Curried slop. The Royal Indian Mounted Food Control Police would not have approved. In fact, I can easily imagine the pinched expression of pain on his face as he regarded this travesty of “Indian” cooking. Ground beef (NO!), Celery (NO!), Worcestershire sauce (God NO!), Apple (NO, NO, NO!!). All of these are ingredients in my mother’s curried beef (my personal favorite childhood dish). I took it a step or two, or 10 further. I was pretty unconcerned about measuring, wildly throwing in teaspoons of curry, coriander, ginger, you know, whatever was Indianish. Then I slopped in some tomato paste and a can of “Italian” chopped tomatoes, I figured you’d never taste the itty bitty amount of oregano and I was right.
The taste of the final product had more in common with pumpkin pie than lasagna although there was no cinnamon or nutmeg in it.
It was delicious. I ate it with sour cream and chopped raw onions in a sort of deconstructed raita while I watched Poldark. Whatever he was having for dinner did not look as toothsome as my meal and it certainly fit companionably in the slop category but I feel that his probably didn’t violate the myriad food rules mine had.
