Bendy Vegetable Curry

This might be even easier than soup as you don't even have to blend it.  So the night before last I got to supper time and on opening the fridge was faced with this rather unappetising selection of vegetables and very little else.  Not one to waste food I did some careful chopping and ended up with a delicious warming filling comforting curry, just what I needed after a long day of unpacking.  This is the perfect way to disguise slightly sad vegetables, make sure you always have a tin of coconut milk or cream and sachets of creamed coconut in the cupboard!

An onion

3 or 4 cloves garlic

A selection of bendy vegetables (this works equally well with gorgeous fresh veg obviously!), chopped potato (parboil these first or use up leftover boiled potatoes or mash) or sweet potato are pretty essential if you want a nice thick sauce.  You can also sprinkle in some desiccated coconut to

      thicken the sauce.

1 tin coconut milk

1 sachet creamed coconut (50g/2oz)

Spices to taste

(You could also add meat - either fresh or bits of leftover roast - brown in a hot pan with a little oil before adding the onions and continuing as below, or fish or prawns - add towards the end of the cooking time)

My rather grim looking mouldy sweet potatoes were fine once I'd cut off the mouldy bits and the carrots perked up after I peeled them.

The beans however were deliciously fresh, picked from my aunt's garden at the weekend!

Slice the onions and fry in a splash of oil.

When soft and turning golden, throw in the garlic for a minute stirring all the time (I also found a piece of fresh ginger in the freezer and grated that in too), then the potato or sweet potato.  Cook for another minute then add the rest of the vegetables.

Cook for a couple of minutes, stirring every now and then, then add the coconut milk, creamed coconut, spices (to taste - I used 5tsp of Garam Marsala mix - very flavoured but not spicy) and enough water to almost cover the vegetables

and simmer uncovered for about 40 minutes until the potatoes/sweet potatoes have mostly disintegrated.

If you are using very thin beans, mange tout peas, greens, frozen peas or any other vegetable that cooks quite quickly, you can add them nearer the end of the cooking time to keep them from turning to mush.

Serve with rice, naan, poppadoms or (I was too tired to cook anything else at this point) just loads of mango chutney!  So that unappealing pile of vegetables, made 6 servings of delicious curry, which is not bad at all considering they could have ended up in the bin!