Its 2am on a Monday morning. I’m just off nights since Saturday morning, and my sleeping pattern is up the air, naturally. I start back at work in 5 and a half hours for a long day and I need to make something for my lunch. I open the cupboard… Chickpeas, tinned tomatoes, “okay, good start”, I think to myself. I go to the fridge… courgette, cauliflower, mushrooms, a discoloured broccoli and a couple of limp carrots. “Cool, now how will I season this would-be stew?”, to the spice-box (not that kind of spice-box, it’s not that kind of 2am!), cumin, coriander, turmeric? curry? “okay, I’ll make a curry”. Back to the cupboard for come chillis, garlic, fresh ginger and onions. “but I really don’t want to bother making rice too, potato?” Potato. Potato in my curry. Welcome to my mind on cooking. This is how this recipe came to be.
You will need:
- 1 can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed thoroughly
- 4 cans of chopped tomatoes
- 2 tbsp tomato puree
- 3 birds eye chillis (less or more, or milder chillis if you’d prefer), deseeded and finely chopped
- 1 thumb of ginger, minced
- 6 cloves of garlic, minced
- 3 white onions, finely sliced
- 4 medium potatoes, roughly diced
- 1 courgette
- 5-6 chestnut mushrooms (my favourite) roughly chopped
- 1-2 carrots, diced (mine were old, limp and small)
- couple generous handfuls spinach
- 1 heaped 1tsp each chilli powder and cumin
- a heaped half tsp each of coriander, garam masala, cinnamon and turmeric
- some water
N.B. you can obviously exchange or omit any veg in this and add more or less spice depending on you own taste, have fun with it.
How to make:
Water-fry (or oil if you fancy) the onions, garlic, chilli and ginger until soft and translucent. Then add in all the spices and mix well, repeat with the tomato puree. once this is all good and incorporated, throw in the chopped tomatoes and stir until mixed well.
This is when you can throw in all your veggies, apart from the spinach, broccoli and cauliflower, and cover with water, and mix in thoroughly until all the veggies are coated well. Then you can add the broccoli spinach and cauliflower on top, and we are going to kinda of steam them on top of the curry.
I should also note at this stage I had to transfer into a bigger, 5l pot as I greatly underestimated how much I was making (I originally planned on using only 2 tins of chopped tomatoes and no water!)
Pop on the lid and simmer until all the veg is cooked, then take the lid off, stir and simmer until the sauce reduces a little.
Then serve, without rice, cos you’re rebellious like me! This keeps well and is obviously freezable, and full of nutrient rich veggies! Enjoy!
Let me know if you try this recipe by commenting down below and tagging me on Instagram! If you have any suggestions on ways you improved this recipe or your own little additions, please share! Also feel free to share/pin this recipe on Pinterest!
Hannah Finds Vegan 