Vegetable Jalfrezi

Vegetable Jalfrezi – served here with a second curry made of lentils and spinach with fenugreek.

It didn’t seem to matter what I added to my curry, it never seemed to come out quite like the restaurants. So in desperation one day, I tried a new approach to really maximise the flavours, and it worked!

This recipe captures the tangy flavours of curry house jalfrezi. It’s so tasty… but beware it is laced with raw chillies!  The trick is adding lots of the flavoursome ingredients right near the end of cooking…

Serves 4 if accompanied with rice and/or breads.

How to make extra tasty spiced dal

The secret to making a good dal is to make a temper and the secret to a really good dal is to make a really good temper!

Tempering a dal is the act of adding the cooked dal to a pan containing a mixture of fried vegetables and spices and heating it through before serving. This imbues the rich flavours into the dal in a way that can never be achieved though cooking the dal with the spices from the start.

This recipe is really quick and simple to make and can be done with red lentils just as easily as with the moong dal used here. I can personally guarantee that it is exceedingly delicious!

Chilli stuffed paratha (Indian fried bread)

I created this recipe in an attempt to replicate the best meal I had in India (in the few days before I got ill). They were chilli parathas, circular fried flaky breads with fresh chilli slices all the way through them, and I had them for breakfast in Haridwar!

Haridwar is an amazinig vegetarian city in North India and I arrived there in the middle of pilgrimage when it was packed and people were making offerings and chanting by the ganges. I ordered the chilli parathas at a cafe that had no menu, as I saw them being served to somebody else and thought “Yes! That’s what I want to eat!”

I couldn’t find any recipes online for what I’d experienced, so I adapted this plain paratha recipe to make it my own, and added fresh chillis of course.

Makes 4-6 parathas.