Cashew and Cauliflower Korma

Who doesn't love a good korma? This recipe turned out better than i expected; we used a recipe from our 'Vegetable Bible', but this is a bit of a variation. You can get 4-6 servings out of this recipe, and you can put it in the freezer.

Ingredients:

• 95g unsalted cashews
• 1 tbsp garlic
• 1/2 tbsp ginger
• approx 200ml water
• 55g ghee or vegetable oil
• 1 large onion (chopped)
• 1tsp cardamom powder
• 1tsp cinnamon powder
• 1tsp turmeric
• 250ml cream
• 140g potatoes
• half a cauliflower (cut into small florets)
• 1tsp garam masala
• 2-3tsp chili flakes
  
• 1 medium aubergine/eggplant (cut into small pieces)
• 140g green beans (chopped)
• salt & pepper
• fresh mint or coriander (chopped - to garnish)

Let's DO our THANG:

The first thing you want to do is dry cook the cashews in your pot until they are browned and delicious. The smell is amazing, a bit like popcorn. Once browned, set one handful aside for garnish, and put the rest into a blender with the garlic, ginger, and about a tablespoon or so of water. Szhoozsh it up until it makes a paste. Leave this to one side.

Okay, now you want to melt your ghee/vegetable oil in a pot (make sure this pot has a lid for later simmering). Once it's all melted, you want to brown your onion (should take about 5-8 mins), then you can add your nut paste.

Stir it around for about 5 mins, and now you can add in your cardamom, cinnamon, and turmeric. Just after adding these powders you can start to stir in the cream and the rest of your water. From here, you bring it to boil, and then let it simmer (covered) for about 5 mins. It should start to smell really yummy at this point!

Okay, now you can add in your potatoes, cauliflower, chili flakes, and the garam masala. If you're like me and you really like garam masala, you can add in a little extra (tee hee). Now, you want to let it simmer again (covered) for another 10 mins. The potatoes should start to get a little bit softer before you add in your green beans and your aubergine.

Now, our original recipe said 'simmer for 5 mins or until vegetables are tender'. Excuse me? Potatoes do NOT take 5 mins on medium heat. They need much longer. For us, it was almost another 15 mins on simmer, but it's entirely up to you to check and taste your potatoes.

Just before serving, you will want to add a little bit of salt and pepper. Now, it's really your choice as to how you serve this. You can have it 'as-is', or you can have it with brown rice, white rice, or cous cous.

We chose cous cous simply because we were really hungry and cous cous is really quick n easy to make! Hehe. We used chopped mint and our leftover handful of roasted cashews as a garnish (the ones we didn't nibble on whilst cooking!) ENJOY!