Curry Sauce Made Easy In A Slow Cooker
Curry Sauce In A Slow Cooker And Various Curries
Mamta Gupta
Curry sauce can be made a slow cooker, especially when you have too many other things to do. Here I have shown only enough for roughly 500 gm. of main curry ingredient, but you can make it in larger quantity than you need, so you can refrigerate/freeze some for another day. I often freeze it in small jam jars, making sure to leave some space at the top of the jar. If you don’t, the jar may crack or the lid may pop open by increased volume of frozen sauce.
Most meats and chickens will cook fine by adding this sauce to the slow cooker and switching it on. But most vegetables and fish/seafood cannot be cooked for too long in a slow cooker, they lose their structure and crunchiness. So cook them in a pan, using this curry paste.
To get individual taste to a dish, so they don't all taste alike, you can add various things to a portion of the ready-made curry sauce;
1/2 cup of thick natural yoghurt can be added to the sauce, but make sure that it is full cream milk yoghurt and it is at room temperature. Otherwise, it may curdle during cooking.
To give a redder colour to the curry, you can add 1 tsp. of sweet paprika powder.
To give different flavours to a curry, you can add any one of the following ingredients during reheating of the curry sauce, before you add main ingredients:
1. 1 tbsp. dry fenugreek leaves called kasoori/kasuri methi or 100-200 gm. of fresh fenugreek leaves.
2. 100-200 gm. chopped/frozen spinach or half a tin of pureed spinach.
3. You can add a few nuts like almonds or cashews at the end of the cooking process. They taste better if you soak and grind them first. They add a richness/creaminess to the dish.
4. As far as I am concerned, sultanas and raisins are a definite no, except in very few select curries. But if you like them, go ahead and add them.
Always garnish with chopped green coriander leaves. If coriander is not available, finely chopped spring onion greens also look nice and taste good. Unfortunately, most of my curries do not have coriander leaves, because my husband is allergic to their flavour/taste.
I use my slow cooker a lot, why not get yours out of the cupboard and give this a try.
Serves 3-4
Ingredients
For the curry sauce/gravy
1 large or 2 medium onions, approximately 300-350 gm., peeled and roughly chopped
1/2 inch ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
2 garlic cloves, peeled
2-3 medium sized tomatoes, chopped
2 tbsp. oil
2 tsp. roasted cumin seeds, roughly ground
1 tsp. turmeric powder
2-3 tsp. coriander powder
Chilli powder to taste
A handful of coriander leaves, chopped (optional)
1 tsp. Garam Masala
Main curry ingredient as shown here: 6 chicken pieces of your choice, approximately 500 gm, with skin removed.
Instructions
Peel and roughly chop onion, ginger, garlic, roasted cumin seeds, turmeric, coriander powder, chilli powder and salt. Place in an electric chopper, along with tomatoes and all the spices. Make it into a rough paste. It does not have to be very smooth.
Place the oil in the slow cooker that has been turned on to full. Add whole spices, if used.
Add the curry paste, turn the cooker on full/maximum and leave it to cook for a couple of hours, stir once or twice in between. It should begin to look shiny.
Allow it to cook on high for an hour or two, stirring a few times in between.
Use it straight away
Making a chicken curry with the sauce
Add chicken stir it in.
Add water and stir it in.
Leave to cook on medium power for 3-4 hours, until done, when the chicken/meat/vegetable is cooked.
Adjust seasoning.
Sprinkle garam masala and chopped coriander leaves. I have not added coriander leaves in pictures here, because my husband does not like coriander leaves.
Serve hot with Boiled Rice or Chapatties, or Tandoori Roti or any other type of Indian bread of choice.
