friday night fakeaway

Tom and I had a big week and we were so looking forward to Friday night. But the poor sausage (him) had to work late and I was feeling grumpy after walking through 3 miles of deadshits to get home (sometimes living 10 minutes away from some of London's major tourist attractions has its drawbacks). As I turned up my street, the irresistible smell of Indian curry hit my nostrils. Suddenly, all seemed right with the world. The whole street smelled divine, like korma and masala, coriander and coconut, fresh naan bread and tandoori....

Phone out.

Let's get Indian take away tonight! :) xx

Message back.

Why don't we make Indian ourselves? Cheaper, healthier :) xx PS: I need a drink.

I knew there was a reason I'm marrying that man ;)

So instead of going down to our local Indian, I headed up to Sainsbury's instead, armed with a recipe for Butter Chicken, which I found on the Campbell's Australia web site, thanks to Miss (sorry, that should be Mrs now!) Nicky :)

It was the most delicious Indian meal I have ever made! The house smelled utterly divine, and still does, 24 hours later. We got all the ingredients for the meal, a bag of rice, naan bread, ice cream for afterwards and a bottle of our new favourite Villa Maria Sauvignon Blanc, and it came to much cheaper than what a takeaway would be!

It's not a meal I would eat all the time, but I'll definitely be making it the next time I feel like a treat!

The original recipe is here, but what follows is what I did, as I wanted to double the recipe to make enough to freeze for lunches next week:

Butter "Chicken"!

Makes at least 6 servings

2 bags of Quorn fillets

2/3 cup Tikka Masala or Tandoori paste (Sainsbury's only had Tikka Masala)

Cooking spray or 1 tablespoon olive oil

2 onions, diced

3 cloves garlic, crushed

1 can tomato soup (I used Baxter's)

2 tsp garam masala

300ml light cream (to lower the calories/point count you could use light evaporated milk, or maybe no fat natural yoghurt?)

A few good handfuls of spinach, to add at the end

To serve:

Steamed white basmati rice

Naan bread

Defrost the Quorn fillets briefly (not fully - just so you can cut them safely) in the microwave and chop each fillet into 3 or four pieces. Place in a dish with the curry paste, stir to coat and set aside.

Heat the oil or cooking spray in a large pan. Add the onion and garlic, cook for a few minutes until softened. Add the Quorn, cook for a few minutes and then add the garam masala, soup and cream. I also added 1 can of water (used the soup can to get the last dregs) because I wanted more sauce, so do this if you think it needs more liquid.

Combine everything and bring to the boil, then reduce heat and simmer for about 20 minutes. I let it simmer until the rice cooker had finished, which was about half an hour.

Just before it's ready, add a few handfuls of spinach leaves and stir through to wilt them. This is optional of course - I just can't have a meal without something green in it. I feel awful if I don't!

Serve with basmati rice and naan bread.

We normally only have brown rice, but as we felt like a treat I got white basmati rice instead (low GI!).

Sorry for the steam in the photo, I wanted to eat it straight away :P

I don't need to tell you how delicious it was. The Quorn was so tender and soft, it fell away from the fork! Ali, I will win you over to Quorn!

I only ended up eating half of my portion - once again my eyes are bigger than my stomach! And we had loads leftover to freeze for next weeks lunches. I think I will have envious workmates this week :)

I don't know about you, but I've certainly had my fair share of disappointing takeaways. And it really annoys me when I do, especially if it was my "treat night" and I was really looking forward to it! I've eaten pizzas with flabby dough, curries with no punch, underdone chips and sushi with no substance. What a waste of money, points, etc, I usually think. By making your own "fake away" you're guaranteed to have something yummy, but it's also cheaper and healthier for you too!

What's your favourite "fakeaway"?