelous short asian trip in my mind and on my tongue.
Summer is the season suited for all those asian flavours. Summer is also the season for fish and light, white meat. I developed the idea for the following recipy by the accidental discovery of a typical asian fruit: I found a rest of dried mango slices in my cupboard. Starting to think about what to do with those slices before their expiry-date will arrive, I tried to integrate them into the dinner I wanted to cook for friends.

Mangos
Beside their intensively sweet flavour, Mangos carry a nice, colorful acid when they were dried. Furthermore, dried fruit in general are able to absorb liquids, a very good attribute when you roll/put them into meat, because they soak the gravy inside and create wonderful new flavours on the meat as well as later on in your sauce. 

Dinner
So I made up my mind: I wanted to cook a delecate chicken brest filled with coriander, dried mango slices, a little piece of garlic, fresh red chilli and lemon basil. The best with this combintaion of flavours is the entourage of a sweet basmati rice I think.


Preparation of the chicken

I bought big fine slices of chicken brest of organic grown-up chicken. I hope that dear little chicken had had a happy life.
I washed and dried the brests in the usual way. Afterwards I cut a bag into each of them. Thereafter I searched nearly half an hour for my cookery appropriate packthread. This unlucky search reminds me strongly to store needful cookery acessories not to far from the kitchen and furthermore not to use them for inappropriate purposes - my cookery packthread was nearly completely gone for parcel packing:-)
The brests were salted and peppered with black pesteled pepper from all sides. I filled the bags with the herbs, then placed garlic, red chili and two slices of dried mango in it. I rolled and packed the brests carefully wiht the rest of my thread and put them in the fridge again for a minimum of two hours. That time really is necessary so that the aromamix feeds in the meat.

Fry the chicken brests
Half an hour before I started, I took the brests out of the fridge again. I heated a good amount of sesamoil in a pan and fried them from slowly until they encrust a little bit. After the brests were done, I rewrapped them carefuly and took out the mangos and the herbs for the sauce. The garlic and the red chili I layed aside for later decoration. The chicken brests have to be keept warm until they are served. 

The sauce
The gravy, the herbs and the mangos I pureed together with a spoon of sweet sherry, a half glass of white wine, a dash of mild, very old aceto balsamico, a little bit of brown sugar and a spoon of butter. 
After the sauce boiled up once more, I mixed  two spoons of creme fraiche in.

Flavoured Basmati
Good qualities of organic basmati have their price. But you should never regret your buy - no matter if you bought organic for flavour or sustainability reasons. As a side dish of the asian summer chicken it is nice to boil the basmati rice wth a piece of butter and two long slices of fresh lemon grass.

The wine  
Since I drunk that wine for the first time in 2007 it has remained one of my favourite Sauvignon Blanc within the 10 Euro class: It is the Spanish Sauvignon Blanc out of the Rueda Region called "Palacio de Menade". This light, fruitful wine overwhelmes you with intense fragrances and tastes of mango, gooseberry, white peaches and apricot: sunny and at the same time sound, with a discreet acid. This wine is perfectly in line with chicken and asian herbs like coriander. It is one of these summer wines you are very surprised when the first bottle is already empty and very glad that you bought a second one. 
There´s another little detail I fell for: the colour of the cork is almost neon-green, as well as the main color of the simple but nice label design. And that´s another reason why it is worth to buy a third bottle sometimes.
dolce vita ahoi • mobile minds • monika ebert

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gaumenperlen - a label by mobile minds, monika ebert::: gaumenperlen is a diary about affairs of the heart. I´m addicted to delicious food, unique and extraordinary places as well as valuable things, fine arts, design, music, tango argentino and interesting people. The focus of this diary is food. Delicious food is much more than nutrition, health or prestige. it is the basis of your body& soul, it is at the core of your way to think, to live and act, it is your attitude towards nature. For me cooking is a wild, joyful, creative process with the objective to share the result in the end. This process is surrounded by a bunch of exciting encounters - nevertheless where I am:: at the markets, talking to producers, at the book stores, in restaurants, in my kitchen. That´s why I love cooking and travelling.