In my strong desire to not go to the grocery store and to cook with only the items in my pantry and two refrigerators, I noticed a beautiful package of Naan, an Indian bread, that I had purchased at Costco. There was a lot of bread, to say the least and I felt it deserved something Indian to be served with it.

I have made pizza-like concoctions on Naan in the past but I was going to make Indian food, even though I find it a bit intimidating. The first thing I did was check out my refrigerator and I decided that I was going to make vegetarian. I had a 5 lb. bag of frozen organic peas from Costco and the equivalent amount of potatoes.

To get inspiration, I took out the stainless steel Indian spice container that my close friend, Shreeti Kapoor, gave me. It smelled amazing and I sat down at my computer to find a recipe that had similar ingredients to the ones I had on hand.

I found a recipe that used potatoes and peas with ginger and spices. How bad could that be? I know from stories told to me by Shreeti that Indian food can be labor intensive so I decided to double the recipe so that I could freeze half for another time. I will include a link of the original recipe later.

First, I made a paste in my Vitamix using:

4 Tbsp. of fresh coconut (I have a huge bag of Organic unsweetened coconut in my fridge!)

2 inch pieces of ginger, peeled

12 cashews

1 green hot chile pepper

4 Tbsp. roasted sesame seeds (I did not have any poppy seeds)

1 cup of water

Next, I toasted all the other spices in a pan with 3 Tbsp. of olive oil:

2 bay leaves

1 Tbsp. turmeric powder 

4 cloves

1 Tbsp. fennel seeds

2 Tbsp. chile powder (Indian)

1 Tbsp. coriander powder

1 tsp. of cinnamon

1 Tbsp. of cumin powder

I toasted the spices for 2 min. or until very fragrant. Then, I added 1 diced onion and sautéed it for 8 minutes.

I added the paste I had made in my Vitamix and toasted it with the onion for 2 minutes.

I added 4 peeled and diced potatoes with 2 cups of water. I cooked them on simmer for ½ hour. Then, I added a can of garbanzo beans and 2 cups of frozen peas. I continued to simmer it while I made rice. 

I made plain rice and served my version of Potato Peas Kurma on top with Naan. It turned out green because I used green chile instead of the red in the original recipe. I thought it was delicious and shared some leftovers with my gluten-free, egg-free BFF!