Here we are with another recipe article, this time veering away from Korean recipes like my past two (which can be found here and here respectively.) Today I’ll be showing you how to cook a staple meal in my family (with my mother’s permission, it’s not quite a family secret) over the past 30 years, a vegetable curry with tomato rice. It’s incredibly simple but packed with wonderful flavours and beautiful colours.
While we used cauliflower and potatoes this time, any vegetables can be used following this recipe, such as courgettes, spinach, okra, and so on.
These amounts of ingredients will serve 2-3 people, so increase or decrease the amounts as you see fit. The images used were for a few more people, so it won’t be accurate to the amount of ingredients we personally used.
Ingredients:
Fresh:
- 1 Onion, thinly sliced
- 8-10 baby potatoes, cut into bite size pieces
- Small florets of cauliflower, cut into bite size pieces
- Approx. ½ cup of frozen peas
- 1 tsp garlic paste
- 1 tsp ginger paste
- Green chilli, to taste or roughly ¼ tsp
Spices:
- ½ tsp cumin seeds
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp turmeric
- 1 tsp medium or madras curry powder
- ½ tsp cumin powder
- ½ tsp coriander powder
- ½ tin chopped tomatoes
- Optional – dried/fresh coriander leaves
Tomato Rice:
- 2 cups of rice
- 1 tin of tomato soup
- ⅓ cup of frozen peas
- Pinch of salt
- Margarine (exact amount varies, but you need enough that will coat the rice when frying)
Method:
Step 1: Prepare the rice
Wash the rice until the water is clear to remove the starch, then leave to dry. Once dried, place in a large pan suitable for your oven.
Step 2: Combine the cooked sauce with the rice
Add peas to another pan, throw in the pinch of salt, then the tin of tomato soup. Fill the empty tin with water and add it to the pan also. Bring to boil on your hob.
Fry the rice with enough margarine that all the rice is coated, until the rice is slightly golden brown. When the soup comes to boil, turn down the heat for your rice and slowly and very carefully add soup to the rice (this will splash).
Stir through, cook on the hob for a minute, then cover with a lid and place in your oven at 150°C. Check after 10-15 minutes and stir through, cook for a further 10 minutes until rice is cooked through.
Step 3: Begin cooking the curry
Have your cauliflower and potatoes (or any other vegetables you may be using) ready on the side.
Add some olive oil to a pan and begin frying the onion with the cumin seeds, until the onions are golden brown.
Add the ginger and garlic pastes and the chilli, frying for approx. 2 minutes. Then, add all dry spices, cooking for a minute before adding the chopped tomatoes (and coriander leaves if using them).
Let the sauce simmer on a low heat until the sauce reduces slightly, before adding the potatoes. Cook until the potatoes are almost done, then add the cauliflower and peas, while stirring from time to time.
Cook on a low heat until the cauliflower is soft, and potatoes are cooked through.
At the end, your curry should look well mixed and cooked all the way through. Simple!
Step 4: Serve your curry and rice
Your rice should come out a golden orange colour like so, with tons of flavour.
Serve rice in a bowl or plate and add the curry on top.
Optionally, serve with chopped salad on the side, such as tomatoes, cucumber and spring onions (I recommend mixing some of these with mint sauce). You can also serve with plain yoghurt, or, as we do, grate some cucumber into a bowl, add yoghurt, salt and pepper, mix thoroughly into a delicious cucumber yoghurt that perfectly complements the flavour of the curry. You can also add some spicy, fragrant mixed pickle for an extra kick – although this will taste very strong so be careful.
Again, the vegetables can be anything you want, so use as many or little ingredients as you like. The next day, if you don’t have as much rice to serve with the curry, grab some frozen parathas, fry in a pan, and serve with the curry. There’s really so many things that go perfectly with this meal, and it makes for a great family meal.
I hope you enjoy such an important and memorable recipe as this one for me and my family, let us know in the comments if you’d like to see more just like this one!
Ashley is a copy editor and writer with a passion for gaming, music, films and animation.
