Aleecha

Aleecha is one of my favorite Ethiopian dish that comes with the "Vegetable Sample Platter" in a restaurant. The version I had contained cabbage, carrots and potato and the color was yellow. A search online came up with mainly two versions: one made with curry powder and one made with cumin and turmeric. My instinct told me that the turmeric recipe was the correct one, but since I didn't have turmeric in my pantry, I decided to try the curry recipe first.

The recipe said to boil cabbage first, but it was not clear to me how long it should boil. I cooked the cabbage until it softened, but at the end it was too mushy. Then I sauteed chopped onions in melted butter and cooked in curry powder for 1 minute. The aroma was great. After cooking with additional water for 5 minutes, potato and carrots were added to the onion mixture and cooked for 15 minutes. Boiled cabbage was added and cooked 15 more minutes.

The resulting Aleecha was not very flavorful. There was a slight hint of curry and lots of butter flavor. Salt was not mentioned anywhere in the recipe but I had to add quite a lot to give the dish any flavor. The Aleecha I remember having from the restaurant had a tangy and deeper flavor, and this version of Aleecha did not replicate the restaurant version.

I am definitely trying the turmeric version next time which also contains tomato paste. (http://memcache.cookeatshare.com/recipes/aleecha-ethiopian-63075). Where do I find queman? Or berebere?