Wednesday, December 3, 2014

Indian-style Lamb curry インド風ラムカレー

We bought butter flied lamb leg last weekend to be barbecued but the weather was not co-operative and we could not cook it outside in our Weber grill. We were planning a dinner party so we had to cook it somehow. My wife suggested we make an Indian-style lamb curry. This is more like ragout than a saucy curry but it was very good.



I was a sous chef and did all the prepping and my wife made the dish.

Ingredients:
Lamb, butterflied leg of lamb (about 3lb), sliver skin, visible fat removed and cubed (#1).
Garlic (3 fat cloves, finely chopped),
Jalapeno pepper (two, seeded and deveined and finely chopped),
Ginger root, half inch, skin removed and finely chopped (#2)
Spices; (#4)
Curry leaves, dried,15 (#3).
2 tsp garam masala,
1 tsp ground cumin.
1/4 tsp ground turmeric.
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper.
1/2 tsp salt (#4).
2 tsp sushi vinegar (original recipe calls for lemon juice but I used the vinegar

lamb curry compoist

My wife first sautéed or bloomed all the spices (#2, #3 and $4) in vegetable oil (3 tbs). Once the spices became fragrant, she added the lamb (Our philosophy is that "searing" the meat before adding is not important or necessary) (#5). She put the lid on and simmered it for an hour. Although, my wife did not add any liquid, enough liquid came out of the meat that the dish looked like a soup. She removed the lid and reduced the liquid until it just formed a thick coating of  'sauce" on the meat (#6). We reheated this before serving to our guests by adding a small amount of liquid (we used chicken broth but water would have done it).

This was a great hit. We served it “family style” with rice so the quests could take what they wanted. The meat was tender, very flavorful and a bit "spicy". When served with rice, it was just right. We provided yogurt as a condiment. In addition of tasting good with the meat the yogurt also calmed the spiciness for anyone who felt it was still a bit too much for them. (One of our guests did that but the rest of us were OK with the spiciness). This dish did not stay around long enough to get cold.

No comments: