Nigel Slater's root vegetable korma

You can have this sweet and creamy vegetable curry on the table within an hour. Use up vegetables like carrots, parsnips and swede in this mild Indian dish.

Serves: 4 with rice or Indian breads
Takes: 1hr

2 medium onions
A fat, thumb-sized piece of ginger
3 cloves of garlic
1.5kg mixture of parsnip, swede, carrots, Jerusalem artichokes
100g cashews
6 green cardamom pods
2tsp cumin seeds
3tsp coriander seeds
2tbsp vegetable or sunflower oil, or butter
2tbsp ground turmeric
½ chilli powder
A cinnamon stick
2 smallish green chillies, depending on their heat, thinly sliced
150ml single or double cream
150g thick natural yogurt
Fresh coriander, chopped

1. Peel the onions, cut them into large pieces, then blitz in a food processor until roughly minced - you don't want a sloppy purée.
2. Peel and roughly grate the ginger on the coarse side of a grater. Peel and finely slice the garlic cloves. Peel and coarsely chop the vegetables. Roughly chop half of the cashews.
3. Now deal with the spices: open the cardamom pods with your nails and scrape out the seeds, then crush them to a gritty powder. Grind the cumin and coriander seeds to a fine powder.
4. Put the oil or butter into a deep, heavy-bottomed pan and stir in the onions, letting them soften but not colour. Stir in the grated ginger and sliced garlic, continue cooking over a gentle heat for a couple of mins, then introduce the spices - cardamom, cumin, coriander, turmeric, chilli powder and the cinnamon stick.
5. Continue cooking, stirring for a couple of mins, until the fragrance of the spices begins to rise, then add the chopped root vegetables and the chopped nuts. Season with the thinly sliced chillies, salt and black pepper.
6. Stir in 750ml water, partially cover with a lid and leave to simmer gently for 45-50 mins, 'til the roots are tender to the point of a knife.
7. Toast the reserved whole cashews. Carefully introduce the cream and yogurt to the pan, allowing them to heat through but not boil. Should the mixture boil, it will curdle, and though the flavour will be OK the grainy texture will be offputting. Check the seasoning, adding more salt or pepper if necessary. Scatter over the toasted cashews and some chopped coriander.

This recipe is from Nigel Slater's Tender volume I, £30 from 4th Estate and is available from Amazon.co.uk

Nigel Slater's Simple Suppers is on BBC1 on Wednesday's at 7.30pm, from 9th September 2009 for six weeks

More recipes:
Nigel Slater's carrot and coriander fritters
Chicken korma
Annabel Karmel's fruity chicken curry

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