Vegetable Korma

Of the many delicious meals Indian cuisine has to offer, vegetable korma will forevermore be at the top of my list. I started to fall in love with Indian food before I was a vegetarian. Thus when I started to tweak my diet I had the beautiful opportunity of exploring new dishes.

From what I understand, Southern Indian food is mostly vegetarian anyway. They utilize lots of lentils and chickpeas to make rather healthy dishes. The creamier curries found in most Indian restaurants in the U.S. originate in Northern India.

Of course there is a huge spectrum in between and I’ve just dipped my toe into the cuisine so there is still much more to explore.

Once I developed my list of favorites to order at a restaurant, it was only natural for me to try and replicate them at home. Well here I am several years later. I’ve purchased a handful of super authentic Indian family cook books. I have been on more than a few treasure hunts to source fresh Indian spices. And yet, my dishes never seemed to hit the spot the way they do when ordered.

My family and friends were kind. They said things like, “They probably just use a ton of cream and ghee to make their dishes taste so good.” But I wasn’t satisfied. So one day I threw caution to the wind and just decided to improvise. The result was a totally un-authentic, but totally delicious homemade version of vegetable korma.

It was the first time my taste-testers took a bite and said, “Mmm…this tastes like it does at Sitar!” (Sitar is our favorite Indian restaurant.) So here’s the recipe I created that day, and have made many times since.