There have been a distinct lack of recipes on here for the last two days! Firstly, Wednesday was a write off because of differing evening activities (Champions League watching at the Albany and after hours Uni placement working), which meant using up some leftovers from previous days, and Thursday evening was scuppered by more Uni work related extra-curricularity that cast all time to come up with a meal asunder. As there were no leftovers leftover for last night, we went to Chapter Arts Centre on the way home, mindful that they might have something to our taste that wouldn’t require too much quantitative easing of the purse strings.
Chapter was pretty busy, as it usually is in the evenings, but there was plenty to choose from their giant wall-based menu. Well, the choice was cut in two after we were told they were only offering dishes from the right hand side of the menu, either because we arrived relatively late in the day and they were coming to the end of service, or for some other unknown and arbitrary motive. No matter though, sometimes it’s good only having a limited choice as you end up ordering quicker.
We ordered one curry of the day, with naan @ £5.50, and one Moroccan chick-pea tagine which was similarly priced give or take a quid, but I think give more than take. The Moroccan chick-pea tagine was precariously accompanied on the menu by Moroccan chicken tagine, something that given a previously experienced mixup here between vegetarian and venison sausages for one of us, seemed like an accident waiting to happen (even though venison makes a particularly meaty and tasty vegetarian sausage). Surely not you say, chick-peas come from a can, one couldn’t envisage a confusion between a can of chick peas and a chicken, no matter how much their first syllable is the same. That’s what I thought before seeing this monstrosity. Thankfully though, there was no confusion tonight, and you get the strong sense that Chapter wouldn’t use those sort of ingredients anyway!
The curry was quite midly flavoured, a mixture of chick peas (they’ve obviously got a job lot in) and potato, with what seemed a light tomato and onion sauce. It was quite a fuzzy curry, in that the starchy properties of the ingredients meant it had quite a soft consistency, and the mild spices gave it a subtle flavour. Not much bite to it in either sense, but it tasted nice, and did the job. Given it is curry of the day it can vary quite a lot between visits, and this was good if not as interesting as some of their other dishes can be. But, you get what you expect, and it was a welcome meal.
The tagine with cous cous arrived (sans chicken, thankfully) and was a lovely mixture of lightly flavoured cous cous, with a smattering of pomegranate seeds and parsley, and a more substantial tagine of broccoli and chick peas. A good combination, and delicately flavoured, the broccoli having given over its verdant lustre to the warmer hues of a Moroccan sauce.
Needless to say both dishes were devoured pretty sharpish, and at £13 for two main meals and a cup of coffee each it was a well received Thursday night indulgence.
Washing up count: 0!
supper diem - a dinner a day 