Indonesian-Style Goat Curry
It's official. The goat book is out there and on sale. Early by a couple of weeks. It's available right here. (Bit of a shocking photo, eh?)
If you liked the ham tome, you'll love GOAT: MEAT, MILK, CHEESE. Let me give you the first sentence: "I lied while wearing make-up."
What? It doesn't sound like a cookbook? Oh, but it is: quick guide to butchering, the physics and chemistry of cheese-making, and over 100 of Bruce's killer recipes. Plus some rather salacious stories. One involves a poster of Farah Fawcett Majors. And yes, it's still a cookbook.
To celebrate, I'm going to drop an original recipe here, one Bruce created just for all of us who hang around this blog. This one's not in the book--call it a "blog exclusive": a hot and sour and spicy curry, just a little sweet, modeled less on Thai wet curries than on the savory ones found in Singapore and Indonesia. So let's get to it.
First, you need to make a spice melange. Start by toasting all of this in a dry skilet over medium-high heat: 1/4 cup (50 grams) unsalted shelled peanuts, 1/2 cinnamon stick (about 2 inches or 5 cm long), 6 whole cloves, and the seeds from 2 small green cardamom pods and 1 large black cardamom pod. You'll need to stir these things frequently to make sure nothing burns. Watch carefully. Pour all these spices in a small bowl and set aside.
Next, start the curry. Heat 2 tablespoons (30 ml) almond oil in a large pot over medium heat. Almond oil will offer a delicate sweetness under the spices. If you don't have it, try peanut oil--although it's more assertive.
Add 2 chopped shallots and 2 tablespoons (30 grams) minced peeled fresh ginger. Stir this around the pot a minute or so, then add 8 ounces (225 grams) sliced mushrooms. Stir these over the heat for a few minutes, until the mushrooms begin to give off their liquid and it reduces to a bubbling glaze.
Add 3 tablespoons (45 grams) yellow curry paste. Bruce prefers the Mae Ploy brand--it's not quite as tongue-piercing as some others. When you're buying curry pastes, make sure chiles are not the first thing in the ingredient list. You want aromatics galore. If yours is superhot, chiles first in the list, cut down the amount used.
Stir the curry paste into the mixture in the pot just until aromatic, then add the meat. You need 2 1/2 to 3 pounds (around 1 1/4 kilograms) bone-in goat stew meat. The best bet here is to use bone-in goat shoulder chops and cut them into 2-inch pieces, a bit of bone in each if possible. However, Bruce used ribs with big chunks of meat attached and stewed them whole. These are very unusual cuts, the rib cage in big, long segments. Shoulder chops are much easier.
All that said, if you don't have goat, you can use lamb--like lamb shoulder chops. Sure, it'll be a little stronger, a little gamier. It's not goat! But it'll do in a pinch.
Stir these over the heat until browned, then pour in 1 cup (240 ml) coconut milk. Bring this to a bubble, stirring to get up the browned bits from the bottom of the pot.
Then add 2 medium bell peppers, cored, seeded, and chopped. You'll note this technique in many curries: the vegetables are not necessarily browned. We did so with the mushrooms, but that was to release some of their trapped water so it wouldn't drown the stew. We're not looking for the caramelization of vegetable sugars. Rather, we're looking for a fresher, milder taste.
Now stir in all of the following: the toasted peanut/spice mixture, 3 tablespoons (45 ml) fish sauce, 3 tablespoons (45 ml) lime juice, 2 tablespoons (6 grams) grated palm sugar, and 2 teaspoons (20 grams) tamarind concentrate.
Grated palm sugar: that's the ticket. It'll give the stew a lovely finish, a little mineraly, not quite as sweet as brown sugar. But packed light brown sugar can be used in a pinch. But note this: there's not as much sugar added here as to some Thai coconut curries. We want this more savory than sweet. It's a hot/sour balance, actually, given the lime juice and tamarind concentrate.
Stir those spices into the simmering liquid, then pour in 1 1/2 cups (360 ml) reduced-sodium chicken broth. And you're done. For a good long while. Put the lid on the pot and bring it to a simmer. Reduce the heat and simmer slowly until the meat is tender, between 2 and 2 1/2 hours, maybe a little longer, depending on the interstitial collagen content of the meat.
Serve the stew by garnishing the bowlfuls with chopped cilantro. We had ours over white rice. But the mix is so hearty, it could stand up brown rice, even medium-grain brown rice--or even black rice. It's so good and savory, the perfect thing for a chilly evening, refreshing but comforting all at once. I hope it'll turn you on to goat. Or even if you used lamb, you'll see that those flavors could work so well with this global meat I hope you get to know very soon.
Mark Scarbrough | Posted on Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 9:42AM | in Bruce's Asian Obsession, Comfort Food, Curries, Main Courses braise, braised goat, comfort food, curry, goat, goat curry, goat meat, indonesian curry, spices
Reader Comments (5)
Mark, this curry recipe is intriguing and the result looks and sounds incredibly delicious. Am I seriously the only person commenting on this? Yum! Note that the more this moves from savory to sweet, in its variations, the less cilantro you'll want to use. That's my guess. But in the more savory editions it can be replaced with coriander seed added to the original toasted spice/nut mix?
Yep, you're it--although since the recipe has gone up, there have been 278 original hits and over 700 subscribers looking at it. I thought maybe it was a bad choice for a recipe. I think this blog gets great traffic and few responders. Ah, well. Anyway, you could do that with coriander seeds, adding them at the start, but the green color at the end adds a nice appeal for the eyes, something the curry can lack as it comes out of the pot. Maybe chopped basil leaves if coriander seeds are added to the original spice mix?
M.
Yes, I agree- thai basil!
Yummm...goat curry...must say I don't recall eating much of it in either Singapore or Indonesia, but I believe it's a mainstay in Nepal!
Celia: Indonesia is one of the great goat destinations, more eaten there per capita than anywhere else in southeastern Asia. Goat, after all, can be halal, and so fits into dietary strictures quite nicely.
M.