Aloo gobi is great because it is simple, delicious, and it sounds like a dirty joke. It’s also incredibly cheap because it’s based on potato, which is basically free, and it just uses all the standard spices from your drawer, no specialty pastes or anything.
The key is frying your potato for a good long time in thicc buttery goodness first. You don’t need to cook them all the way through – the curry is going to boil them, but it can turn a bland starch into the absolute star of your meal.
- Start by getting a frying pan on a med-high heat and melting a good chunk of butter in it – 50-100g should work. Chop 2 or 3 big potatoes into rough cubes and throw them in.
- After 5 minutes or so, throw in a couple of chopped onions. Add more butter or some oil if needed. You want to get to the point where your onions are softened and browing, and your potatoes look nice and browned on the outside, but the inside is still too hard to eat.
- Turn your heat down a little, then add like 7 or 8 cloves of garlic (the more the better) and a teaspoon of ginger, and fry them off for a minute or two before adding around a tablespoon each of curry powder and garam masala, plus a teaspoon each of cumin and coriander, as well as some chilli powder if you are that way inclined. As a general rule, the longer you fry them for the more of a kick the spices will have. If the powder is starting to stick to the bottom and burn, add a dollop of coconut cream and turn it into a paste.
- Add a couple of cans of tomatey boys and around the same amount of either coconut cream or cream. You can add other veges such as carrot or spinach at this point too. Turn the heat up high until you get it to a boil, then turn it right down and let it simmer. Give it 15 minutes for the potatoes to soften a bit and get the flavour into them. Then add like half a cauliflower, ripped up into pieces and let it simmer in the sauce. After 15-20 minutes the cauliflower should be cooked and the flavours of the sauce infused.
Make sure to season the fuck out of it, and like most things, the more cream the nicer it will be.
Bonus Tip: Try adding peanuts or peanut butter for a sweeter, more mellow curry.