Jaffna Goat Curry - My Sri Lanka

This recipe of Peter Kurivita's for Jaffna Goat Curry was another from his show on SBS My Sri Lanka.

I have eaten goat but never attempted to cook it before. And since I loved other recipes from My Sri Lanka (pork curry, cashew nut curry and prawns with black pepper sauce) I knew I had to try it.

Fortunately I live in an area in Sydney where Sri Lankan ingredients are easily come by, and that includes goat! In fact goat brains, tripe, liver.....

The spices are prepared and mixed with the meat along with tomato paste and coconut milk.

Then the aromats. I tried this technique Peter shared of making garlic paste with salt. He made it look very easy and although I was pleased with the result it was nothing on Peter's effort!

The garlic, ginger, onion, green chilli, pandan, curry leaves and lemon grass are all fried initially in some oil until the onion is translucent and the aroma incredible.

Then in goes the meat and its sauce along with water.

Now this is where my problems started. The recipe says to cook for 30 minutes or until gravy thickens and meat tender. Well the gravy thickened beautifully and I tested a piece of meat, it seemed quite tender. But when we served it most of the meat was quite tough. 

I am assuming that the cut of meat I used was not right. Anyway I tried using the same cut again 'goat curry on bone' and it took two hours to become tender adding extra water at intervals.

But the sauce was incredible. Oh my goodness it tasted like a real curry!

Served with some string hoppers made at our local Sri Lankan takeaway, it was amazing.

The goat flavour wise was fantastic, suited the sauce perfectly, but mastering the cooking time is an issue.

Next time I'll probably just use lamb!