Recipe: Potato-Peanut Curry
Looking for a spicy, rich dish suitable for company? This is it. Yet it's fast enough to make from scratch on a weeknight. Serve over hot rice or with flat bread. It's good the next day just reheated. Or make a dynamite burrito by wrapping it up with scrambled eggs or sauteed green peppers.
Active time: 35 minutes. Total time: 45 minutes. Makes four main-dish servings or eight side-dish servings.
Ingredients
1 pound potatoes
1/2 can diced tomatoes (14 ounces total)
1 cup water
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons vegetable oil (corn or canola)
2 tablespoons tahini
2 tablespoons peanut butter
1 teaspoon ground chipotle or cayenne pepper
4 cloves garlic
1/2 teaspoon turmeric (optional but very good)
2 tablespoons chopped parsley leaves
Method
- Scrub the potatoes. If they are not organic, peel them. If they are, just cut out any bad spots. Dice the potatoes into 1/2 inch cubes.
- In a medium pot, add the potatoes, tomatoes with the juice, water, and salt. Cover and bring to a boil over medium-high heat, then turn heat down to medium low so the mixture just barely boils.
- In a small microwave-proof bowl, combine the vegetable oil, tahini, peanut butter, and chipotle or cayenne pepper. Put the garlic through a garlic press or mince it very fine. Stir the garlic into the tahini mixture. Cover the bowl and microwave on medium-high for about 2 minutes, until the mixture is fragrant. Stir in the turmeric, then add the tahini mixture to the potato mixture.
- Simmer for about 10 minutes, until the potatoes are tender. Garnish with chopped parsley and serve. Refrigerate any leftovers. Freezing will make the potatoes mushy.
Tips and notes
- I peel regular potatoes but not organic ones to reduce the amount of pesticides in the dish. Unfortunately, peeling potatoes means throwing away some of their nutritional value and fiber.
- If you don't have a microwave, heat the tahini mixture in a small pan on the stove over medium-low heat for about 5 minutes, until the the mixture is fragrant, stirring often. If you have time, you can do that step first, then add the potatoes, tomatoes directly to that mix, saving a pot.
- This recipe was inspired by one in Raghavan Iyer’s 660 Curries: The Gateway to the World of Indian Food. This is an easier version, made with ingredients already in the Cook for Good kitchen. It also starts cooking the potatoes while making the peanut sauce, which cuts the time needed by about 10 minutes.
