Easy lamb curry

Forget Korma, Jalfrezi, Madras. Try this easy lamb curry recipe for the tastiest lamb curry ever. It's packed with spices for great flavour and enough chilli to give it heat without too much of a bite. It's also loaded with veggies, which makes it an ideal one-pan meal.

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• Easy Lamb Curry
• What you will need
• What to do
• Your questions answered
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• Other curry recipes
• 📋The recipe

Easy Lamb Curry

We love a good lamb curry. Left to himself, Graham would eat it every night of the week. In fact, the very first dish he ever cooked for me was a lamb curry. (Did I mention that lamb is his favourite meat? (He loves my lamb curry in pita and this delicious Moroccan lamb pie).

To be honest his lamb curry didn't taste too bad. What I liked about it was that he'd included potatoes and carrots in the same pan, which went really well with the flavour of the curry. The only drawback was that he'd used a jar of instant sauce.

Made from scratch

We've come a long way since those days. I've introduced him to the art of making a curry from scratch, and I think between us, we've come up with a pretty good-tasting lamb curry.

What I like about this easy lamb curry is that it's not too hot. There is a lot of flavour from the combination of spices with just the right amount of heat (for my taste). If you prefer a spicier curry, it is easy to tone down the heat by adjusting the amount of chilli flakes you add.

There are quite a few spices in this lamb curry recipe, but they are all readily available in the supermarket for under £1 each. And a little goes a long way. You will get at least 8 to 10 curry meals from the spices, so when you offset the upfront cost of buying the spices, against buying a jar of ready-made curry sauce, this works out to be very economical. There is also no comparison when it comes to flavour. Homemade is always better, and this dish wins hands down.

This is an easy recipe, and the lamb curry virtually cooks itself. I'm all for making things easy in the kitchen. Once you've prepared the vegetables, all you have to do is fry the onions with the spices, brown the meat, add the tomatoes and veggies and leave it to simmer on the stove for 50 minutes or so while you get on with more important things (like relaxing with a glass of wine maybe?).

You don't have to worry about over-cooking either. A little extra cooking time won't hurt. The worst that can happen is that the potatoes might be a little soft. Also, the flavours improve on standing so you can prepare the curry in advance and warm it up when you are ready to eat it. It freezes like a dream, so why not make a double quantity and freeze half for another meal?

Let's get on with it, shall we?

What you will need

Equipment

For cutting up the vegetables you will need a sharp knife and a chopping board to protect your work surface.

I like to cook my curry in a saute pan, but you could just as easily use a large saucepan. Just make sure it has a tightly fitting lid.

Ingredients

It takes about 2 hours in total to prepare and cook this homemade lamb curry, but the prep time is less than half an hour. The rest of the time the curry simmers away by itself.

This recipe makes enough lamb curry for 4 people. Even though we are only 2 people at home I cook the entire batch, eat half and freeze the rest for another meal. This lamb curry is a great standby to keep in the freezer for those nights when you don't feel like cooking.

• Cubed lamb - I normally buy a small lamb leg roast and cut it up myself, but you can buy cubed lamb from the butcher or supermarket. I would recommend leg rather than shoulder as the leg meat is much more tender and doesn't take as much cooking.
• Onions and carrots - these should be peeled and chopped into approximately half-inch pieces.
• Potatoes - the potatoes should be peeled and chopped into approximately one-inch pieces.
• Canned tomatoes - I buy them ready-chopped, if you get whole tomatoes you should chop them before adding to the curry.
• Fresh tomatoes - chopped into half-inch pieces.
• Stock - I use a lamb stock pot dissolved in a cup of boiling water. You can use fresh lamb stock if you have it on hand. You could use either chicken or vegetable stock.
• Salt - (not pictured) for seasoning.
• Sugar - (not pictured) I always like to add a small amount of sugar when cooking with tomatoes to cut through the tartness. Leave it out if you prefer.
• Sunflower oil (not pictured) - for frying off the onions and spices and for browning the meat.
• Spices - don't let the number of spices put you off - the flavours work really well together.
  • ground cumin
  • cumin seeds
  • ground coriander
  • garam masala
  • yellow mustard seeds
  • turmeric
  • dried chilli flakes

**You can get the exact quantities of the ingredients you will need to make this easy lamb curry recipe on the printable recipe card at the end of this post**

What to do

Preparation

I like to get the preparation done before I start cooking so that everything is to hand and ready when I need it.

• If you are cutting up the lamb yourself, cut it into bite-sized pieces - approximately 1-inch in size. Trim away any bits of sinew or excess fat.
• Peel the vegetables and cut them to size.
• Measure all the spices into a small dish.

Top tips for a perfect outcome

• The onions, carrots and tomatoes should be approximately 1 cm (half inch) cubes and the potatoes a little larger. I find that carrots take a bit longer to cook than potatoes, so keeping the carrots smaller ensures that everything ends up being cooked at the same time.
• Do take the time to fry the onions until they are translucent and then add the spices and fry a minute more. This allows the spices to release their aromas.
• Don't wipe out the pan before frying the meat. There will still be lots of flavour remaining in the pan from the spices and onions which will transfer itself into the meat.
• When browning the meat, use quite a high heat so that the meat sears and does not release any juices. The reason for sealing the meat is to ensure the meat juices stay in the meat as it cooks which will result in a more tender-tasting meat.
• Don't be tempted to add more than one cup of stock. There's plenty of moisture in the tomatoes. You want to end up with a thick gravy rather than a thin soupy consistency.
• Check the curry after 45 minutes. If the gravy seems a little thin, remove the lid for the last 10 minutes of cooking time to allow some of the excess liquid to evaporate.
• Do remember to taste towards the end of the cooking time and adjust the seasoning if necessary.
• A final note on the chilli - the recipe states the amount of chilli that I enjoy - if you want more heat, increase the chilli to your own taste.

Serving suggestions

• I like to serve lamb curry with a bowl of white rice and a side helping of peas.
• If you prefer not to serve with rice, this lamb curry is delicious piled on top of a warmed, split pita bread. To warm pita bread, place it in a dry frying pan over low heat for about one minute on each side.
• The favourite South African way of serving a curry is to top it with a few slices of bananas and a sprinkling of coconut. Serve with a small dish of chutney on the side.

Your questions answered

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📋The recipe

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