Chickpea coconut curry - with Swiss chard

Some days cooking comes easy and I feel inspired to just whip up a dish from what's discovered in my pantry. Other days I'd open my fridge and stare at a bunch of ingredients and nothing comes to mind. Today was one of those days. Good thing I have friends and co-workers who are also into cooking, vegetarian/vegan ideas, and shared the love for food. So when I got this fabulous recipe I was very excited, and I'm gonna share with you today. Hope you are ready for some vegetarian, creamy, delicious chickpea coconut curry.

Chickpeas are one of my favorite things to add to a salad. They are full of potassium, magnesium, vitamin B6, iron and lots of fibre. They are also packaged so nicely and cooked already - in a can. Yes I know they sell these things dry but I have not yet tried to take that step. I have a bag of raw dried chickpeas, and let's just say it's taken permanent resident in my cupboard for now. Also, hummus is made of chickpeas - and who doesn't love hummus? So you see, chickpeas are a familiar ingredient and we're going to make it shine with today's dish. This was originally a NYtimes recipe - but they wanted me to sign up to the site before I can view the recipe.... so I'm saving you a step here. Visit their site if you like to give that a try, credit to them: 

https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1019772-spiced-chickpea-stew-with-coconut-and-turmeric

What you need:

-  2 cans of chickpeas, drained

- 3 3/4 cup of coconut milk (or 2 cans of coconut milk)

- 2-3 cups of water or veggie stock

- 3-4 cloves of garlic, chopped

- 1 inch ginger root, chopped

- 1 med onion, chopped

- 1/4 cup olive oil, and more to serve

- 1 tbsp of turmeric powder

- one bunch Swiss chard (many other greens will work also, like kale, spinach, collard greens, etc)

- salt and pepper to taste

- mint leaves and plain yogurt as topping.

Recipe:

- Heat up olive oil in a pan on med heat. Put in turmeric, ginger, garlic and onion, stir fry for 3,4 min until fragrant and the onion is translucent.

- Pour in the drained chickpeas, fry for a 5-7 min. The recipe I modeled after said it would be "crispy". Mine wasn't as crispy as in the traditional sense, it's still soft, maybe with a bit of a drier exterior. So don't be discouraged if your chickpeas don't turn out totally crunchy. Scoop up about a cup and set aside, we'll use it as topping later.

- Pour in the coconut milk, water/stalk into the remainder of the chickpea mix. Stew for about 30 min. Use your spoon to mash the chickpeas a bit so the flavor is fully soaked in and combined. We are aiming for a creaming consistency.

- Wash Swiss Chard and remove stem, rip leaves into bite size pieces. Toss in the curry, cook for about 2-3 min. Swiss Chard cooks pretty fast, so will spinach. If you had other vegetables like kale, allow a bit longer cooking/stewing time.

- Add salt as needed, if using stock you might not need more salt, but try it and see for yourself.

- scoop out your curry in a bowl, top with a big heaping spoonful of previously kept aside fried chickpeas, a swirl of olive oil, a dollop of plain yogurt and a couple of mint leaves. IF you leave out the yogurt, it's completely vegan. :)

- Serve as is, or you can have some crunchy bread, or pita with it.

Notes:

- You could use the canned coconut milk - typically they are about 16 oz or so a can. They have a thick layer of coconut cream on top, pretty much solidified. And the rest is the thinner coconut liquid that's transparent. I have bought those before and sometimes it's just so very rich and very creamy. If you like that, go for it. I on the other hand, used the carton of coconut milk this time. Since I have been replacing milk with non-dairy nut milks, my local grocer has coconut milk in addition to almond, soy, cashew varieties. They also come unsweetened. It is about 20% saturated fat of our daily total intake per serving. I liked the taste, the coconut wasn't over powering, and it's still quite creamy.  

- A word on Swiss Chard: It's my first time trying this vegetable today so I'm uber excited! I always see the bunches of beautiful Swiss Chard displayed nicely next to kale but never knew what to do with it. Oh and get this, it has a whopping 122% vitamin A, and 50% vitamin C per serving. How great is that? I seriously get so excited when I find an ingredient that's full of lovely nutrients. Who needs multivitamins when you can get all of the good stuff naturally?

- Another word on turmeric - it's also known to have many medicinal properties, anti-inflammatory, promote joint health. Double yay. 

So I hope you will like this wonderful curry. Not only it tastes good, but also super duper good for you. I thoroughly enjoyed till the last drop.