Brunei - Pajeri Nenas/ Pineapple Curry

As I mentioned in my Bulgaria post my partner and I are trying to reduce the amount of animal produce we consume due to health and environmental reasons. The idea isn't to be vegan or even vegetarian but rather to make an active effort to reduce quantities, part of the drive behind keeping some animal products in our diet is that we don't want to burden friends and family that we stay with occasionally to have to cater for different diets , especially as everyone is always so accommodating of my IBS; the second reason is my IBS, because of it I don't tolerate pulses overly well which does limit my protein options somewhat. So while I'm actively trying to reduce you will still see the occasional meat recipes which I hope will be extra special as I will be appreciating meat even more. One of the easiest ways to do that is to pick vegetarian dishes wherever we can for meal prep and just keep meat for special occasions or meals out - but I will say that not cooking a beef rendang for Brunei week was one of the hardest decisions!

Brunei is a small country on the Island of Borneo, the rest of the island also homes parts of Indonesia and Malaysia and so all three countries share similar cuisines - so there may be some dispute over what dish belongs to what country! But overall it tends to be called Malay cuisine. This pineapple curry that I chose is a delicious sweet savoury dish, highly fragrant, spicy and aromatic - but more importantly absolutely DELICIOUS and TOTALLY made up for missing out on the rendang! The dish is more of a side dish, and I paired it with rice and a bean dish from Burundi!

Serves 4 (as a side)

Ingredients

• 1 ripe pineapple - cut into 1cm thick slices

• 3 cloves star anise

• 2 tablespoon coriander seeds - pan roasted then ground

• 1 red onion

• 10 dried chillies - soaked in hot water

• 1 cm of fresh turmeric or tsp of ground turmeric

• 1tbsp oil

• 400ml coconut milk

• 3 tablespoon of brown sugar

• salt

Method

1. Blend onion, fresh or ground turmeric, chillies and pan roasted coriander into a thick paste.

2. Add oil into a hot wok or large frying pan, over medium heat.

3. Add the paste you made in step 1 and star anise to the pan and cool cook on medium-low fire until fragrant and thickened slightly.

4. Add the pineapple slices, coconut milk, sugar. Leave to simmer until pineapple is cooked and soft. Season with salt, taste and serve.