When I lived in Saudi Arabia back in the Dark Ages, Indian, Goanese, and Pakistani workers would get workers’ visas so they could come on as domestics for American and British oil company employees. Pedro was a Pakistani man who worked as a cook for our friends the Dakers.
Pedro was a past master of concocting curry dishes for American and English tastes. It was a challenge, because many fresh products were unavailable, and so he had to make do with a lot of canned and dried goods. I’d like to share with you two dishes he used to make for his employers: Pedro’s curry and Pedro’s curry puffs.
Curry Puffs
As a little girl, no snack food thrilled me more than Pedro’s amazingly delicious and tongue-singeing curry puffs. He used to make real puff pastry, layer after layer after layer of folded-together butter and dough that took at least a full day to create. Unless you love to stand in the kitchen, substitute the sheets of puff pastry you can get in the grocery store freezer, or sheets of phyllo dough, also available in most supermarkets.
Given his choice, he likely would have used lamb. He was probably Moslem, and if so he wouldn’t have used pork, nor do I ever recall him adding it. He used ground beef. I’ve combined ground beef and lamb in this recipe, to good effect. Try to get the best quality curry powder you can find, or make your own.
You need:
• puff pastry dough or phyllo dough
• hamburger, ground lamb, ground pork, or some combination thereof
• an onion, chopped
• one or two cloves of garlic, minced (Pedro used garlic powder)
• a little olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste
• a lot of curry powder
Sauté the onion in enough olive oil to cover the bottom of a skillet. Lift the onion out of the pan and brown the ground meat in the onion-flavored oil. Add the minced garlic. If a lot of water cooks out of the meat into the pan, drain the liquid by dumping the meat into a sieve or colander and then put the meat back into the pan. Mix the onions back in to the meat. Season with salt and pepper, and then stir in enough curry powder to raise the hair on your head. Just keep adding and tasting until it’s good and zingy. When the meat is cooked through and the spice combined well, remove from the heat.
Preheat the oven to about 375 degrees.
Roll out the pastry dough on a floured board (if using phyllo, work with a small amount at a time, keeping the remainder moist under a dampened clean kitchen towel). Cut it into pieces about 4 inches wide by about 8 inches long. Place a dollop of the curried meat in the middle of a piece of dough. Fold the short ends inward over the meat, and then fold the longwise ends over those. Pinch to seal. Place on a baking pan.
When the pan is full (leave some space between each packet), cook the curry puffs in a fast oven until nicely puffed and brown. Allow them to cool before eating—the filling can get very hot.
Serve as an hors d’oeuvre, or to small scavenging children who hang around your kitchen.
Pedro’s Curry
This is a stew-like affair, from what I’m told unlike anything real Asians eat. Apparently it was designed for Anglo-Saxon diners.
You need:
A wide variety of condiments:
• grated or flaked coconut
• papadums or thin, crunchy crackers such as Wheat Thins
• chutney, preferably mango chutney
• high-quality plain yogurt (an afterthought; we didn’t have it in Arabia)
• toasted almonds or pine nuts
• rice cooked with raisins
Ingredients for the curry:
• stew beef (lamb is also good) cut in two-inch chunks
• 1 large can of tomatoes
• plenty of curry
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 or 2 cloves garlic, minced, or 1/8 to 1/4 tsp garlic powder
• a little olive or cooking oil (we had no olive oil; Pedro used Crisco)
• beef or chicken stock (I have added red wine, but of course we didn’t have it out there)
• various canned, frozen, or fresh vegetables: peas, carrots, corn, string beans, etc.
• optional: a potato, cubed
In a stock pot or good-sized Dutch oven, brown the onions in the oil. Remove the onions and set aside. Add the meat to the hot oil, a few pieces at a time, and brown on all sides. Put the onions back into the pot. Lower the heat and add three to six tablespoons of curry powder. Stir well; then turn off the heat. Allow the meat to stand for an hour or two, soaking in the flavors of the curry.
Return to the stove and add the can of tomatoes and about three or four cups of broth. If you wish (assuming you’re not living in the Middle East), add a dollop or two of red wine. Simmer for an hour or two to cook the meat well and blend flavors.
If you’re using fresh vegetables such as carrots or potatoes, add them far enough ahead of serving time to cook them through. Add each vegetable with serving time in mind. I like to use frozen veggies, because they’re fresher-tasting than the canned vegetables we had overseas but are parboiled and so needed simmer as long in the pot.
While the curry is simmering, cook up some rice: one cup dry rice will serve three or four diners. Bring 2 1/2 cups water to the boil for every one cup of dry rice you plan to use. When the water reaches a boil, add the rice and turn the heat to medium-low. Add a quarter cup of raisins for each cup of dry rice. Cover and simmer. Length of cooking time depends on the kind of rice you use. I prefer converted rice (sold under the Uncle Ben’s label in supermarkets); it takes about 20 to 25 minutes to cook.
While the rice is cooking, turn the oven to 400 degrees and toast some almonds or pine nuts–again, about a quarter-cup per cup of rice. Lay them flat on a cookie sheet and place in the hot oven; watch carefully, because they’ll brown quickly.
If you’re serving papadums, fry them in hot oil while the rice is cooking.
To serve, place the cooked rice and curry in separate serving dishes to take to the table. Pass the condiments in small serving bowls.
Guests serve themselves rice, spoon the curry over it, and then top the dish with condiments. Waldorf salad makes a very good accompaniment to curry.
