I had a jar of Trader Joe’s curry sauce in the cupboard, so today I put a couple of pounds of boneless chicken thighs in my slow cooker. I added the jar of curry sauce, a cup of water, and then cooked it on “high” for 3½ hours. I ate it over plain white rice.
Now, the nearest Trader Joe’s is 50 miles away. It might be handy if I knew how to make curry from scratch.
Do any of you have any easy curry recipes?
Not super-quick or super-easy, but I don’t find it difficult. It’s great, and one of my favorite dishes:
THAI CHICKEN CURRY W/VEGIES
makes 4 large servings
In a medium-sized bowl, mix well:
1 tsp five-spice powder*
1/2 to 1 tsp salt (easy on the salt, maybe less)
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp MSG
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp ginger
1 tbl soy sauce
Cut 1.5 lb skinned, boned, chicken breasts into small pieces. Place in bowl
with spices and mix until chicken is thoroughly coated. Heat 2 tbl oil in
large skillet or wok over med-hi heat.
Now is a good time to begin cooking 15-min rice (make about 4 cups). Go
easy on the salt in the rice; the spices make this dish taste salty.
To the skillet, add chicken, cook for 5-8 mins stirring frequently until
no longer pink. Add to skillet and stir:
1 cup chicken broth
3 tsp curry powder
2 tbl rice wine vinegar or vinegar
1 14oz can coconut milk (not cream of coconut)**
Bring to boil and simmer uncovered 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Add:
sliced carrots
other vegies as desired (broccoli, cauliflower, red peppers, etc.);
(Mixed frozen vegies work fine).
Cook about 5 minutes until vegies are the desired tenderness. Add:
sliced water chestnuts
Stir enough to heat & blend water chestnuts. Serve immediately over rice.
** If coconut milk is not available, substitute more chicken broth and
use a thickening agent if desired.
NOTE that curry may permanently stain plastic utensils and plastic
storage dishes.
Musicat, your recipe includes “3 tsp curry powder” – but what are the ingredients of curry power? I assume it’s a multi-spice mixture – I’ve never heard of a curry tree or a curry plant.
Lemon curry?
Curry powder, unlike Five-Spice Powder, I have found readily available in every super- and notsosuper-market I have looked in; I doubt if you’ll have a hard time finding it. I have found it in bulk and the one-ounce “Spice Trend” tiny uniformly-sized containers. But you are right, it is a combination. The Spice Trend label says: “Coriander, fenugreek, tumeric, cumin, black pepper, bay leaves, celery seed, nutmeg, cloves, onion, red pepper, and ginger.”
I think the tumeric is the yellow stuff that discolors or eats into the storage containers. The end product stores better in glass ones.
try googling ‘curry powder recipe’
Supermarket curry powder isn’t a complete loss, but you’re better off looking for an Indian grocery and buying garam masala. Ask the storekeeper about the different varieties they have. You can also get some of the individual spices and adjust the flavour to taste, depending on the dish. (If you get a mortar and pestle to grind your spices and use it immediately, it will probably leave bits of grit in your food. Condition it first by grinding small amounts of rice until you get a batch that’s pure white.)
BrainGlutton, there is a curry plant, although the common use of the word ‘curry’ does refer to a spice mix. Look here for more than you wanted to know. (It’s a great site for spice info!)
Here’s a very casual, but delicious, recipe for vegetable curry that I’m happy to c/p. I have no idea how one might work meat into this; maybe add the cooked meat to the vegetables near the end of cooking? At any rate:
\ANNE’S VEGETABLE CURRY
to serve 2 or 3:
Saute gently in olive oil, not letting anything brown:
6 large cloves chopped garlic
About twice as much chopped ginger as garlic, or 1.5 times as much
1 medium onion, sliced
Chopped walnuts / sesame seeds / sunflower seeds
Add tamari or water if it sticks.
Raw Vegetables:
cauliflower
potatos, white and sweet (chop thinner than other things)
broccoli
carrots
snow peas
mushrooms
Add to the steamer near the end:
white cabbage
raisins (essential)
apple
Spices:
1/2 tsp five-spice
1/4 tsp curry powder
1/4 tsp cinnamon
Sauce:
(Add to the vegetables near the end of steaming)
Peanut Butter
Orange Juice
Procedure:
After the garlic and onions are sauteed, add the vegetables (except white cabbage, raisins, and apple) to the
sautee pan. Add some more tamari and 1/4 c. water. Cover and steam.
Near the end, add the cabbage, raisins, and apple, plus 1 Tblsp. of peanut butter and 1 Tblsp. of orange juice.
Serve over rice.
Garnishes:
Coconut
Yogurt (essential)
Chopped peanuts
Raw apple
Raw banana
Actually, curry is how you cook the dish, adding the spices first, then the rest, thereby mixing the spices with oil and bringing out the taste in a much better fashoin. (Source: my Indian cooking class, taught by an Indian chef).
Apparently, you’re all using a definition of “easy” of which I’m not aware! 
Looks like there’s no getting around gathering lots of spices and multi-step cooking if I want to make a proper curry.
I found this recipe for Chicken Vindaloo.
Vindaloo the Hard Way
2 t whole cumin seeds
2-3 hot, dried red chili peppers
1 t black peppercorns
1 t cardamom seeds (take seeds out of the pods)
3-inch stick of cinnamon
1 1/2 t whole black mustard seeds
1 t whole fenugreek seeds (if available)
5 T white wine vinegar
1 1/2 to 2 t salt
1 t light brown sugar
10 T vegetable oil
2 medium onions, peeled and sliced into fine half-rings
1 1/3 c water (or broth/stock)
2 lb boneless lamb (or pork or beef) shoulder meat, cut into
1-inch cubes
1-inch cube of fresh ginger, peeled and coarsely chopped
1 small, whole head of garlic, with all the cloves separated
and peeled
1 T ground coriander
1/2 t ground tumeric
Grind cumin seeds, red chilies, peppercorns, cardamom seeds, cinnamon, black mustard seeds, and fenugreek seeds in a coffee- grinder or other spice grinder. Put the ground spices in a bowl. Add the vinegar, salt, and sugar. Mix and set aside.
Heat the oil in a wide, heavy pot over a medium flame. Put in the onions. Fry, stirring frequently, until the onions turn brown and crisp. Remove the onions with a slotted spoon and put them into the container of an electric blender or food processor. (Turn the heat off.) Add 2 to 3 tablespoons of water to the blender and puree the onions. Add this puree to the ground spices in the bowl. (This is the vindaloo paste). It may be made ahead of time and frozen.)
Dry off the meat cubes with a paper towel and remove large pieces of fat, if any.
Put the ginger and garlic into the container of an electric blender or food processor. Add 2 to 3 Tablespoons of water and blend until you have a smooth paste.
Heat the oil remaining in the pot once again over a medium-high flame. When hot, put in the lamb cubes, a few at a time, and brown them lightly on all sides. Remove each batch with a slotted spoon and keep in a bowl. Do all the lamb this way. No put the ginger-garlic paste into the same pot. Turn down the heat to medium. Stir the paste for a few seconds. Add the coriander and tumeric. Stir for another few seconds. Add the meat, any juices that may have accumulated as well as the vindaloo paste and 1 cup water (or stock). Bring to a boil. Cover and simmer gently for an hour or until meat is tender. Stir a few times during this cooking period. Serves 6.
From Madhur Jaffrey’s Indian Cooking, accoring to the page.
Dead easy, non-traditional curry using left-over chicken or lamb:
Fry one chopped onion and 1 peeled chopped apple in about 3 TBSP of cooking oil til soft but not brown. Add 2 TBSP flour mixed with 2 TBSP curry powder and fry with onion/apple mixture until it starts to stick on bottom. Add left-over cubed chicken or lamb and then about two cups of water or chicken broth. Simmer 1/2 hour until thick, adding more water if necessary. Add salt to taste. Adding a bit of chutney if you have it is also good.
BTW: I finished off my Trader-Joe’s based curry for breakfast. A little on the mild side, but not a bad way to start the day.
Actually, there are two different plants which bear the name curry. There’s the curry plant, which isn’t used in much except for maybe potato salads and cream cheese. It’s so named because it smells like curry.
There is also a plant which produces curry leaves. These are used in the preparation of some curries. You can find them in some Asian stores. They’re only worthwhile if bought fresh. Dried curry leaves are tasteless.
But most curries are not made with this plant.
The easiest solution for quick & easy curries is to buy a jar of spice paste. Personally, I’m a fan of Thai green curry, so I have an enormous jar of green curry paste in the fridge. Heat some oil over a pan, add the curry paste, add some veggies (bamboo shoots, snow peas, etc.) and chicken. Fry. Pour in a can of coconut milk, and you’re done. Takes no more than 10 minutes to prepare.
For a 10-minute meal, I don’t think you can do better.
Speaking of Thai curries, nothing like a nice bowl of pa naeng for breakfast! I keep meaning to go to the Thai place down the street (in Birch Bay, of all places!) and getting some beef pa naeng and saving it for breakfast. Of course, that will now have to wait until next week.
Musicat, my husband and I make that very recipe (although ours calls for Garam Masala in place of the 5-spice powder, and no MSG. We also use “fish curry” and white wine vinegar, as opposed to regular curry and rice vinegar, but that’s more because it happens to be what we keep on hand, not because it makes it better or even different, necessarily) and we LOVE it. Very yummy recipe indeed. Johnny, I do recommend you try it – it’s not nearly as hard as it might appear to be.
We had a very tasty Murgh Masala for dinner last night. Mmmm, leftovers.
Hi Shayna! 
Check for other Curry?Indian threads. I say unto you PATAKS and just follow the directions on the jar/can. I used to be a legend amongst my friends because I could cook “proper” curries (my mother learnt from Indians) back in the 70s. With Pataks sauces anyone can do it now.
Curry leaves are a common Asian ingredient.
The Angua family curry recipe - handed down from mother to daughter:
For 2 people
Ingredients:
Method:
*Whilst this is happening, chop the onion finely, peel the potatoes and cut into 4 or 6 pieces.
*Once chicken is cooked (20 mins or so), take it out of the stock (but do not throw stock away), and cut chicken up into small-ish pieces.
*Add the potatoes and cook for about five minutes.
*In a small plate, mix the tomato puree with the curry powder, tumeric, some salt, chilli powder, and some more of the peppercorns, cardamom, cloves and cinnamon, as well as a large spoonful of the stock. Add to pan, and stir briskly to mix.
*Let this cook for about 3 or four minutes, before adding the chicken, and about half to three quarters of the stock. Stir to mix, and then leave to simmer until the potatoes have cooked.
Violla. Curry.
This has been tested by others, and apparantly its rather easy.
Oh, curry powder is the aforementioned garam masala.
Huh? I’ve never heard of curry powder and garam masala being used interchangeably.