Chicken, Pistachio and Black Pepper Curry

This is the second dish this week from Sabrina Ghayour's book "Feasts" - a fragrant, slightly spicy curry with a rich, luxurious sauce.

As always, I have swapped out the coriander for parsley because I cannot stand the stuff but if you love it, feel free to swap back. Aside from that, this recipe is totally up my street with plenty of flavour from not only the holy trinity of chilli, ginger and garlic but also from black pepper and the brown meat from a chicken. This is a great dish to cook when you have lots of mouths to feed and be easily scaled up or down to accommodate your needs.

Chicken, Pistachio and Black Pepper Curry
Serves 6

2 tbsp oil
2 onions, sliced
800g boneless, skinless chicken thighs
2 tbsp coarsely ground black pepper
30g fresh parsley, roughly chopped
seeds from 6 green cardamom pods
2 long red chillies
7.5cm piece fresh ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
5 large garlic cloves, peeled
100g shelled pistachios
300g peeled and deseeded butternut squash, cut into chunks
150g baby sweetcorn
sea salt

Heat the oil in a large sauce pan over a medium-high heat. Add the onions and fry for 10 minutes until soft and the edges start to brown. Add the chicken and black pepper and cook for a couple of minutes until sealed on all sides and starting to colour. 

Put the parsley, cardamom seeds, chillies, ginger, garlic and pistachios in a blender with enough water to cover them all. Blend until the mixture is evenly green and silky-smooth.

When the chicken is sealed, stir in the pistachio curry paste. Pour in just enough water to cover the chicken. Season generously with salt, and cook over a medium-low heat for an hour.

Check the season, and add more salt if needed, then stir in the squash and baby corn. Increase the heat to medium and cook for a further 45 minutes, or until the squash and baby corn are cooked and soft. Serve with rice or naan breads, or both!