December 2018 - Oddbod's Slimline Dhansak

[OddBod]

This month's Curry Club "Curry of the Month" recipe is Oddbod's Slimline Dhansak kindly selected by DamienD.

Remember, the first member to try this recipe (anew) and report back, with photos, gets to select next month's recipe......CA

Recipe can be found here


With New Year just gone and with what must surely be the most common time to start a diet (probably to start again if you're like me), I thought I'd do a bit of experimenting in the kitchen to try and come up with a 'diet' version of some of the more well known curries. To be honest I haven't got far having only trialled a Dhansak so far. I tried two versions, one cutting out some oil only and one cutting out some oil and sugar. Whilst I can't say either was as good as the full fat version, they were certainly 90 - 95% there (in mine and the other three dieters opinions) - that's good enough for me to get my curry fix and lose weight. In the end I stuck with the lower fat and no sugar version as it obviously provided the most benefit for my curry habit on a diet. Moving forward, as well as trying other recipes, I'm going to go more extreme and cut out even more oil from both the dish and the ingredients - one thing I won't be doing is reducing the amount of oil in the base gravy as IMO this is a 'no no'. If anyone's on Weight Watchers this recipe is 26 points if using Chicken Tikka and 20 Smart Points if using fish or plain chicken. For now, if you're trying to lose weight and need a curry fix why not try this recipe?

Posted in medium dishes as that's where the other Dhansaks are, but IMO this is a hot dish.

Remember, when cooking this you can always add more of the sweet and sour ingredients at the end after tasting. What you can't do is take them away!

If you do try either the diet or full fat version please let me know what you think.

Odd

[Cory Ander]

Thanks for sharing, Oddbod

[Damocles]

This sounds good and I am going to try it. Mrs D likes a bit of sweetness in her curry and this should fit the bill.

I'll probably add back in the mango chutney and use the castor sugar whilst keeping the oil reduced.

[Marktheshark]

Sounds nice oddbod, thanks for posting, always good if you can cut down on the oil and sugar without compromising the end result, can't beat a tasty dhansak

[Cory Ander]

This month's Curry Club "Curry of the Month" recipe is Oddbod's Slimline Dhansak kindly selected by DamienD.

Remember, the first member to try this recipe (anew) and report back, with photos, gets to select next month's recipe......CA

[rdu]

Looks nice. I love Dhansak. You can always make it as hot or medium to your own taste. I am afraid if I put this in front of my wife she will find it too hot.
Will definitely try it with less chilli to please her.

[holmdene]

Nice looking recipe...My son likes Pathias so will be looking out for those too. I just joined

[Jenk]

This will give this one a go over the holiday period as my hubby likes dhansak

I'm not a fan of pineapple though, is really added for natural sweetness or flavour?

Thanks

Emma

[OddBod]

It’s ok to leave the chunks out. The juice does add a touch of sweetness so just try it without. You can always add a tiny bit more of sweetener. Just remember you can always add more but you can’t take away

[Greybeard]

Good recipe this, although Mrs GB and myself have little need of watching our respective waistlines as we both disappear when standing sideways. As a consequence, Splenda is not an item we have in our store cupboard, nor would we ever use. This was duly substituted with some toasted dark Muscovado sugar (highlighted).

The pre-cooked Dhal on its own was in grave danger of being consumed and never actually reaching the Dhansak as it was just the right consistency and very moreish. The final dish had a good helping of King Prawns added, as these would work well with the pineapple and we didn't have any chicken to hand.

Overall, this was quite a hot Dhansak, but this could have been down to the use of my own mix powder and base which leans towards the spicy side or possibly the different method used to fry off the spices. I couldn't resist the temptation to up the oil level a bit, "low calorie food" being an anathema in our household. Mrs GB gave it a 9, which is a compliment indeed for any prawn dish as she is not a huge fan. Needless to say, there wasn't much left on my plate either.

[DamienD]

I made this tonight, I don't think I have made a Dhansak in quite a while. This was highly rated by the 4 of us although the youngest wasn't keen on the inclusion of pineapple.

Thanks for the recipe Oddbod and here's a picture!

[andrw]

Good job Greybeard and Damien, both curries look great.

[Damocles]

Forgot about this one from last year, will definitely give it a bash in the New Year. Cheers!

[Cory Ander]

Many thanks to the two members who tried this months Curry Club Curry of the Month recipe and for reporting back with their photos and findings:

1. Greybeard
2. DamienD

Recipe can be found here