Chicken Korma

Chicken Korma, boiled basmati rice and 

Last September I posted a curry recipe and I quote myself as saying " I'm sure I will post lots of curry recipes". Well despite the fact we eat plenty, I haven't! I must confess that we do eat a lot of pre-prepared curry for convenience, even though I always used to make them from scratch. I've got out of the habit. It was Lauren who spurred me on to dust off my old and faithful copy of "Indian Cooking" by Lalita Ahmed, it's short and sweet and all the pages have brown and green and yellow splashes over them, proof that it's been well used.

We decided to tackle a Korma as Lauren is still a bit hesitant about food that makes your tongue tingle!

Korma

The young Master Chef,
the goggles are for the onions!

Peel and thinly slice a medium sized onion. Fry it in some vegetable oil on a medium heat until it's golden brown. Add to the pan a 1" cinnamon stick, 6 cloves, 6 cardamoms, 1 bay leaf and 1 teaspoon cumin seeds*. Fry for a couple of minutes before adding 2 teaspoons freshly grated ginger and 2 cloves of finely chopped or grated garlic. Fry for another couple of minutes, stirring well.
Next add your meat (or vegetables). This time I used chopped boneless skinless chicken thighs (the recipe suggests 450g diced shoulder of lamb, I've used cubed chicken breasts, even diced pork before).
Sprinkle with 1 teaspoon chilli powder (adjust to taste), 1 teaspoon ground coriander, 2 teaspoons ground cumin, 1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder. Give it a good mix and then add 150ml of natural yoghurt. Cover and cook for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add 175ml water, season with salt. Cook for 30-40 minutes until the meat is tender, chicken breast will be less than this. A korma should have a thick gravy, use 1-2 tablespoons of ground almonds to thicken it, sprinkle in some chopped green chillis if you like them and coriander leaves. Add some extra water if needed and then serve with boiled rice or chapatis.

It's a mild curry (depending how much chilli you add - obviously), but really tasty, with a rich spicy taste.
*I usually fish out the cardamoms, cloves, cinnamon sticks and bay leaves before serving, but it is quite hard as the cloves and cardamoms are difficult to spot in the thick brown sauce.
I also on occasion add some spinach or mushrooms, to sneak in a bit of vegetation!

Bubbling in the pot