Name: Lamb with Potatoes
Ingredients: salt; whole peppercorns; ginger; turmeric; cardamom pods; garam masala; full-fat yoghourt; onions; chilli powder; cinnamon sticks; sunflower oil; potatoes; cloves; ground coriander; ground cumin; meat; tomatoes; garlic

Ingredients

2 lb meat, cut in small pieces from a leg of lamb
2 onions, thinly sliced
½ tsp turmeric
Salt
1 tsp chilli powder (less if you like it mild)
1 tsp garam masala
½ cup plain, full-fat yoghourt
1 lb potatoes, peeled and cut into large pieces
2 tsp crushed ginger and garlic
2 tins chopped tomatoes
3 tbsp sunflower oil
2 tsp ground coriander/ground cumin mixture
Five each of cardamom pods, whole peppercorns, cloves and small cinnamon sticks

Method

Heat the oil in a pan with a lid and add the whole peppers, cloves etc.
Then add the onions and fry until they brown.
Add ginger/garlic and the meat. Cook for three minutes.
Then throw in all the spices except for the garam masala.
Lower the heat and cook for ten minutes, stirring from time to time.
Add the tomatoes and cook for another ten minutes.
Add yoghourt and enough water to cover the meat.
Cover and cook for forty minutes.
Add the potatoes and cook for another twenty minutes.
The meat and potatoes should now be cooked; if not, give it another ten minutes. Uncover for the last five minutes.
Add garam masala and serve with rice.

Old friends and acquaintances from mosque came to visit my in-laws, some with the all-healing khichri to help Bapaji recover from his strange ailment. It was Kampala again, for a few months. TL was getting moodier, the light on his face autumnal. He often found a full house, noisy with overlapping voices speaking Kutchi, when he returned from his weekends away. We would take Bapaji to a nearby Nepalese restaurant – he liked that a lot. But the fuss, burps and loud ramblings of the old man made my punctilious, perfectionist husband uncomfortable and unhappy. He couldn’t bear the decomposing personality, the proud father falling to bits.

My man was always attractive, beguilingly so. He had called himself Sky for some years, had erased his old Muslim name like so much else. Celestial, blue, free and open, such connotations. His parents were the only ones now to use his birth name. To us he talked a lot about the acupuncture course, brought in books and needles, practised on me, told me hilarious stories about the younger students, so naïve, he said, so ignorant. When his parents left after four months, they were both even prouder than before. Their best son was going to be a real doctor after all, perhaps even one day curing the affliction that was destroying his father.

TL was popping in to Leamington to look in on the course, that much is true. But really his weekends away were needed to set up a new life with Rapunzel, who had moved to Cambridge. They had an immaculately worked-out, phased programme of withdrawal from the old life and into the new, and he extricated himself slowly so as not to cause himself too much sorrow. He needed time enough to adjust to his decision before he set himself free from his teenage sweetheart and a son he adored.

By this time I had given up my teaching job and joined New Society, a unique publication which disseminated to readers detailed information about academic research, public policy, activist campaigns and the arts. I was elated. In my late thirties, I had finally alighted at that place which had always seemed on the horizon and never come nearer. David Lipsey (now Lord Lipsey) was the editor, the most nurturing and tough master I have ever worked for. I couldn’t even type fast, and for many months the lexicon of journalism baffled me. I had to pretend I knew it all and hold my own. Some of my colleagues must have seen through the twittering brown girl in their midst, but they were kind and never let me know they knew I knew nothing about the business and was winging it.

Once a month I got to edit a supplement – ‘Race and Society’ – and to commission young journalists who were keen and cheap. White aspirants rapidly progressed and got coveted jobs on the nationals, whence they were fast-tracked to the top. Those blessed with less – darker skin and hair – stayed on my pages, and many just gave up. I never did. One part of our game plan had worked, mine and TL’s; now we only had to wait for the acupuncturist to start up, and we would be well away.

That summer, TL’s eldest niece was getting married in Canada. So extremely sorry, choking with regret, TL confessed that he had to go to Zimbabwe to join a new field project for an international environmentalist organization. It had come up unexpectedly, and his professor wanted him to grab the opportunity. It was very important that Karim and I should represent our side of the family. The night before we were to go our separate ways, I made an old favourite, lamb curry with potatoes. TL left all the meat on one side, and ate only the potatoes and sauce, said he had problems with red meat suddenly, it upset his digestive system. ‘Since when?’ I asked crossly. You ate your mum’s lamb sag happily enough.’ ‘I know, but I couldn’t upset her, could I?’

Lamb with Potatoes

Preparation info

Serves

Difficulty

Appears in

The Settler's Cookbook

Ingredients

Method