What curry dishes are the easiest to start with for a beginner?

OK, well this one's a bit different from a lot of curries, but one of my absolute favourites and pretty straight forward to make, and not hugely expensive at all. It is a Goan rather than Indian recipe, especially if you do add the banana. Everyone I have ever made it for has loved it.

Fruity Chicken Curry

Ingredients (serves 4)

• 4 chicken breasts, skinned and boned
• 1 tbsp plain flour
• salt and black pepper
• 1 mango
• 1/2 fresh pineapple (tinned works fine too!)
• 1 inch piece fresh ginger
• 3 shallots
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• 3tsp curry powder
• 200ml chicken stock
• 100ml natural yoghurt
• 2 tbsp grated coconut

Cut the chicken breasts into 1cm (1/2 inch) strips. Mix the flour with the salt and pepper on a plate, add the chicken strip and toss until evenly coated.

Peel the mango, pineapple, ginger and shallots. Cut the mango flesh off the stone, core the pineapple and cut both fruit into bite sized pieces. Finely chop the ginger and shallots.

Heat the oil in a large frying pan or wok. Shake off any excess flour from the chicken and add the strips to the pan. Fry for five minutes over a high heat, or until browned. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon and set aside.

Fry the shallots and ginger in the pan for two minutes. Add the fruit and curry powder and fry for one minute, stirring. Add the chicken stock and bring to the boil. Turn down the heat and simmer for five minutes. Return the chicken and stir in the yoghurt. Season with salt and pepper. Cover and simmer for five minutes.

Just before serving I like to add a sliced ripe banana (avoid stirring to much after adding it, or you'll just get mush!).

Meanwhile, dry-fry the coconut in a frying pan over high heat. Sprinkle over the curry before serving. Enjoy with basmati rice and naan breads or chapati.

I suggest you try experimenting and creating your own curry with the ingredients you feel comfortable with. Here is a nice list of ingredients that can go into making a curry: http://www.660curries.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/curry-pp-772.pdf

Even with a limited amount of ingredients you can make something quite tasty.

This is what I like to do as a base recipe:

1. Fry a small onion until brown.
2. Add 2 heaping tablespoons of fresh chopped garlic, 2 heaping tablespoons of fresh chopped ginger, 3 small fresh chilli peppers, and whatever other spices you want(I like adding coriander powder, turmeric, cumin, cumin seeds, cardamom pods, and a cinnamon stick) and fry for another 1-2 minutes
3. Add a chopped tomato and some water
4. Add chickpeas/veggies/meat/daal in the to the sauce
5. Serve over rice

This is one of my favourite curries, it is quite basic on spices, but very tasty and quite simple to make. A huge hit whenever I've made it!

Beef Curry with Whole Spices

Ingredients (serves 3)

• 600g chuck steak, cut into cubes
• 2 tsps coriander seeds, crushed
• 1 tsp cumin seeds, crushed
• 2 cardamom pods, crushed (I tend to use a bit more!)
• oil
• 2 large onions, sliced into rings
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed (I tend to use a bit more!)
• 2 fresh green chilli peppers, de-seeded and chopped (I prefer red for a bit more kick!)
• 1 1/2 inch piece fresh root ginger, grated or very finely chopped
• 1 tbsp ground tumeric (I tend to use a bit less)
• 55ml hot water
• 1 tbsp grated creamed coconut (I tend to substitute these last two for coconut milk)
• 150ml natural yoghurt
• salt

Begin by dry-roasting the crushed spices in a frying pan for about five minutes over a gentle heat to draw out the flavours.

Then brown the cubes of meat in oil in a flame-proof casserole, and transfer them to a plate. Add the onions to the pan and fry them for about five minutes, before adding the garlic and all the spices, including the ginger and chillies. Continue to cook for a further five minutes before returning the meat to the pan.

Next mix the hot water with the creamed coconut, whisking with a fork, then gradually stir in the yoghurt and add some salt (I am not a big fan of adding lots of salt, but this recipe definitely does need some). Stir this into the meat and onions. Cover the casserole and keep the heat at the lowest possible simmer for 2 hours, stirring everything around a few times and adding more liquid of necessary.

After two hours, take the lid off and continue to cook for a further 15 minutes to reduce the sauce slightly. Serve with pilau rice, pickles and mango chutney.

Use your favorite curry powder, and add chicken and tomatoes, very basic, but not as flavorful. Otherwise you'll need to use the ingredients that actually go into the curry powder (see previous answers) to get a more complex flavor. My sister-in-law just does curry powder and coconut cream, it's quite good as well.