Sour: pork vindaloo recipe

If you are the sort of excellent person who likes to look forward to what you’ll eat later in the week, you can make this well ahead.

Mark Diacono17 October 2019

SERVES 4 GENEROUSLY

Ingredients
*800g pork shoulder, cut into 3cm chunks
*4 tbsp coconut oil or vegetable oil
*500g onions (about 4 medium onions), thinly sliced
*75g tamarind block or 5 tbsp paste from a jar
*12 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
*6cm piece of fresh ginger, peeled and finely chopped
*4 medium-hot chillies, deseeded and finely chopped
*400g tin chopped tomatoes
*16 curry leaves
*3 tsp black mustard seeds
*1 tsp salt

For the masala paste
*2 tbsp Kashmiri red chilli powder or hot paprika
*10 green cardamom pods, seeds only
*1 tsp black peppercorns
*6 cloves
*1 tbsp cumin seeds
*1 tbsp coriander seeds
*1 tbsp ground turmeric
*6cm cinnamon stick
*80ml banana
*vinegar or cider vinegar

Method

1. Using a pestle and mortar or coffee grinder, reduce the masala spices to a rough powder. Stir in the vinegar to create a loose paste and tumble the pork through. Leave to marinate for 3 hours minimum, ideally overnight.

2. Heat the oil in a large pan over a medium heat and fry the onions until soft, 12–15 minutes at least, stirring regularly. While they are cooking, break up the tamarind block (if using) and stir into twice its weight of boiling water – if you love tamarind as much as I do, it’s useful to prepare more than you need for this recipe, so that you have more to use in dressings, cocktails and so on.

3. Add the garlic, ginger and chillies to the onions, and cook for 5 minutes or so, stirring frequently.

4. Add the tomatoes and curry leaves and use the back of a wooden spoon to encourage the tomato pieces to break down and soften into the sauce.

5. Add the pork, mustard seeds, salt and tamarind and bring back to a lively boil before lowering the heat to the laziest of simmers. Cover and cook for an hour or so, stirring once in a while.

6. Uncover and cook until the meat is really tender and the sauce has thickened nicely – this should take 30–45 minutes. Serve with basmati rice and/or flatbreads.