Friday 8 January 2016

Recipe corner: A turkey curry for Boxing Day and beyond

I assume that every household has a turkey curry recipe.  I’ve been trying to remember whether we ate turkey curry when I was a child and I can’t…there was definitely such a thing as turkey lasagne, and turkey soup and, of course, sandwiches but when it comes to curry I’m drawing a bit of a blank.  So let’s say that I assume that most households have a turkey curry recipe. 

This is ours.  Or, rather, this is D’s.  It’s yummy.  It is flavourful rather than spicy and creamy enough to be a soothing hug of a dish.  The addition of the carrot and the raisins add a pleasing sweetness, while the potatoes make it substantial enough to be consumed on its own (although the addition of rice and flatbreads is always welcome).

I haven’t included a picture.  Curry never photographs well anyway.  It just looked like…curry.  But really tasty curry – there’s no need to wait until next Christmas to cook it (I’m sure it would work well with roast chicken).

(BTW: regular readers might notice that from now on, I stop putting the pro points count on recipes – mainly because pro points is now an outdated system and it will be meaningless to the majority of people following WW.  My email address is above, and I’m always happy to do a calculation of pp if you so wish.)

Ingredients

2 onions
2 carrots
6 cloves of garlic
Thumb sized piece of root ginger
Tbsp vegetable oil

Tbsp ground cumin
Tbsp turmeric
Tbsp garam masala
Tbsp ground coriander
Tsp chilli powder

2 chicken stock pots, made up with 600ml water
150ml double cream
150ml coconut milk

250g roast turkey, roughly chopped

450g (3 smallish) potatoes, diced
100g sultanas

Serves 4-6

Blitz, or finely chop, together the vegetables to make a rough paste.  Heat the oil over a medium heat, add the veg and soften slightly for a few minutes.  A pinch of salt at this stage will help it soften and sweat rather than catch.

When soft, stir through the spices and cook for a further couple of minutes until they no longer smell raw.  Now you can pour in the chicken stock and bring the whole to a gentle simmer.

Add the potatoes and sultanas.  Allow to bubble away until the potato is cooked through and yields to a knife.  Reduce the heat and add the cream and coconut milk.  Further reduce until the sauce is thick, glossy and smells like turkey curry heaven. 

Finally, stir through the turkey pieces.  As with all curries, this will taste better if left to stand for at least a couple of hours and preferably overnight.  Serve with rice and naan bread as required.

8 comments:

  1. Rats!! I defrosted some turkey today intending to mske a turkey, ham and leek bake (cutting out pastry see). Then realised no spuds in the house and too lazy to go to the shop so thought - turkey curry! Ended up making Thai Green turkey curry which was v tasty but yours looks nicer. I have one last batch of turkey (might need to add some chicken) and will give it a whirl. Mmmm

    Good luck with the solo pro pointing. I am not really doing any particular diet which is not a good idea in the long run but seems to be my best way of starting.

    Lxxx

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  2. Is it horribly American to say all I know of turkey curry is the New Year's Day turkey curry buffet in Bridget Jones's Diary? Yes, I guess it is. But this sounds delicious. Is there anything you can think of that I might be able to substitute for the double cream that is not actually dairy? (Yes, the joys of cooking for New Yorkers with very specific diets...) Thanks!

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    1. The turkey curry buffet thing always makes me smile - I've never personally experienced one, but I bet they're going on somewhere in Middle England...

      I'd just double up the coconut milk or leave out the additional cream altogether. The main reason ours has cream in it is that we always seem to have some to use up after Christmas, otherwise it seldom finds it way into our fridge. Other than losing some of the richness, I would guess it would still be tasty without.

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    2. thank you! (In 8 years in London I never once experienced turkey curry...)

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  3. I put some turkey and ham in the freezer to make a savoury crumble later this month. Otherwise it was bubble and squeak for us and Coronation turkey as P loves it!

    Px

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  4. Updated to add: In case you're curious, I tried this using cashew cream to replace the heavy cream for the non-dairy eaters. People had seconds so it can't have been that bad!

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  5. Ooooh, I'm intrigued. Does cashew cream actually have any sort of nutty flavour, because I can imagine that would work beautifully in a curry, giving it a sort of Korma feel. Thanks so much for the feedback!

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  6. Yes, it's very subtly nutty, and korma-ish is exactly how I'd describe (I kind of forgot about korma, because I never eat Indian in the US -- got too spoiled in London.) You can make cashew cream savory or sweet, so I suspect it's more versatile than you'd think. Though keep in mind this guess is coming from someone with exactly zero percent of your + D's culinary instincts/skills.

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