I'VE just returned from a visit to see my family in Pakistan. I had an amazing time seeing everyone and catching up, while most of my time was spent eating my favourite traditional foods. Nowadays, in my home village, people use gas fires or electric cookers to cook food, but at the same time they are very much keeping the old traditions alive by cooking traditional foods in a traditional way.
And that means, cooking on a wood fire in the outdoors. People have small ovens in their courtyards where they cook their meals.
Spinach and potatoes (Sag aloo) is one of my favourite foods that my eldest nephew's wife cooked for me during my visit in the traditional way, on a wood fire.
Seeing as we're now in Autumn, and the British weather is not the best for cooking outdoors, it is probably best to stick to the kitchen. To find out more about Teresa and her cooking lessons, visit Yousafasiancookery.co.uk
Ingredients
1kg spinach
2 medium potatoes (diced)
1 medium onion (diced)
4 medium fresh tomatoes (chopped ) or half a large tin of chopped tomatoes
3 tbls cooking oil
1/4 tsp chilli powder
salt to taste
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp ground gram masala
1cm fresh ginger
3 cloves of fresh garlic
Method.
1 Brown the onions in the cooking oil.
2 Make a paste by adding the ginger, garlic and tomatoes in a blender.
3 When the onions are brown add the paste, chilli powder, turmeric, ground gram masala and salt and cook for two to three minutes on medium heat.
4 Add spinach and diced potatoes and cook until the potatoes soften and the water is completely dried out. During cooking stir occasionally to stop it sticking to the pan.
(There’s no need to add water when cooking spinach and potatoes as spinach is a very watery vegetable).
5 Eat with chapati or Naan bread.
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