- Estimated Time: 1 hour prep, 1 hour simmer-time
- Difficulty: Moderate
- Servings: 6 as an entree served with rice
This curry packs plenty of heat and makes a generous amount of delicious gravy.
I also make a version of this curry where the curry powder and chili powder are pan-roasted individually to a dark brown color which gives the curry a different flavor profile. (roasted ‘individually’ because they roast at different speeds). Remember roasting mellows down the heat of the spices so increase the quantities a bit if you’re roasting the spices.
Curries generally have a huge list of ingredients that make it seem like you can’t make it if you don’t have them all. In reality the core flavors come from the onion, ginger, garlic and spices – the rest are nice to have. So in a rush I’ve skipped ingredients I’ve marked as optional below and it’s still come out fine.
Ingredients
2 to 2.5 lb chuck roast, stew meat or similar cut of beef
2 big red onions
5 roma tomatoes
6 cloves garlic
1 inch piece of ginger
4 tsp Sri Lankan curry powder (simple mix of 1/2 cumin & 1/2 coriander)
3 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp turmeric
2 shallots or 1/4 onion
3/4 cup thick coconut milk
3 tbs coconut oil
1 tsp or salt to taste
4 cloves (optional)
3 cardamom pods (optional)
2 sprig curry leaves or 2 bay leaves (optional)
A piece of cinnamon (optional)
5 fenugreek seeds (optional)
Preparation
Dice the onion – checkout my video on how to do it quickly. Use a microplane grater on the ginger and garlic to make a quick paste or chop them finely. Use a mortar and pestle to grind the cloves and cardamom to a powder (often left whole and it’s always unpleasant picking this in-edible stuff out your rice and curry in my opinion). Cube the meat into a small 1/2 to 1 inch size pieces, they soften faster when they are smaller. A really sharp knife and slightly frozen beef will speed up the chore of cubing the meat.
Heat oil in a large pan to medium-high. Add onions, salt and stir. After a few minutes add curry leaves, cinnamon, garlic and ginger. Stir and cook until the onions soften. Add spices, beef, tomatoes and stir until beef is mostly lost its red color.
Add 2 cups of water, lower heat and cover with a fitting lid. Simmer for 1 hour, checking every 20 minutes if it needs more water. After about 40 minutes taste a piece of beef to check if it’s soft enough for your taste. Cook longer as needed.
When the meat is tender add coconut milk, more salt as needed and bring to a boil. Serve warm with rice and veggies or with bread.
You could also freeze it for later use. The picture shows three containers each containing 2-servings. It’s a great curry to freeze and have on hand for days you don’t want to spend time cooking.
Did you open a can of coconut milk for this curry? It’ll keep in the fridge for a few days but to store for much longer pour into an ice-cube tray, freeze; then store the cubes in labelled bags. 6 ice-cubes is 3/4 cup worth.
Leave a Reply