Cooking with spices

21st May 2019
We had an excellent afternoon today.  To continue our India theme we looked at basic curry paste recipes.  The children chose their groups on the basis of how adventurous they were feeling with regard to eating spicy food.  They then adapted the basic curry paste recipe to suit their group.
 
Each group then came out to the fire pit garden to make their recipe.  They got to cut up garlic and fresh ginger.  They found out about dry roasting coriander seeds and cumin seeds.  The children took it in turns to use the pestle and mortar to pound up the spices they had chosen to make the paste which we then cooked with oil in the pan.  One group also needed to pop some mustard seeds in oil first.  
 
The final paste was then mixed with either natural yogurt or coconut cream (or both!) and, if they had chosen to do so, coriander leaves.  The children got to taste test their creation either by dipping in bread or eating the potatoes we cooked in the paste.
 
Every group created a different, but delicious curry paste.  Every child has tried something new and experimented with eating something a bit different.  It has been a marvelous afternoon!