Pumpkin Curry and Coconut Taro
Pumpkin and beef curry on the left, mildly spiced coconut Taro on the right and a dollop of ChilliChoko sauce…
We currently have a lot of pumpkin. We also have a fair bit of Taro which was dug up and I had to do something with. So I made a pumpkin and beef curry and a mildly spiced coconut Taro.
I started by putting the unpeeled whole Taro in a large pot, added water and put it on the stove to boil. Then I put some ghee to melt in a pot on the stove and cut 500gr of homegrown beef into cubes. I added the beef to the pot and stirred it on occasion, to brown it on all sides. Whilst the beef was browning I peeled, pitted and cut up some pumpkin (around 1/2 a medium to large pumpkin). I added the cubed pumpkin to the beef once it had browned. I added 1 1/2 tsp sea salt, 1 1/2 tsp of my favourite powdered curry mix and a can of coconut cream. Then I put the lid on and brought it to the boil. When it boiled I lowered the heat to simmer, stirring occasionally, until the pumpkin was soft.
Once the Taro had boiled for around 20 minutes to half an hour, I drained the water and ran cold water over the Taro in a colander in the sink. With a small sharp knife, I cut and peeled away the skin and any blemishes, and chopped the Taro in medium size cubes. I put the Taro back in a pot and added coconut cream and some chopped up Italian parsley, one large leaf of mustard greens, some basil leaves and some endive, and added about 1/4 of a chopped up red chilli. I added 1 tsp of sea salt and warmed the pot until the greens were nice and soft.
To add some extra heat, you can add a dollop of my ChilliChoko sauce.
Great alternative to having rice with your curry, and a lovely way to prepare Taro. The taro tastes great for breakfast with some sausages and eggs too!!
©2012 Permaculture Research Institute Sunshine Coast – Permaculture recipe: using pumpkin and taro.
Author: Zaia Kendall
Zaia grew up in a family of musicians in Holland, and has a background in top sport (snow skiing) and web development and design. She co-founded the PRI Luganville and PRI Sunshine Coast Inc (now PermEco Inc.) with Tom, and runs the “invisible structures”, like finances, business administration, website design and maintenance, writes articles and records and edits videos. She assists Tom in running the Kendall Permaculture Farm and supervising other volunteers. She is an active member of several musical projects and bands, involved in community music and runs percussion and marimba workshops, is the percussion leader for the Woodford Folk Festival People’s Orchestra and composes as well as plays music. She is passionate about community music and loves seeing people discover that they can play!
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I tried your chilli choko sauce today with tomato and zucchini mixed through some gluten free pasta. You get a lovely sweetness first and then the chilli sneaks up on you! I’m glad I only put in a teaspoon worth. I’m looking forward to trying it as a marinade on some beef.
That sounds delicious and easy to make. Thanks for the recipe!