Curry Up

Tonight's dinner was a bit rushed because I had to be on the road by 7 PM. To make matters worse, rather, challenging, I didn't have a plan.

A quick look through the fridge and pantry uncovered enough for a decent dinner: chicken curry and lentils.

Here's the blueprint:

chicken tenders
plain yogurt
curry powder
onion
carrots
chicken stock

dried lentils
mango chutney
coconut milk
curry powder

In the picture you'll see a box of chopped tomatoes which at the time I took the picture I planned to use, but later decided against.

To prepare the chicken I tossed the tenders with a small tub of plain yogurt, about 6 oz, with some curry powder and put it in the fridge to marinate.

While the chicken was getting zesty in the fridge I covered a cup of lentils with about two fingers of water and got it boiling. Turning down the heat I simmered the lentils for 5-6 minutes then added a tablespoon of chutney and the coconut milk. I turned down the heat to the lowest setting and let it cook while I got the chicken going.

I cooked the onions and carrots together over a high heat in some peanut oil then dumped in the chicken/yogurt mixture. After stirring this messy looking mixture for a few minutes, I transferred it to a casserole dish, added enough chicken stock to nearly cover the chicken and popped it into the oven, set to 350.

That's basically it. Aside from checking on the lentils from time to time to make sure they weren't sticking to the bottom of the pot or scorching, there wasn't anything to do for about an hour, although I turned off the lentils after about 30 minutes and just let them sit and soak up all that coconuttyness and mango mojo.