Pumpkin coconut curry
Pumpkin coconut curry
A good warming curry is one of my favourite things to eat in cold weather. Being able to transform a bunch of everyday ingredients into a mouth-watering dish with a judicious use of spices feels like culinary wizardry.
One day, I am hoping to be able to visit India and get some curry making lessons from a master. For now, I have to rely on my general cooking knowledge, experience of eating various curries over the years and a method of trial and error.
The spicing of this dish took me a few goes and I’m really pleased with the final result. It is super simple and quick to make and even though dry roasting and then grinding your own spices is preferable to using an already ground one, sometimes speed and convenience are more of a consideration.
This pumpkin coconut curry has a bit of a kick (use less chilli if you don’t like hot food) which is nicely soothed by the cooling coconut sauce. It’s delicious with dry roasted cashews and fresh coriander leaves on top. As curries and stews tend to gain more flavour over time, make this dish a day ahead and I promise that you’ll have a sudden urge to lick your plate clean;).
- about 600 g pumpkin or butternut squash, cut into equal size cubes
- 2 tbsp rapeseed / canola oil
- 1 tsp black mustard seeds
- 1 small red onion, finely chopped
- 4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
- 4 tsp finely grated ginger
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- ½-1 hot red chilli, sliced
- ¼ tsp hot chilli powder
- 1½ tsp garam masala
- 1½ tsp ground coriander
- 1 tsp turmeric
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1-2 tsp maple syrup
- a handful of coriander, stalks chopped* + leaves for serving
- 2 cups / 1 tin full-fat coconut milk
- ½ tin chopped tomatoes / 1 large tomato (peeled and chopped)
- about 1¼ tsp fine sea salt
- lime wedges, to serve
- handful of cashews, lightly toasted (to serve)
- OPTIONAL STEP: I prefer my pumpkin caramelised so instead of cooking it in the curry sauce, I roasted it in the oven. I drizzled it with olive oil, sprinkled with some salt and baked on a baking tray in a 200° C / 390° F oven for about 30 mins.
- Heat up oil on a medium heat, in a heavy bottom pan. Once the oil is hot, add mustard seeds and wait until they start popping, stirring from time to time. Wait another minute before adding onion.
- Add chopped onion, sweat it gently, stirring from time to time until it gets almost soft.
- Add garlic, ginger, fresh chilli and chopped coriander stalks. Cook for 2 minutes stirring frequently so that ginger does not stick to the pan.
- Now add all the ground spices and 1 tsp of salt. Reduce the heat to low and coat everything in the pot in spices. Stir frequently, cook for 1-2 minutes until all spices are fragrant.
- Add chopped tomatoes and ¼ cup / 60 ml of water. Cook for 2 minutes until tomatoes become mushy.
- Add coconut milk and pumpkin. Let everything come to a gentle boil, simmer covered until pumpkin is tender. If you’re roasting the pumpkin, simmer the sauce for about 10 minutes.
- Taste and adjust spicing if needed. I added a bit more salt and a 2 teaspoons of maple syrup.
- Serve with coriander leaves and chopped cashews on top, with basmati rice or a vegan naan. A side of spicy coconut kale goes really well with it too.
As with most curries and stews, the flavours of this dish benefit from being made a day ahead.
So easy and delicious. We aren’t fans of coriander so I substituted with flat leaf parsley.
Will certainly be making this again!!
Yum!! Can't wait to check out your other recipes :)
I made a few adjustments (no chili cause of my little one) and no maple syrup as I found it sweet enough from the pumpkin. But the spice mix and thick coconut sauce are simply delicious!
Hugs from Germany
I'm glad you are planning to make this curry - it's one of my favs! I hope you'll like it too! I just checked the recipe and I am not sure where you got the 2 cups coconut milk equals to 480 g. 2 cups equals 480 milliliters though. I tend to give dry ingredients in grams and ounces and cups if possible and liquid ingredients in milliliters and cups. Hope that answers your question. Ania
to be honest I was not expecting this punch of flavours in one dish!
My husband loved it so will repeat for sure!
Thanks a lot!
Great stuff! Thanks so much!
I just made your pumkin curry for dinner and it was amazing!!!I added pumpkin seeds instead I didn ´t have cashews at home😀can ´t wait until my husband is going to eat it later.Great recipe!!
Thanks, Lazy Cat!!
I usually never leave comments but I had to because I've been coming back to this amazing recipe more times than I can count.
Thank you so much for sharing!
Lots of love from Denmark
My tip: reduce the maple syrup and cinnamon just a tad - unless you really like sweet curries!
You can either peel it and cut into same-size cubes or leave the skin on and cut into same-size slices (I sometimes do half-moons) and then peel the skin off with a pairing knife after roasting UNLESS you are using the type of pumpkin with edible skin. Hope that helps! Ania
One change I'd make, and I think it's good you know, is to use a different oil than Canola, it's basically Canadian Oil from the Rapeseed plant that has been genetically engineered & modified to be used in food products here in the US. Here's just one excerpt from Snopes.com... please look into this oil before using again...
[Canola oil from the rape seed, referred to as the Canadian oil because Canada is mainly responsible for it being marketed in the USA. The Canadian government and industry paid our Federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA) $50 million dollars to have canola oil placed on the (GRAS) List, “Generally Recognized As Safe”. Thus a new industry was created. Laws were enacted affecting international trade, commerce, and traditional diets. Studies with lab. animals were disastrous. Rats developed fatty degeneration of heart, kidney, adrenals, and thyroid gland. When canola oil was withdrawn from their diets, the deposits dissolved but scar tissue remained on all vital organs. No studies on humans were made before money was spent to promote Canola oil in the USA.]
thank you again for the wonderful recipe!
Sincerely, from one "foodie" to the next,
God bless, Marcy~
PS: As I live in Europe, I use British rapeseed (canola) oil rather than US/Canadian one so not sure if the above applies. The type of oil used for sauteing is up to the individual, it does not need to be rapeseed oil per se if you would rather avoid it.
But I have to admit I was really a lazy cat so I used a pumpkin masala I recently bought. But it has the same spices as you used. I will definitely make this more often, now that the pumpkin season started. Thanks for this inspiration!
http://www.pleasanthillmarket.net/pumpkin-coconut-curry/
Thanks so much, I'm glad to hear that you like this recipe. It has a bit of a kick, for sure so if you are not too keen on spice go easy (or skip altogether) on both fresh and ground chilli. Other spices used don't contribute to the hotness at all.
Hope that helps,
Ania
That definitely helps! Thanks so much for your reply! Looking forward to trying this out! Thanks for sharing! :)
Thank you so much, your comment made my day! :) x
It smells and tastes divine can only imagine how it will be tomorrow after flavours develop even further . Thank you for a great recipe
Overall it was a very nice warm wintery curry that really did get even better the next day! I combined it with buckwheat, and it was a surprisingly good combo.
Thank you for inspiring! :)