Leah_guffey 's dagbok, 18 apr 24

oh wow some of my favorite kind of food when I'm in Houston 

Yum! 

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 

Wow! That looks great!! 

Wow! That looks fantastic!  

OMG so healthy even for a person already improving their eating habits, like, healthy enough to get negative instead of positive comments if a person is just jealous of your preference for smart choices. Those people aren’t fun, and should keep that to themselves lol! 😂 Half-jokes aside, what an amazing meal with both nutrition and probably taste too. 

looks amazing  

That looks great, Leah! 

that is gorgeous and looks soo delish! recipe?? i dont know what some of those ingredients are!  

tandoori sauce and masal basam? 

Tandoori sauce it's just a simmer sauce it's typically made out of things like tomato paste, lemongrass, ginger root, and a broth and then simmered together until reduced but because I don't have much time I typically will just buy a simmer sauce from the store you can buy it in your world food section. I have made it before and I will admit that it's much better but I don't have two to three hours each time I want to make something to prepare just the sauce nor do I have lemongrass on the average day on hand although I do keep ginger root in the freezer. As for gram masala it's a spice that's typically used in a lot of Indian cuisine it's used on different things like tofu, chicken, pork, etc and it just gives that characteristic flavor that you're used to if you've eaten Indian food before. Honestly you could probably skip it I keep the rest of the spice mix and still have a similar effect on your meal. In addition if you do replicate the dish I would recommend that you hand fry the sweet potatoes so that you caramelize them bringing other natural sugars and whatever oil or fat type that you prefer. I air fry my yellow potatoes because I like them a little bit more crunchy I feel that once you simmer them in the simmer sauce that they give a better texture how much more fluffy texture than they would be if they were pan cooked or cooked within the summer sauce itself. I typically cook the majority of my ingredients separately and then combine in the simmer sauce and simmer for about 10 to 20 minutes to warm everything together. I do not cook my peas I add them Frozen at the end this way they do not get wrinkly and stay that nice bright green color. I personally like to talk with lots of cilantro and green onions this is not required it's just a garnish and I think it adds a nice crunch and fresh taste to the finished product but if you have little ones they typically will snub their noses at it so I would lay that off. As for a recipe I will try to get back with you all when I'm not at work and give a step by step on what I do to prepare my meal. I don't add as much chicken as an average person would because I had so many veggies for those of you that like heavy meat you would normally add about a pound to a pound and a half of chicken I only add about 3/4 of a pound because I added about four times as many vegetables as most people would to the recipe. sometimes I'll also add green beans or squash depending on the season but since I don't have any fresh from The fresh market or the garden I avoided using those because I felt that it would water down the dish or leave it tasting as if it just didn't have as much flavor as it should because they're out of season at this time. I really like this dish because it allows me to use a lot of veggies that I get from the food bank because I don't eat a lot of sweet potatoes right now because my oven is broken so it's hard for me to prepare them as they normally would be roasted for about 1 to 2 hours in the oven. 

Thank you so much for all the lovely compliments I've been having a little bit harder week this week and it made me feel a lot better. 

Those compliments are true! It is down to 55 degrees in St. Louis after a heat wave for a week until today. But it will warm up to 63 later so nice for a walk later!