Gary's Lamb and Tomato Curry

It's been a while since I posted a (cookbook based) recipe (Last one here) and it would seem that I have another one after this to finish off the things I made from the cookbooks at my Mum's house.

The cookbook this time around is Gary Mehigan's Comfort Food, published by the Penguin Group, ISBN 978 19213 82321. I can't remember if there is much modification in this, though I know I used nutmeg instead of strands of mace. I don't have the book near me either, since it's at my Mum's house.

Ingredients

^{Mum needed some more of most of the spices. And I think the nutmeg managed to hide from the photo too}

^{So many ingredients that they nearly escaped from 2 photos!}

Ginger Paste

60 ml Oil
1 thumb ginger, roughly chopped
6 cloves Garlic, peeled
4 long red chillies
30 ml water

Spice Mix

3 tbsp cumin seeds
3 tbsp coriander seeds
1 tbsp salt
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp nutmeg
2 tsp chilli powder
2 tbsp paprika
6 cloves
8 cardamom pods, crushed
2 cinnamon sticks
5 star anise

Meat and Onion

90 ml oil
1 kg lamb, diced
3 large onions, sliced

Remaining Ingredients

150 ml white vinegar
2 tbsp tomato paste
400 g tin chopped tomato
2 sprigs fresh curry leaves
1 L chicken stock
1/2 bunch coriander, leaves picked, roots cleaned.
6 potatoes (dutch cream, kipfler, similar), halved or quarterd

Method

Ginger Paste

^{I chopped up the chilli to give it a bit of a start too}

Add the Ginger, Garlic, Chilli, Water and 60 ml Oil to a food processor.
Blend until a paste forms.
Set aside until needed.

^{I'm sure I could have gotten it smoother, but this is a good enough paste for me}

Spice Mix

^{There is something about the smell of seeds roasting that is so nice. Possibly related to knowing what comes}

In a dry pan over medium heat, dry roast the Cumin and Coriander seeds until fragrant (about 3 to 5 minutes).
Grind them in a mortar and pestle (or spice grinder if you have one) before mixing in all the rest of the spice mix ingredients (salt, turmeric, nutmeg, chilli powder, paprika, cloves, cinnamon, cardamom and star anise)
Set this aside until needed.

^{I just mixed all the spices in the mortar, since it's a nice sized bowl that already had most of the volume in it}

Meat and Onion

^{I probably still have too large a batch in this pan}

Heat 90 ml of Oil in a large pan over high heat.
In batches, brown the Lamb for 6 to 8 minutes, stirring until browned on all sides and setting aside when done.

^{When all the lamb was in here, this bowl was big enough. And held the juices well too}

Add the Onion to the pan and reduce the heat to low, stirring occasionally for 20 minutes until the onion is golden and very soft.

^{Sliced onion goes in and become quite soft. Would have liked more colour on it really, but this was 20 minutes and I was already tight for time}

Final steps

^{That's a much better colour on the onions}

Add the Spice Mix to the Onion and mix well, cooking over medium heat for 5 minutes, stirring regularly.
Stir in the Vinegar.

^{I'll stir it in properly after this photo, promise}

Return the Lamb and any juices that have accumulated to the pan.
Add in the Ginger Paste and stir well to combine into the sauce that is starting to form.

^{phew! This recipe fit inside the pan. Only made a small mess when I stirred it}

Add the Tomato, Tomato Paste, Curry Leaves, and stock to the pan and stir.
Bring to the boil before reducing the heat to low and adding the Coriander Root.
Simmer over a low heat for 1 hour.

^{By this point, the house smelled fabulous. Heck, the front yard smelled great!}

Add the Potato and cook for another hour, stirring regularly.

^{So close to finished. Just have to stir those leaves through and serve it up}

Remove from the heat and stir through Coriander Leaves

Serve with Rice (and fresh coriander if you'd like. I didn't this time around as I was tired)

Thoughts

• That list of ingredients can seem imposing, which is why I've broken it down into 4 smaller groups here. When you take 4 out for the paste and another 11 out for the spice mix, it really makes a much less imposing list of ingredients.
• It takes a long time to make, so make sure you have the whole afternoon. Sure, it took me longer because I take my time and have photos to remember to take (I think I used about half of them this time around...), but from start to finish it is going to be 3+ hours. That sounds like a lot, but then you look at the last 2 hours of it, and it's just simmering away, so you can be elsewhere. I watched a couple of episodes of Game of Thrones, and played some games on the PC between stirring. So it's really only an hour or so of actually doing things.
• It has some heat to it. If you don't like spicy, I'd recommend halving or removing the chilli powder as the first options, and halving the fresh chilli content as another possibility. De-seeding the chilli would also be an option.
• It makes a lot of food. Each of those containers actually does me for 2.5 to 3 serves. Or a bit over 2 of the serves as shown above.

^{I still have 1 of these containers in mum's freezer as it's too hot for her}

• It is delicious. Yes, that's going to be my final word on it. Delicious and will certainly make again at some point.