Eliachi Gosht (meat cooked with cardamom)

I recently had a birthday and received a fair number of cookbooks. One of them is a wonderful cook/history/philosophy book called "50 great curries of india" by camellia panjabi. In this book she tells the reader about the background of indian cooking from different regions with the idea in mind that someday you will be making your own curries at home. Half the book is preparing you for improvising your own recipes so that you can cook just like the regional cooks.

Here's one that sasha and I tried last night. The flavors are subtle, but definitely there. Not satisfied with the rules, we started making changes in the middle. We were satisfied with the results:

Serves 6

2.25 lbs of lamb (on or off the bone)
1/2 cup plain yogurt
35 green cardamoms
1/2 cup oil (any kind will do, according to the book. We used Sesame Seed Oil)
2 tsp ground black pepper
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 teaspoon chile powder (we used traditional chile powder, I think next time we'll try to use a more traditional Asian pepper or birdseye pepper)
2 tsp coriander powder
3 medium tomatoes, sourish variety, finely chopped (the author talks a bit about tomatoes in the beginning of the book "Even when ripe the Indian tomato is slightly sour in taste, compared to European or American varieties. Its acidity level is also much higher. When using tomatoes for curry-making, avoid sweeter Italian tomatoes." (p. 38))
salt

1. If the lamb is on the bone, wash it in warm water. Whisk the yogurt with a fork in a bowl.

2. Grind the whole green cardamoms in a blender with a little water, or in a coffee grinder without water and then mix with a little water to make a paste. (we went the coffee grinder route with the cardamoms, coriander seeds, and black pepper. It was so cool. sasha laughed at me and called me a dork.)

3. Heat the oil in a cooking pot. Add the cardamom paste and the pepper, and fry over a low heat for 2-3 minutes. Add the meat and the turmeric, chile, and coriander powders, and saute for 10 minutes, stirring all the time to prevent the mixture from sticking to the bottom of the pot, adding water if necessary. The secret of success with this dish lies in making sure that the meat and spices are fried for a full 10 minutes without allowing the spices to burn. Therefore it is essential to keep the heat low and use the recommended amount of oil.

4. Lower the heat and add the yogurt, tomatoes, and salt to taste, and continue to saute for a further 5 minutes. Add about 4 cups of water (we only used 2, this is supposed to be a "thin gravy" but we were worried about diluting our mixture too much), cover the pot, and leave to simmer over a low heat until the meat is tender.

The recipe suggests serving it with chipatis or rice. We chose the latter, since it was less work (but the chipati recipe in the back of the book looks remarkably like a certain director's tortilla recipe). This was pretty easy, took us about an hour to prepare and maybe an hour to simmer (at the end of step 4). The leftovers look great, I'm staring at them right now.