Lamb Vindaloo

Name: Lamb Vindaloo
Total time: 240 min
Yield: 6 servings
Cuisine: Indian
Ingredients: Lamb; Vegetable oil; Red wine vinegar; Chicken stock; Onion; Tomato puree; Garlic; Fresh ginger; Dried chillies; Mustard seeds; Ground coriander; Ground cumin; Ground cinnamon; Cloves

376 kcal a serving, against 747 for the traditional version. That is 371 kcal off, or 50%, with 43.8g of protein. Serves 6. 240 minutes.

What the traditional version is

A huge pile of fatty lamb shoulder chunks, aggressively marinated in sharp vinegar and dried chillies. The meat is slow-cooked with fried onions in a terrifying amount of vegetable oil, until the fat renders out and pools heavily on the surface of the sauce.

What changed, and what each change costs

1200g of fatty lamb shoulder for 1200g of lean lamb

Lamb shoulder is glorious, but it carries massive amounts of fat that melt straight into your curry. Swapping to a lean cut drops the fat drastically while keeping exactly the same amount of meat in your bowl. You still get that deeply savoury flavour.

What it costs you. Lean meat dries out quickly if you rush it. You absolutely lose that rich, gelatinous texture that a fatty shoulder brings to a slow-cooked sauce, and you have to be careful with your simmering times.

100g of vegetable oil down to just 15g

Traditional recipes use oil as a primary ingredient to fry the spices and carry the flavour. I use just enough to stop the onions from sticking to the frying pan. The fierce spices and the vinegar carry this dish perfectly well on their own.

What it costs you. You don't get that classic, vibrant red oil slick floating on top of your bowl. The resulting sauce is much tighter and clings entirely to the meat.

Adding 250g of chicken stock and 30g of tomato puree

When you remove the vast quantities of fat, the pan gets incredibly dry during a braise. The chicken stock provides the necessary liquid for the meat to simmer until tender, while a tiny bit of tomato puree helps thicken the sauce.

What it costs you. What you've got is a practical workaround. A completely traditional technique for a true Goan curry is a different dish and you know where to find it. The tomato slightly sweetens the harsh edges of the vinegar.

What goes in it

The ingredients, without the quantities. The weights are what the figures below are computed from, and they are in the book.

Lamb
Vegetable oil
Red wine vinegar
Chicken stock
Onion
Tomato puree
Garlic
Fresh ginger
Dried chillies
Mustard seeds
Ground coriander
Ground cumin
Ground cinnamon
Cloves

How it starts

Put the dried chillies, mustard seeds, cumin, coriander seeds, cinnamon and cloves into a dry frying pan.
Add the red wine vinegar, garlic and ginger to the blender.
Heat the vegetable oil in a heavy cooking pot over a medium heat.

The rest of the method, and every weight, is in Authentic-ish Indian.

The numbers

Per serving	Traditional	Lightened
Calories	747	376
Protein	35.4g	43.8g
Fat	61g	15g
Saturated fat	20.9g	4.4g
Carbohydrate	13.2g	15.1g
Protein per 100 kcal	4.7g	11.6g

Every figure is computed from the recipe's own weighed ingredient list against public food composition databases. The appendix in Authentic-ish Indian prints the exact database row used for each ingredient, so any number here can be checked. How every number is computed sets out the method.

Allergens. mustard, sulphites.

The method is in the book

This vindaloo hits you with exactly the right balance of sharp vinegar and fierce chilli heat. It demands patience to braise the lean meat properly, but the reward is a massive portion of deeply flavoured lamb without the usual heavy grease. You get all the aggression of a Friday night takeaway, but you actually feel fine the next morning.

The quantities and the method for this dish are in Authentic-ish Indian, along with 54 more. Buy the paperback