Ministry of Food: Rogan Josh

Recently, I blogged about my new cookbook, Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food and the hope that he has to change the fundamentals of home cooking.

In it, Mr Oliver has asked to learn a recipe from each section and pass it on to at least four other people. Here is my offering from the "Easy Curries" section... and oh my goodness, it's amazing. Usually I steer far clear of making actual Indian or Thai recipes, as it never seems to taste as good as the take-out dishes. I knew Jamie wouldn't let me down.

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:
2 medium onions
1 fresh red chilli
Thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger
Small bunch of fresh coriander
Vegetable oil
A knob of butter
4 bay leaves
sea salt and pepper
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 x 400g tin chopped tomatoes
800ml stock or water
1/2 a jar of Patak's Rogan Josh curry paste or Jamie's recipe
2 handfuls red lentils
A bunch of your favourite veggies - I used carrot, broccoli (including stems), snow peas, potato and capsicum
200g natural yoghurt

Directions:

1. Peel, halve and finely chop the onions. Finely slice the chilli, peel and finely chop the ginger, pick the coriander leaves from half the bunch and leave aside for sprinkling. Chop the remaining coriander, including stalks.

2. Put large casserole dish on medium high heat, add a couple of tablespoons oil and the butter.

3. Add onions, chilli, ginger, coriander stalks and bay leaves and cook 10 minutes until onions are soft and golden. Add carrot and any root vegetables, cook 5-7 minutes.

4. Add balsamic vinegar and cook 2 minutes, add tomatoes, stock/water and curry paste.

5. Stir in the lentils, bring to boil, then turn heat down and simmer with the lid on for about 50 minutes.

6. Add softer vegetables: capsicum, broccoli etc and simmer 10 minutes.

7. Serve with rice, poppadoms, chutney, pickle, anything you like!


Jamie's Rogan Josh Paste:

2 cloves garlic
Thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger
75g roasted peppers, from a jar
1 tablespoon paprika
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
2 teaspoons garam masala
1 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
2 tablespoons groundnut oil
2 tablespoons tomato puree
1 fresh red chilli
1 small bunch fresh coriander
Spices for toasting: 2 teaspoons cumin seeds, 2 teaspoons coriander seeds, 1 teaspoon black peppercorns.

First peel garlic and ginger. Put a frying pan on medium heat and add spices for toasting to the dry pan. Lightly toast them a fewminutes until golden brown and smelling delicious, then remove pan from heat. Add the toasted spices to a pestle and mortar and grind until fine, or put in food processor and whiz to fine powder. Whiz toasted spices and mix with rest of ingredients until a smooth paste.