I Love Curry

Butternut Squash, Red lentil & spinach Curry.

So the Euros are upon us! Finally we have football on the TV screen again, wahoooo! Obviously this calls for some food that go well with (ginger) beer, and festering in front of the TV for a while. And what’s better than curry?! In my personal opinion, vegetable curries are seriously underrated (along with vegetable pizzas, they are always better than pizzas with meat!), so with a big knife in one hand, and a butternut squash in the other, I set about to make my delicious curry!

Ingredients:

1x large onion

4 cloves of garlic

1x butter nut squash (diced into tiny little cubes)

A big, generous handful of red lentils

1x red chilli, chopped

1x tinned tomatoes

800ml chicken stock

Spinach

Cumin

Garam masala

Coriander

In a large cooking pan, heat oil.

Add in onions, keep the heat low, throw in a bit of salt.

After 5-10 minutes of cooking, add in garlic.

Allow flavours to come out, and add in red chilli.

Add in all of the herbs and spices.

By this point it should be smelling bloody lovely!

Add in your (what seems a huge amount) butternut squash.

Give this a good stir and then, throw in lentils.

Quickly after, put in all of the stock, and the tinned tomatoes. Give it another good stir and cover.

Allow the curry a good few hours to develop on the low heat.

Give it an occasional stir and don’t forget to put the rice on 15 mins before you dish up!

3-5 mins before dishing up add in a few decent handfuls of spinach and stir in.

What I think:

Overall a really nice meal. I’m always impressed when I make something with no meat (excuse the stock!) and my boyfriend appears to be a big fan. The colours were beautiful and the curry had a lovely texture throughout, and a tasty bearable heat. Had with rice (I made cute little rice towers), some kind of Bombay potatoes (need to develop that recipe) and some garlic nann bread the boyfriend picked up (I wouldn’t have a clue how to make that!). Easily made veggie by switching to vegetable stock! I enjoyed the meal even more when I realised how cheap it was! 

Mum-Ma-Mia! Slow that cooking down!

Slow cooked Italian Beef Stew.

On my days off from work I like to cook things that I’ve not tried before, or different ways of doing things. After recently receiving a slow cooker, I thought I’d try and do as much slow-cooked meals as possible, because they taste so much better!

Overall it took a good four hours to make, but that’s not bad because once it’s in the oven, its just a case of going back every 20-30 minutes to give a stir.

Ingredients:

400g Beef braising steak

1x red onion

1x onion

6x cloves of garlic

100g mushrooms

1x courgette

2x peppers (one red, one yellow)

2x tinned tomoatoes (400g each)

Basil

Rosemary

Start of with a large frying pan, heating up some olive oil. Once heated, add in both slices of onion. Gently cook on a low heat.

After about 10 mins, add in all of your finely chopped garlic.

After allowing the garlic to release its flavour, add in your beef. Remember to keep it on a low heat, you’re not really cooking here, just mixing with heat!

Season the meat generously with rosemary, basil, and a little salt.

Add in peppers, courgette.

Once everything is all in together, transfer to your oven-proof dish.

This is where you can add your two tins of tomatoes.

Place in pre-heated oven, should be about 110 degrees.

Pop back every so often, to keep an eye on the delicious pot of food.

What I think:

The food being slow cooked was so much tastier! The originally tough beef melted in my mouth! The whole dish tasted incredibly rich and full of flavour. Will be making again at some point for definite! If only I didn’t need to make sure I was in for the whole afternoon!  Tastes wonderful with some really good quality, fresh bread. Easy 10/10!