Pheasant curry and naans

Pheasant curry and naans

Winter

I never usually make the same curry twice. I don’t know why, my curries are just always different. In the summer, they are herby and mild and packed with seasonal vegetables, like new potatoes, green beans, chard, spinach and ripe tomatoes from the greenhouse. The accompaniments tend to be light and fresh. In the autumn and winter, my curries are richer and hotter, and I’m usually cooking a bit more meat, too, particularly game. This curry uses pheasant, and is so, so good I had to write the recipe down. Now I make it time and again, and almost always serve these gorgeous naans alongside for mopping up the sauce. You can prepare a delicious variation of this recipe using chicken, or use the same punchy spices but replace the meat with chickpeas and winter squash.

Serves 4

Ingredients

  • 500g (1lb 2oz) strong white bread flour, plus extra for dusting
  • 5g (1½ teaspoons) quick yeast
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon caster (superfine) sugar
  • 150ml (5fl oz) warm water
  • 150ml (5fl oz) full-fat natural (plain) yogurt
  • 30g (1oz) butter, melted

For the curry

  • 8 cardamom pods, bashed
  • 2 teaspoons cumin seeds
  • 3 teaspoons coriander seeds
  • 2–3cm cinnamon stick
  • 1 teaspoon fennel seeds
  • 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
  • 2 pheasants, cut into portions
  • 50g (1¾oz) butter
  • 2 onions, finely diced
  • 4 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
  • a thumb-size piece of ginger, peeled and very thinly sliced
  • 2 medium-hot dried chillies
  • 4 bay leaves
  • 4 curry leaves
  • 1 teaspoon turmeric
  • 2 teaspoons garam masala
  • 2 teaspoons black onion seeds
  • 1 teaspoon flaky sea salt, plus extra to season
  • freshly ground black pepper

Method

First, make the naan dough. Place the flour in a bowl with the yeast, salt and sugar. Add the water, yogurt and butter. Bring everything together to a dough and knead for 5–10 minutes, or until you have a nice soft, stretchy dough. Cover and allow to rise somewhere warm for 2–3 hours. An hour or so into the rising time, turn your attention to the curry.

Get a nice, medium-hot fire going and set a large, heavy-based saucepan on a grill over it. Scatter in the cardamom pods, cumin and coriander seeds, cinnamon stick and fennel seeds and toast them all, tossing them around the pan until they begin to pop and smoke a little. Remove the pan from the heat and tip the toasted spices into a pestle and mortar. Crush them all up as finely as you can. Have a good smell (they’re so aromatic at this moment) and set aside.

Return the pan to the heat. Add the extra-virgin olive oil and, when it’s hot, add the pieces of pheasant. Season them all over with salt and pepper. Fry the pheasant on all sides until it’s lovely and brown and crisping in places. Lift the pieces of pheasant out of the pan and set aside.

Keep the pan on the heat and add half the butter. When it’s bubbling away, add the onions, garlic and ginger and fry this all gently until the onion is sweet and soft – about 10 minutes.

Add the toasted crushed spices, and the whole chillies, bay and curry leaves, as well as the turmeric, garam masala, black onion seeds and sea salt. Stir well.

Return the pheasant to the pan, turning it through the onions and spices. Add just enough water to cover the meat, then give everything a good shake and place a lid on the pan. Position the pan where the heat isn’t too fierce (you don’t want the liquid to be boiling too ferociously) and continue to cook for a further 1–1½ hours.

While the curry is cooking divide the naan dough into 6–8 equal portions and shape them into rounds.

Roll or stretch out the rounds to a thickness of roughly 1cm (½in) and leave them to prove on a lightly floured surface for a further 15–20 minutes.

You want to cook the naan over a really hot part of the fire, so when you’re ready to cook them, build up an area of embers so they’re giving out lots of heat. Lay a few of the naans down on the grill and cook them until they start to blister and bubble up – they should take only a minute or so. Flip them and cook the second side. Repeat with the remaining naans. Stack them up and keep them warm as you go.

After the pheasant’s had its allotted time, lift the lid and turn the meat through the sauce once or twice. Continue to simmer everything without a lid, until the sauce has thickened and the meat is nice and tender (about 15–20 minutes). Stir in the remaining butter, season with some flaky sea salt and serve with the naans for dipping and mopping.

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