This is one of my most recent recipes for a nice thick beef gravy dish that is fairly spiced and cooked so well that the meat literally melts in your mouth. I have been cooking beef curries for a while and have tried various combination of spices and ingredients over the years. The following dish uses some of the typical south Indian spices and techniques to cook a wonderful meal.
The key to a tasty dish is the right amount of spices. Too much, the flavors could be over powering, too less and the flavors could be mild. For this beef curry, we are going to use few whole spices, fresh onions, potatoes and some spice powders. Lets dive straight in to the ingredients
Ingredients
- 2 lbs beef cubes
- 3 medium red onions, finely chopped
- 4 green chillies
- 3 medium potatoes, skinned, and cut in cubes
- 1 cup yogurt
- 300 ml water
- 1/2 cup canola or olive oil
- 1 tblspn Garam masala
Spice powders
- 1 tspn turmeric powder
- 2 tblspn curry powder
- 2 tblspn Kashmiri chilli powder (non spicy and adds color and flavor)
- 1 tblspn ginger powder
- 1 tblspn garlic powder
- 1 tblspn table salt, and more as required
Whole spice to grind
- 2 bay leaf
- 1 tblspn fennel seeds
- 6 green cardamom
- 6 cloves
- 2 small cinnamon sticks
Grind these to a fine powder using a small grinder.
Steps
- Add turmeric to beef cubes
- Add all dry spices, except garam masala, to the meat and mix well
- Place heavy bottom pressure cooker over medium flame
- Add 1/2 cup oil and when its hot add the ground whole spice powder and stir
- Once it starts to sizzle add chopped onions
- Fry on medium heat until the onions are well done and light browned
- Now add whole green chillies and fry for about a minute
- Add the beef and spice mixture to the pressure cooker and cook for about 2 minutes
- Add yogurt and stir
- Add chopped potatoes
- Add 1 tblspn salt and 300ml water
- At this point the ingredients should look like this
- Once the water starts to boil, securely close with the pressure cooker lid
- Let it cook for 4 whistles or about 15 minutes on medium heat
- Turn off the stove.
- After cooking, do not manually release the pressure, and wait until the pressure is naturally released. This could take about 20 to 30 minutes.
- Once its safe to open the cooker lid, do so carefully and the dish should look this.
- The dish would be piping hot
- Now add 1 tblspn of Garam masala and some chopped fresh coriander leaves to the dish and mix gently.
- Carefully serve Beef and potato curry in a bowl
This was so easy to cook, with only dry spices and tastes fantastic. You can add more chillies to increase the heat if required. This goes really well with white rice, chapati, roti etc.
Try it and let me know.