Laal Maas – Rajasthani Red Lamb Curry
I did a class at home after a while… Among other things the class featured Laal Maas or Rajasthani Red Lamb Curry. The curry was a drop dead seriously good creation. I realize that I need to plan more classes once I am done with the kids dance recital.
My pressure cooker addiction has morphed into a full blown love affair with the instant pot. Can you blame me?
My Laal Maas Story
I am acquiring quite the collection of instant pot recipes, and am enjoying the process of learning how to adapt things for the electric pressure cooker. In case, you missed my last recipe, here it is. While I particularly savor cooking down these heavy cuts of meat into fall off the bone tenderness, I have made several good vegetable dishes with real success. 
Laal Maas is a bold and full flavored curry from the princely state of Rajasthan. I have to confess to truly get the rich red color I need to notch up the red chilies in this dish even more. I have lightened this dish some by making this in an instant pot, which allows me to seal the flavors. The traditional recipe does this with lots of clarified butter or ghee. This includes a good dollop of ghee with garlic at the end to wrap up. I skipped the finishing ghee and we did fine. In fact, have no ghee for this dish.
I finish with added the chopped garlic at the end, inspired by this recipe. The result was awesome. I marinate the lamb overnight resulting in a very well flavored dish.
Two other hearty lamb recipes include Nigerian Lamb Stew and Lamb Curry with Potatoes and Cumin.
A gorgeous full bodied lamb curry robustly spiced with cayenne and garlic.
Ingredients
- 2 inch piece ginger
- 6 cloves peeled garlic
- 1 tablespoon ground cumin
- 1 tablespoon ground coriander seeds
- 1 tablespoon freshly ground red chili powder (I use 10 dried red chilies)
- 1 tablespoon powdered kashmiri red chili powder or paprika
- 2 pounds of lamb on the bone, trimmed and cubed
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons salt
- 2 tablespoons oil
- 1 cup chopped red onions (1 and 1/2 medium onions chopped)
- 1 or 2 pieces cinnamon (2 inch stick)
- 2 black cardamoms
- 1 cup yogurt (low fat 2% Greek yogurt)
- 2 tablespoons minced fresh garlic
- Chopped cilantro to garnish
Instructions
- Puree the ginger and the garlic into a paste and mix in the ground cumin, ground coriander, ground red chili powder, kashmiri red chili powder or paprika and rub onto the lamb. Mix in the salt.
- Set this aside to marinate for 6 hours or overnight.
- Heat the oil in a pot or the base of the instant pot (using the saute setting) and add the onions. Cook the onions stirring frequently, until they begin to sweat and gently turn golden. This takes about 5 minutes.
- Add in the cinnamon black cardamoms and the lamb and saute for about 4 minutes.
- Add in the yogurt and mix well.
- Cover and cook in the instant pot for about 30 minutes or cover and cook on the stove top for 1 and 1/2 hours until fork tender. If cooking on the stove top, add in 1 and a half cup of water.
- Let the pressure settle (about 10 minutes) remove and stir in the minced garlic.
- Serve after two minutes garnished with the chopped cilantro.
Linda
Hi. This curry looks good and I’m always looking for pressure cooker recipes, when you say it’s bold and full flavoured does that mean really spicy? If so do you think it would taste just as good with less spice for people who like to feel their tongue after eating, there does seem a lot of chilli spice.
rinkub@aol.com
It is spicy, but and in this case is a signature trademark of this dish. Having said that, if you wish by all means try it with less chilies and let me know how it turns out.