Tips & Tricks

My New Favourite Yellow Curry

, , , , 0 Comments

I’ve recently got hugely into making my own curry paste – which is way easier than I thought. The proportions are easy and it means you can make the paste when you have time and throw everything together later in the day. 

 

Print Recipe

Yellow Curry

Vegan Sweet Potato, Lentil and Spinach curry which is creamy and spicy with a depth of flavour from the turmeric. 
Servings: 4 people

Ingredients

For the paste

  • 1 Onion
  • 1 Thumb sized piece of ginger
  • 1 bulb Garlic
  • 5 tbsp Olive oil
  • 1 small bunch Fresh or frozen coriander
  • 1 tbsp Turmeric
  • 1 tbsp Curry powder

For the curry

  • 350 g Dried yellow lentils
  • 2-3 Small sweet potatoes
  • Spinach Fresh or frozen – as much as you like
  • 1 tbsp Peanut butter optional
  • 1 tin Coconut milk

Instructions

  • Peal and roughly slice the onion, ginger and add it to an oven safe dish with the whole bulb of garlic – roast with the oil at 200 for 30 minutes
  • Afterwards, remove the garlic skins and add the whole lot to a small blender with the turmeric, curry powder and coriander, blend. Keep in the fridge until needed
  • Add the curry paste to a saucepan and fry for 3 minutes, siring all the while
  • Add 1 ltr water plus the dried lentils. Simmer for 1 hour
  • Add the cubed sweet potatoes and simmer for another 30 minutes
  • Lastly cook your rice or naan, add the frozen spinach until the blocks come apart, the peanut butter and the tin of coconut milk (adding it at the end ensure it stays super creamy)

Top 5 Things to Freeze

0 Comments

I am a big BIG fan of my freezer and there are a few things I feel i’m constantly encouraging people to freeze to make their lives easier and reduce waste. Here are the top 5. 

  1. Fresh Herbs

Before I started doing this I would never get through a whole bunch of fresh herbs and end up throwing half a bunch away always. I haven’t met a type of herb that doesn’t respond really well to being frozen so now I always take the time to chop and freeze all fresh herbs the day i buy them to ensure nothing is wasted. Extra tip: add a couple of frozen mint leaves to your tea to cool it down and give it a nice flavour.

Frozen parsley almost used up (left) and frozen mint leaves

2. Bread and breadcrumbs

I almost always make toast from frozen sliced bread now so it doesn’t go off before I eat it. I’m so into it that I also freeze sliced bagels, english muffins and crumpets and toast them straight from frozen. The king of them all though is breadcrumbs. If you do ever get round to blitzing up your stale bread in the food processor like Jamie Olive does, or like I do beat up stale cracker crumbs in a tea towel, make sure you put them straight into a freezer bag and use them as needed to breadcrumb fish, chicken or to put on top of a pasta bake.  

I couldn’t find any in my freezer at the moment so here’s a free stock image of some bread

3. Portions of pastry

Again, something I use to waste all the time! Now when I buy a block of pastry I cut it into 4 and save three in a freezer bag to use 1 by 1. I find one of these small blocks is enough to make 1 small quiche or tart of pies for two people. Make sure you label the bag whether its puff or shortcrust, as you can see I always forget.

4. Butter

I love love love lurpak and it always seems to be on sale 2 for £5. Momma didn’t raise no fool so i’ll always get two, throw one in the freezer and bring it out a few weeks later when the first tub is finished. It freezes amazingly, I promise you will never be able to tell.

5. Sliced Bananas

I know that banana nice-cream is a big thing now but am I the only one where my food processor has never been able to handle rock solid pieces of banana, always seems to get stuck and give me a massive ball ache with the washing up. If you feel my pain, instead try slicing up a banana and freeze the pieces, nibble on them as you like, they end up being like little mini ice-cream pieces – great Netflix snack!

Yum