Kitchen Diaries: Chicken with mushroom and lemongrass

Cooking from a recipe book is going to be hard. I say this because we often have to depend on Sainsbury's Locals. You have to go into these shops with an open mind - if you want anything specific for dinner you'll be disappointed. If you want seasonally pertinent over-packaged chocolate then you'll probably go home happy.

And so last night after the first pleasurable outdoor pint of 2007 on the Thames by Tower Bridge we decided to cook Nigel's Thai style chicken with mushrooms and lemongrass. The only Sainsbury's busting ingredients being lemongrass and thai basil. R was convinced lemongrass usually comes in so much plastic that there might have been a chance... ha. Turns out that Chalk Farm Sainsbury's Local doesn't even have chicken on a Sunday night (unless you want it packed with chicken tonight sauce). Basil and lemongrass obviously don't get shelf space, but if you want some 'Brunshettas' there's actually variety. It's going to be hard for our cook-the-books entries not to turn into rants against the utter crapness of Sainsbury's Locals. But we can improvise, this is real life after all.

Anyway, with some enforced substitution (turkey & some lemongrass paste from the fridge, cupboard lime leaves instead of basil/mint, onion as opposed to spring onions, plus some fridge neglected sugar snap peas) we whipped up dinner. Took 30 mins and that was mainly spent waiting for the brown rice to think about cooking. Actually it was very nice and very easy to cook, I'd forgotten how nicely turkey browns. I wouldn't leave your washing drying in the kitchen while you cook this though. R's flatmates made a good show of trying not to cough when the chilli went in, but the fish sauce cleared the kitchen.

We reckon: you don't need 3 chilli peppers, we had two and that was still pretty hot. Add in any veg you can or have a side of green something-or-other, ours felt rather meat heavy.

Chicken with Mushroom and Lemongrass - March 18th

N+R