Mutton Xacuti
XACUTI pronounced sha – coo – T. An excellent curry that is generally made with Chicken, beef or mutton / lamb. I believe that it tastes best if it is made the day before and since it is a bit tedious to make you don’t want to be sweating over it on the day of your party. My wife has 4 Goan cookery books and her mother’s recipe but would you believe it, every recipe is totally different. Hence a quest to try and find the correct recipe for Xacuti began. I started by making a comparative statement of the ingredients and then phoning up old aunties in Goa / from Goa and here’s where I came across this unsubstantiated superstition. For Xacuti all the ingredients are dry roasted before being ground and someone told me that they never roast the coconut as that releases the negative cholesterol in it. I however roasted the coconut and made it as per this recipe where I have taken the liberty of adding & subtracting certain ingredients as well as quantities. This curry is rather tedious to make but the result is well worth the trouble taken.
Ingredients:
1. 8 – 10 Kashmiri chillies, deseeded2. 4 cardamom, skinned3. 1 teaspoon jeera seeds4. 6 cloves5. 1 ½ inch cinnamon6. ½ teaspoon methi seeds7. 2 teaspoons coriander seeds8. 1 ½ star anise9. 1 teaspoon fennel (saunf)10. 2 teaspoons khuskhus (poppy seeds) or 1 teaspoon dagar phool11. ½ teaspoon rai dal (skinned mustard seeds)12. ½ teaspoon haldi powder13. 2 onions, roughly chopped14. 8 – 10 flakes garlic, halved lengthwise15. 1 inch ginger, cleaned and sliced16. ½ fresh coconut, grated17. 6 – 8 dried kokam skins18. 1 kg mutton or chicken, cleaned and cut19. 1 teaspoon salt
Method:
On a tawa, roast ingredients 1 to 9 until the coriander seeds turn brown.Take off the flame, add ingredients 10 and 11 to the hot mix and stir for a bit. Empty into the grinder. Add the haldi and grind. (Do not try to roast the haldi)On the same tawa, roast ingredients 13 to 15 until the onions start to turn brown. Remove from the tawa and cool.On the same tawa roast the coconut until it is all separate and a nice toasty brown. Cool.Put all the ingredients into the mixer and grind into a fine paste using as little water as possible.Heat 4 tablespoons oil in a vessel. Add the ground masala and fry well.Add the meat, stirring continuously until the meat has been seared. Add the salt.Add water until it covers the meat. Simmer and cook till the meat is done. Taste and add more salt if required.Add the kokam and simmer covered for 5 – 7 minutes.
Useful Tips:
To increase the quantity add 2 potatoes washed well and skinned and cut into eighths, along with the meat.If pressure cooking mutton, fry the masala in the pressure cooked, add the mutton, sear, add water, bring to pressure and simmer for 15 minutes. Release steam, add the potatoes and steam for another 2 – 3 minutes. Transfer to another vessel, add the kokam and simmer covered for 5 – 7 minutes.