Review of the Lamb Xacutti Recipe
June 29th, 2009
Hi, Ray here again.
Recently I made Chicken Xacutti curry and wrote a review for the website.
I had read that a Xacutti is hotter than a vindaloo but the Chicken Xacutti was nowhere near as hot as a vindaloo.
The Chicken Xacutti was delicious and so I looked at the Lamb Xacutti recipe of the Curry Focus website. I could see one major ingredient in the Lamb Xacutti that was not in the Chicken Xacutti – 6 fresh chillies. The Lamb Xacutti curry was definitely going to be hotter than the Chicken Xacutti and so I decided to try it out this weekend.
I bought some lean lamb and fresh cilantro from my local stores, which was all I needed because I had everything else already in the house.
The lamb recipe starts off much the same as the chicken one in that I had to dry roast lots of spices and then grind them into a powder – I used my recently acquired mortar and pestle and soon had a good blend of spices with a great aroma.
I mixed the spices with the other ingredients and made the paste in a food processor, having to add an extra half a cup of water to make the paste.
I cooked the garlic, onion and lamb in the resultant paste whilst the oven was heating.
Very shortly I was putting the lamb and the sauce into a large casserole and putting it into the oven.
Everything was very simple from here with the Xacutti cooking in the casserole with breaks for stirring and adding the cilantro, mint leaves and garam masala.
After over an hour of cooking, the Lamb Xacutti was served on a bed of basmati to the hungry diners.
I have to say straight away that this curry lived up to its billing of being hotter than a vindaloo. The meat was tender, the sauce was delicious and the spice heat was hot. There was a great afterburn I the mouth following each mouthful – this is a curry with attitude.
The Xacutti went down well with the diners who had been warned beforehand that it could be hot. Comments ranged from “tasty” and “yummy” to “a chilli too far”. This is definitely the hottest curry that I’ve eaten for a while and it was delicious.
I should have made a raita to help cool down the curry and next time I will.
The curry got a rating of 8.5 out of 10 with a spice/heat level of “hot”.
If you like hot curries then you must try this Xacutti. It a bit more preparation than a regular curry but the extra effort is definitely worth it.