Gorgeous Green Bean Curry
Gorgeous green beans, savory spices and creamy coconut milk. Need we say more!
Recipe by Sudarshani, writt en and photographed by Rob Atkinsonacross asia
INGREDIENTS
650 grams green beans
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon turmeric powder
2 teaspoons black mustard powder
3 tablespoons oil
1 small red onion, sliced
3 cloves garlic, sliced
2 green chili peppers, diced or 4 dried, red
chili peppers broken in half
2 sprigs of curry leaves (about 24 fresh leaves)
3 pieces of Ceylon cinnamon stick, 1 inch
(2.5 centimeters) long
235 milliliters coconut milk
METHOD
- Break tips from beans and cut in half,
lengthwise. - Combine beans, turmeric, mustard powder, and
salt. Mix ingredients until green beans are evenly
coated with spices. - Heat oil. Add onion, garlic, chili peppers, curry
leaves, and cinnamon stick. Fry until onions are
tender. - Add green bean mixture and fry until beans
soften. When the beans are tender, add coconut
milk. Simmer for 5 minutes. Adjust salt to taste.
A common dish in Sri Lanka, green bean curry represents an amalgamation of intersecting peoples and foodstuff.
Green beans were fi rst domesticated in Central and South America some 7,000 years ago, and later — much
later — ferried across the Atlantic Ocean by the Portuguese. By way of European vessels, the humble green
bean found its way into the anciently designed earthenware pots, still used in Sri Lankan home kitchens today.
Sri Lankan cooks adopted the bean — just as they had the chili (also from the Americas) — and married it with
local ingredients, such as curry leaf and coconut milk. This particular recipe was gifted to Recipes for Change
by Sudarshani in the outskirts of Colombo, Sri Lanka. A common dish in Sudarshani’s village, bonchi maluwa
often fi nds itself served up at home and throughout her community. Serve with rice and it makes for a full meal.
Alternatively, serve with another curry or two for a small feast.
To have a child in a low-income community,
too often, ends with the mother left at home,
unable to work. At 30-years-old, Sudarshani is
a proud and resourceful seamstress. A mother
of one, and the primary caregiver to her child,
she is unable to seek employment outside her
house. Sudarshani, therefore, works from her
one-room home, on a machine donated by SOS
Lanka Action. She buys fabric scraps from a
nearby textile factory, makes rugs of the fabric,
and sells them in her community. “With profi ts,”
Sudarshani smiles when asked about her work,
“I contribute to the household budget.”If in a hurry, the green beans need not be
sliced lengthwise, but doing so improves
the fl avor of Sudarshani’s bonchi maluwa; if
full fl avor is desired, the extra time it takes
to prepare the beans properly is worth the
eff ort.Yield: 4 servings
Prep time: 20 mins
Cooking time: 20 mins