Slow-Cooked Lamb Massaman Curry

My Slow-Cooked Lamb Massaman Curry is a creamy curry with tender chunks of lamb and potato.  The homemade Massaman paste comes together in 5 minutes.

Slow-Cooked Lamb Massaman Curry.  Ahhh just the title makes my mouth water.

Just home from 5 days of sight-seeing in London, it was a toss-up whether I was looking forward to being back in my own bed, being welcomed home by our two cats, or making and eating this curry.

Sorry cats, I did miss you, but the curry wins.

What a week in London! We had so much fun! Gracey has been learning about the Great Fire of London at school and has wanted to go since then.  Chris and I have only ever been there on business so we were looking forward to the eating, shopping and the famous sites.

We must have covered 8 miles a day and there was so much to see during all that walking that I barely heard a moan from my five-year old (I don’t think we were ever going to manage a completely moan-free trek of that distance).

If you haven’t been, then I totally recommend it!

Quick list – here’s what we managed in 5 days:

• Portabello Market – the worlds largest antique market – so much cool vintage stuff
• Hummingbird bakery – the intention was to pick up some carrot cake or something for the next day’s breakfast, however I walked out armed with chocolate and salted caramel cupcakes that certainly didn’t last until breakfast
• Tower of London – some serious bling in those crown jewels
• The Shard – Western Europe’s tallest building – the view at night was amazing! One of the cheaper apartments in this building will set you back a mere £50 million
• Monument to the Great Fire of London – Gracey was a little disappointed to find no puddings for sale on Pudding Lane
• Harrods – Amongst the £40k children’s cars and the £25k bottles of whiskey – you can actually buy bars of gold here (about £275k in case you were interested)
• Buckingham Palace – we only got as far as the gates, but they were pretty gates…
• Hamley’s toy store – 7 floors of ‘I really want that mummy’ can grate just a little
• Piccadilly Circus – 5 minutes from our hotel and soooo busy
• Nelson’s Column – the iconic monument has stood for over 170 years
• Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament – amazing architecture
• Speedboat ride on the Thames – so much fun whizzing around the Thames to James Bond music
• Science Museum – So many hands-on activities for the kids and totally free (donations gratefully accepted though)
• Chinatown – They were preparing for Chinese New Year whilst we were there.  It was so hard choosing which one of the 80 Chinese restaurants to eat in!
• Covent Garden – very pretty with nice shops and eateries plus street entertainers (Gracey enjoyed embarrassing me in the middle of a crowd by loudly questioning ‘mummy why is that man naked?’ – he was wearing shorts whilst lying on his bed of nails I might add!)

Oh, and I also got to spend half a day on a knife skills course at the brilliant Leith’s school of food and wine.  I loved every minute of it, ok maybe not the bit where I was scooping out fish guts from my seabass, but otherwise it was great!

Ok, maybe that wasn’t such a short list…

Coming back to the curry now.  I won’t go on too much further except to say this is a really good freezer recipe, and the homemade Massaman sauce comes together very quickly.

My Slow-Cooked Lamb Massaman Curry is based on my Beef Massaman curry recipe, and works perfectly to get that fall-apart meat along with potatoes that are full of flavour from being cooked in the sauce.

I use chillies in my recipe, but you can leave them out if you have anyone who doesn’t like it too spicy.  If I’m making this for the whole family, I tend to leave the chillies out, then dish up the children’s portion first.  Then I’ll add chopped chillies and cook them for a couple of minutes in the sauce before serving up to the adults.  It doesn’t give quite the same depth of chilli heat, but is a good compromise.

If you like slow cooker recipes then take a look at my slow cooker roundup for more ideas for what to make in your slow cooker.

Serving Suggestions:

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5 from 4 votes

Slow-Cooked Lamb Massaman Curry

By Nicky Corbishley

Slow Cooked Lamb Massaman Curry – tender lamb and potatoes with coconut milk and an easy homemade massaman sauce.

Prep Time: 15 minutes mins

Cook Time: 2 hours hrs 35 minutes mins

Total Time: 2 hours hrs 50 minutes mins

Servings: 5 servings

Course: Dinner

Cuisine: Asian

Ingredients

Massaman Paste (makes about 6 tbsp):

• ▢ 1 red onion chopped
• ▢ 2 or 3 red chillies depending on how hot you like it, roughly chopped
• ▢ 2 tsp ground coriander
• ▢ 2 tsp cumin
• ▢ ½ tsp cinnamon
• ▢ ½ tsp white pepper
• ▢ 3 cloves of garlic peeled
• ▢ 2 sticks of lemongrass outer leaves removed, softer inside chopped finely (or 2 tsps. of lemongrass paste)
• ▢ 5 cm piece ginger peeled and roughly chopped
• ▢ 1 tsp shrimp paste optional, also it’s generally gluten free, but best to check
• ▢ 3 tsp fish sauce
• ▢ 1 tsp brown sugar
• ▢ 10 fresh coriander/cilantro stalks you’ll be using the leaves later to server, so just wrap them in a bit of damp tissue to keep them fresh
• ▢ ½ tsp salt

Other curry ingredients:

• ▢ 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• ▢ 1 kg (2.2 lbs) casserole lamb chopped into chunks
• ▢ 1.5 tbsp cornflour
• ▢ pinch of salt and pepper
• ▢ 400 ml (1 2/3 cups) beef/chicken/lamb stock – 2 stock cubes with water is fine use kallo beef bouillon cubes for gluten free
• ▢ 400 ml (1 2/3 cups) can coconut milk it’s usually gluten free, but double check
• ▢ 2 large red or white potatoes peeled and chopped into chunks
• ▢ 250 g (9 oz) green beans roughly chopped
• ▢ Juice of 1 lime

To Serve:

• ▢ Boiled rice
• ▢ Chopped fresh coriander/cilantro
• ▢ Chopped red chillies
• ▢ Lime wedges

Instructions 

• Place all the paste ingredients in a food processor or mini chopper and blend until it forms a paste. Set aside.
  1 red onion, 2 or 3 red chillies, 2 tsp ground coriander, 2 tsp cumin, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp white pepper, 3 cloves of garlic, 2 sticks of lemongrass, 5 cm piece ginger, 1 tsp shrimp paste, 3 tsp fish sauce, 1 tsp brown sugar, 10 fresh coriander/cilantro stalks, 1/2 tsp salt
• Heat the oil in a large pan.
  2 tbsp vegetable oil
• Toss the chopped lamb in the cornflour, salt and pepper.
  1 kg (2.2 lbs) casserole lamb, 1.5 tbsp cornflour, pinch of salt and pepper
• Fry the meat in the oil for about 5 mins on medium to high heat. You can do this in batches, but I’m a bit too lazy for that. I find that if you put the meat in, and leave it alone for a few minutes before you stir it, you’ll get a nice dark colour on the lamb. The lamb will probably stick a bit to the pan, so you might need to give it a little scrape with a spatula.
• Once the lamb has cooked for 5 mins, turn down the heat a little and add in the curry paste. Give it a stir to coat the lamb and let it cook for a couple of minutes. Then add in the beef/chicken/lamb stock and coconut milk. Give everything a stir (make sure you give any bits stuck at the bottom of the pan a scrape), place the lid on and gently simmer on a low heat for 1 hour 45 mins (alternatively you can place in the oven at about 160C/320F (fan)). Give it a stir every so often. If it’s starting to look dry you can add in some more stock or water.
  400 ml (1 2/3 cups) beef/chicken/lamb stock – 2 stock cubes with water is fine, 400 ml (1 2/3 cups) can coconut milk
• After the 1 hour 45 mins, add in the potatoes, give it a stir and cook for a further 25 mins until the potatoes are tender (this is a good time to start cooking your rice too).
  2 large red or white potatoes
• After the potatoes have cooked for 25 minutes, add in the green beans. Stir and cook for 5 minutes, then turn off the heat (or take out of the oven) and mix in the lime juice.
  250 g (9 oz) green beans, Juice of 1 lime
• Serve the curry on a bed of rice with a sprinkling of coriander/cilantro, fresh chillies and a wedge of lime.
  Boiled rice, Chopped fresh coriander/cilantro, Chopped red chillies, Lime wedges

Notes

Any leftovers can be cooled, covered and frozen. Defrost thoroughly and reheat until piping hot in the microwave or in a pan.

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Nutritional Information is per serving, without boiled rice.

Nutrition

Calories: 622kcal | Carbohydrates: 27g | Protein: 25g | Fat: 46g | Saturated Fat: 28g | Cholesterol: 99mg | Sodium: 750mg | Potassium: 1059mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 5g | Vitamin A: 810IU | Vitamin C: 44.6mg | Calcium: 88mg | Iron: 6.2mg

Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.

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