Living away from parents has shown me many a day I would have never pictured myself going through. Examples of such days include me actually missing my Mother's vegetable curry, bursting into tears because of one too many burnt chapattis, being excited about an evening in and the day I realised 'Hey, I'm actually enjoying this housewife-biz'.
Another example would be the day I cooked bitter gourd.
My issue with bitter gourd has always been that it takes so much effort and time and patience just to make them bearable to eat. Why go through all that effort when you have vegetables such as cauliflower and potatoes and carrots and peas which taste perfectly fine and you don't have to do anything to them? Then you have karela, which take hours to prepare and they still often have a touch of bitterness left. It was for that reason that I never gave bitter gourd a second glance whenever I went vegetable hunting.
My Mother always kept a touch of the bitterness on purpose, because she liked it that way. That meant that on days when she had cooked karela, I would refuse to eat. Since I've gotten married and now have complete reign over my kitchen and cooking, cooking karela hasn't high on my priority list (see above). But recently, my husband mentioned not having had bitter gourd in a long time and so I decided, just for experiments sake, I'd cook Karela Gosht, bitter gourd and meat.
The results?
Well, it was so good that I can absolutely see myself cooking bitter gourd more often!
I managed to drain out most of the bitterness and whatever was left was complimented so well by the juicy meat and masala!
Having said that, I probably wouldn't ever cook bitter gourd on its own. Just a personal preference! The meat really makes this recipe shine for me and I guess it's just down to personal preference!
Here are some key tips to get that bitter taste out of bitter gourd which you can use for any recipe including it:
And finally. onto the recipe. Enjoy, with love x
📋 Recipe
Ingredients
- 600 grams bitter gourd
- 600 grams mutton or lamb meat bone in
- 2 onions sliced
- 1 tomato chopped
- 4 cloves garlic minced
- 1 small chunk ginger
- 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
- 1 teaspoon coriander powder
- 1 teaspoon cumin powder
- 0.5 teaspoon turmeric
- 1 teaspoon red chilli powder or to taste
- 1.5 teaspoon salt or to taste
- 1 teaspoon sugar or as needed
- 1 handful fresh coriander chopped
- 1 cup oil
Instructions
- Using a sharp knife, peel away the skin of the bitter gourd, cut them into thin slices and deseed them, as shown in the picture.
- Place all the bitter gourds in a colander and add a teaspoon of salt and rub in. Allow this to sit for 30-45 minutes. Once the time is up, wash the salt out with cold water and squeeze the bitter gourds VERY well, using your hands. You want the bitter gourds to be a minimum 90% dry as all the water we are squeezing out is the bitterness.
- Heat a cup of oil in a pan. Fry the bitter gourds till lightly golden, as shown in the picture. Careful not to overcrowd the pan - fry in batches if needed.
- In the same pan, take out all but about a quarter cup of oil. Add one onion, garlic, ginger and cumin seeds and sauté till golden.
- Add the tomatoes, a few splashes of water, some of the sugar (add half now and reserve the other half for later if needed) and all the spices. Cook till the tomatoes loosen up and a masala forms.
- Add the meat. Sauté it on high in the masala till it no longer remains pink, then add 2 cups of hot water. Cover and simmer on low for 50 minutes for lamb and an hour for mutton.
- Once that's done, add one sliced onion, the fried bitter gourds, a handful of coriander and a few splashes of water if the curry is looking dry. Adjust the spices if needed. Cover and simmer on low for 20 minutes, and it's ready!
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Fizza
Salam Fatima,
I know this recipe has been updated since the last time (I’ve only made it once before) and the pictures were helpful, however, I don’t see those anymore. Please help!!
Paul
Hi Fatima,
Sorry to say that the recipe card on this recipe hasn’t come up in the correct form. Everything is written in linear with no spacing. I’m really no computer wizz but could it be that I’m on Apple?
I just wanted to let you know in case it’s not just me that has the problem.
Thanks again for your wonderful recipes. We both enjoy them very much.
Paul
Fatima
Again, thank you for flagging this up! Just fixed it. A redesign isn't for the faint hearted!
Hope you get a chance to try this, if the linear, unspaced recipe hasn't put you off 😁
Fatima
Paul
Hi Fatima,
Thank you for sorting that out, it’s much easier to read now.
It hasn’t put me off at all.
I tried to make a side dish using Karela a few years ago and whilst not unpleasant it did have a strongly perfumed aftertaste which lingered for hours after, no matter what I ate or drank afterwards, including several glasses of a strongly flavoured red wine. If I remember rightly, the recipe just called for peeling and deseeding and made no mention of how to remove excess bitterness so I think this will be a game changer for me. Incidentally, I also follow an Indian lady’s blog and she says she never peels the Karela as that is where most of the goodness is.
I’ll try both methods and report to you both when I’ve tried both.
Thanks again for your lovely well written recipes.
Paul
Fatima
I guess it's a battle of 'Do I want to eat this and get the max benefits?' or 'Do I want to eat it and like it?' Haha.
You're most welcome, as always. Take care.
Zach
Thank you! I’m from a mixed heritage family (mum was English, dad was Pakistani). We used to eat this as children 40 years ago. I haven’t eaten it for perhaps 30. I will make it this weekend. I can’t wait!