Aloo Gajar Matar – Quick stir-fry of Potatoes, Carrots and Peas with Indian spices
An easy and enjoyable North Indian style dry curry of potatoes, carrot and peas. A perfect accompaniment of daal or when served as vegetable side. Enjoy with chapati or rice.
Servings: 4
Ingredients
- 2 cups cubed potatoes
- 1.5 cups diced carrots
- 1 cup green peas thawed
- 2 tablespoon olive oil divided
- 1 pinch asafoetida
- 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
- 1 green chili chopped fine optional
- 1 teaspoon minced ginger
- ½ teaspoon turmeric powder
- ¼ teaspoon red chili powder optional
- 1.5 tablespoon coriander powder
- Salt to taste
- ½ teaspoon garam masala powder
- 5 sprigs coriander leaves stripped and chopped
- Juice from half lime optional
Instructions
- Take the peas out of the freezer and set out to thaw while you get everything else done.
- Set a heavy bottomed skillet or non-stick pan on medium high heat. Add 1 tablespoon of oil and heat it until shimmering. Now add the cubed potatoes and sauté them until nicely browned and almost cooked, about 8-10 minutes.
- I normally use this time to peel and chop the carrots, and get ginger, green chili and cilantro all prepped up and ready to go.
- Check the potatoes, they should be fork tender. Take the potatoes out of the pan into a bowl and set aside.
- Add remaining one tablespoon of oil and let it heat up. Once the oil is hot and shiny, add asafoetida, cumin seeds and chopped green chili, stir around till the cumin seeds start to dance around. Add all the spice powders (except garam masala and salt) and mix. Add ginger.
- Add in the chopped carrots and thawed peas and let these saute for a minute or two. Now add in the potatoes, season with salt to taste and give a big mix.
- Turn the heat to medium low, and continue cooking for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, try a piece of carrot for crunchiness and decide if you want to cook it any further. For me, the sabzi is ready right about at this point.
- Add garam masala, mix and call it a day.
- Oh, do not forget to add the chopped cilantro leaves and a squeeze of lime if you want.
Notes
You can certainly use frozen carrots and peas mix. Let them thaw before adding to the spice oil mix. Frozen carrots cook faster (since they are already blanched), so reduce the cooking time to 7-8 minutes.