• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

FunnyLove

family + food + feelings

  • About FunnyLove
    • Our Life
    • Cooking Classes + Other Services
    • Jay
      • Comedy Chronicles
    • Privacy
  • Travel
  • Food
    • All Recipes By Category
    • Older Recipes
      • Meal Suggestions
      • Entertaining at Home
      • Restaurants
    • Health Kick
  • Wedding
    • Proposal
    • Our Details
      • Venue
      • Invitations & Such
      • DIY Hair
      • Rehearsal Dinner
      • Gifts and Favors
      • Vows
      • The Ring!
      • Dress
      • Music
      • Wedding Shower
    • Planning
      • The Ring Delimma
      • 2 Months to go + Advice, please.
      • Into the Wee Hours?
      • What’s in a Name? ~after marriage, at least~
      • Final Decisions
    • Pictures
      • Photographer
      • Part 1
      • Part 2
      • Part 3
      • Part 4
  • Contact

Homemade Curry with Lamb and Eggplant

August 16, 2012 by funnyloveblog 9 Comments

Um.  Yes.

You know how I love that storebought curry paste that I use to make chicken curry and chickpea curry?

Well, I still love it.


I do!

BUT, I also like doing fun things like making my own curry because other people mock curry paste and I don’t like being mocked even though it’s super delicious and easy.

I just want to be liked, is what I’m saying.

So.  I made my own curry.  Then I simmered lamb in it for 2 hours until it was falling apart.

Then I stirred in seared eggplant cubes.

It wasn’t the WORST idea I’ve ever had.  In fact, it was super duper delicious and I can’t stop thinking about it now and I’m definitely making it again ASAP.

The curry itself isn’t hard to make at all.  There are some recipes where you toast spices, then grind them, then blend them with peppers and garlic to make a paste, yaddayaddayadda….

I didn’t do that.  Sorry. Get over it.

I did, however, use lots of different yummy spices and a fresh pepper and tomato base. Because of the hardiness of the lamb, I made this a darker curry with LOTS of spice – lamb can totally stand up to that!

Also.  You can use any meat you’d like with this, but I’d definitely recommend beef, lamb, or some other dark meat – even pork ribs would work well, just something that can handle being cooked to death until it relaxes and says FINE, I’M FORK TENDER, EAT ME.

Or, you know, whatever your meat says to you after it’s been braised.

So, here’s what you need!

  • 1/2 lb bone-in lamb
  • 1/2 teaspoon meat tenderizer
  • 2 medium or 1 large eggplant
  • 1/2 medium onion
  • 3 garlic cloves
  • 1 fresh hot chili pepper (red or green) or 1 tsp crushed red pepper
  • 1/2 tsp garam masala
  • 1 teaspoon coriander
  • 1 bay leaf or 1 teaspoon crushed bay
  • 1 teaspoon fennel
  • 1 teaspoon cumin
  • 2 small cans tomato sauce
  • 2-4 cups chicken stock
  • 1/2 cup greek or other plain yogurt
  • cooked rice and/or naan, to serve
  • olive oil
  • salt

A note on the spices:  Mine were all in seeds, and I toasted them but didn’t grind them.  I love the texture they add to the sauce!  Use whatever you have, though – don’t obsess over that part.

Let’s make curry!  I started with the lamb.  Sprinkle it with the meat tenderizer on both sides to get it going.  Let the lamb sit for as long as you can – but even 15 minutes is just fine. If you don’t have meat tenderizer just use salt – no worries.

Heat a large pan that has a fitting lid to medium high heat.  In a drizzle of olive oil, sear the lamb on both sides until brown but not even close to cooked through.

While that’s happening, dice the eggplant!

When the lamb is crispy on both sides, remove it to a plate.  Add the eggplant to the pan with another drizzle of olive oil and LET IT SIT.  We want the eggplant to get brown on the edges but not super soft, so we gotta leave it alone for that to happen! Trust me.

While the eggplant is browning, finely dice the onion…

….slice the pepper, removing the seeds if you don’t like things too spicy…

….and mince the garlic.

Note:  You could pulse these three together until they’re finely chopped in a food processor and add them all at once too – up to you!

Flip the eggplant after 2 minutes and let it keep browning, then remove THAT to a plate.

Now, for the curry!  Add the coriander, cumin, fennel, and bay to the pan and stir the spices in the lamb and eggplant drippings for 1 minute.

Then, add the chili pepper and onion.  Stir them around until the onion just starts to become translucent.

Now, add the garlic and garam masala – stir that around for 2 minutes until the veggies are nearly cooked through and very fragrant.

Then, add the tomato sauce!

NOM.  Grab your chicken stock too – we’re ready for it!

Now, it’s time to simmer.  Add the lamb back to the pan and reduce the heat to medium so the curry is barely simmering.  Cover the lamb and curry with 1 cup or so of chicken stock – you want the lamb to be nearly fully submerged in the sauce.

Cover the pan and WALK AWAY.  Every 30 minutes or so, stir the curry and add more chicken stock if the pan is getting dry – even with the lid on it’ll evaporate a bit.  Adjust the temperature on your stovetop as needed so that the curry is barely bubbling.

When the lamb is completely falling off the bone, we’re ready to go.  Remove as many bones as you can from the sauce, then add the eggplant back to the curry.

Taste this, and add a sprinkle of salt if you’d like!  The tomato sauce has salt in it, so I didn’t add any up to this point.

Then, stir in the greek yogurt.

PERFECT.  Wonderful.  Let the yogurt heat through in the sauce for 2 or 3 minutes, then serve.

You can serve this in a bowl with some naan…

I left the bones in the sauce so people would know to look for little bones that I may have missed.

You could also serve this over plain rice, or with both options, or however you like.

I love this because the lamb is a strong flavor, so you don’t need much – better for your wallet and your arteries to have the FLAVOR of the meat without a ton of it actually being in the curry!

This is total wonderful fabulous weekend food.  Make it ASAP, and make a double batch for weekday leftovers.

Enjoy!

 

Filed Under: Food, Recipes Tagged With: braised food, cooking, easy cooking, eating, food, hindu, india, lamb, recipe, recipes, travel, yoga

Previous Post: « So Needy – I Need More Help
Next Post: Facebook Contest WINNERS Announced! »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. trangquynh says

    August 16, 2012 at 11:44 AM

    your curry look really good, I love using curry paste too, super easy and quick ^^

    Reply
    • funnyloveblog says

      August 16, 2012 at 11:53 AM

      Phew. I’m sick of reading blogs talking about fake cooks who don’t do anything but dump in paste. Um, yes. It’s called having a job and a desire to eat before 10pm. SORRY. And, sorry to you for sharing my frustrations with the earth via your comment. Whoops.

      Reply
  2. Sibella at bakingwithsibella.com says

    August 16, 2012 at 11:53 AM

    This is one excellent meal! I will definitely try it!

    Reply
    • funnyloveblog says

      August 16, 2012 at 11:55 AM

      Let me know how it goes – this was my first time making my own flavor blend for curry, and I LOVED it.

      Reply
  3. Diane says

    August 15, 2013 at 12:10 PM

    I’ve just tried this, though I didn’t stick to the recipe exactly, in terms of the spice. I absolutely loved it. I may substitute the aubergine (eggplant) for another veg next time, maybe courgette.

    Reply
    • funnyloveblog says

      August 15, 2013 at 12:16 PM

      Awesome! That’s exactly what I do….use recipes as a guide, not an end-all-be-all! If you have time, hard veg like potato and carrot would be SO good, but you’d want to increase the simmer time by 30 minutes maybe. I love potatoes in curry….can’t explain it.

      SO glad you liked it!

      Reply
  4. John says

    September 19, 2014 at 11:13 AM

    I regularly make curries from scratch but am also not averse to pastes either (nothing better than a piece of mackerel grilled with a bit of tikka paste and some lemon juice). Have made this one incorporating half aubergine and half courgette, also some spinach towards the end. Used cheap stewing lamb and cooked for a lot longer. Absolutely delicious.

    Reply
    • funnyloveblog says

      September 19, 2014 at 11:17 AM

      So glad you like it! I agree- so much fun to make your own curry, but the pastes are luckily really good now for quick uses!

      Reply

Trackbacks

  1. FunnyLoveFavs – Food + Internet | FunnyLove says:
    September 4, 2013 at 11:42 AM

    […]  I have shrimp and sprouts and spinach, and Jay voted Indian.  The spices from this lamb curry, this super simple chicken curry, or this Madras curry are what I’m currently deciding […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

family Hi! Thank you so much for being here. I'm Lindsay, and this is a blog about my life. I like to laugh a lot. Recipes, parenting, and mental health are all here, enjoy!
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter
Food Advertising by logo

Subscribe!

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 992 other subscribers

Best of FunnyLove

  • Five for Friday
  • Spicy Crab Salad (like in sushi!)
  • Easiest Protein EVER - Hibachi Shrimp
  • Easy Asparagus Casserole
  • Easy Loaded Baked Potato Soup {vegetarian}
  • Baby Sleep at Three Months
  • Pan Fried Potato Chips
  • Buffalo Chicken Salad Dip
  • Sausage Stuffed Mushrooms w/ Sweet + Spicy Marinara
  • Shrimp with Curry Cream Sauce
Food Advertising by logo

Footer

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter

Archives

Copyright © 2019 · Foodie Pro Theme by Shay Bocks · Built on the Genesis Framework · Powered by WordPress