TRY THIS FRUIT AND VEGGIE VEGAN CURRY!

Growing up in a British household, curry was a common meal in our house and a great way to use up leftovers. When I was a kid, Curry “Take-aways” were more prevalent in Britain than Pizza or Chinese restaurants here so I developed a real love of it. My mother would use left over meats from our traditional Sunday roasts and incorporate them with vegetables in a fruity curried sauce that I loved.

As a young adult in Canada, I was surprised that most of my friends had never eaten it and the few that had weren’t typically as fond of it as I was. Having eaten at a variety of Indian restaurants, I was always looking for a curry similar to my mom’s but very few lived up to it.

My kids were raised like I was, to eat a variety foods and at the very least, try new ones before forming an opinion on whether they liked them a lot. As a result, my kids as adults like almost everything and still experiment with things new to them. The curry I made then and the vegan curry I make now is like my mom’s and we all love it. With the cool weather that came in yesterday, I decided to make my vegan curry but this time I added Beyond Meat’s Chicken-Free strips and it was really good.

Fruit and Veggie Vegan Curry

Ingredients

1 medium onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

8-10 mushrooms, sliced

3 large carrots, sliced

3 stalks celery, sliced

1 zucchini, quartered and chopped in bite sized pieces

2 medium apples, peeled and chopped

½ cup raisins

1 can of full fat coconut milk

3 T. coconut oil

3-4 T. of your favourite curry powder

½ tsp ground ginger

¼ tsp ground cloves

¼ tsp cinnamon

½ lb Chicken-free strips or 1 small can of chickpeas, drained

Salt to taste

Directions

In a heavy pot over medium low heat, melt coconut oil and to it add the onions, garlic and mushrooms and gently cook them stirring frequently until onions clarify and mushrooms are soft. Add curry powder, ginger, cinnamon and cloves to them and fry a little longer until powders are well mixed into vegetables. Add the rest of the vegetables, apples, raisins and coconut milk, turn heat to low and simmer gently for about 40 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add chicken-free strips and simmer for another 10 – 15 minutes. Serve over rice or quinoa. This will feed 4 people and reheats well for lunch the next day.