Is it weird that I remember the first dish I ever tried at an Indian restaurant? Probably, but I do. It was rogan josh, and I loved it! That was a long time ago, and it started an ongoing love affair with Indian food. If you’ve been reading my blog, you might know my husband isn’t a fan of lamb. I have to plan around his schedule to get my lamb fix, and he was out of town on business this past weekend. That meant a lamb dish was going to be on my menu, and I decided on rogan josh because I haven’t had it in ages.
Boneless Lamb slow cooked with yogurt and traditional Indian warm spices. This lamb curry is popular by name of Mutton (lamb or goat meat) Rogan Josh, from Jammu and Kashmir region of India. Today, I’m sharing with you my take on Lamb Rogan Josh, cooked in slow cooker for an easy Indian Lamb Dinner at home!
The Ingredients
The list of ingredients for this recipe looks long, but it’s not so bad. In fact, this recipe gives you the option of using garam masala instead of 6 separate spices. I decided on that since I had garam masala in my pantry but not all of the spices. I had all the other spics, and a few other ingredients, so shopping was just for the lamb, potatoes, and onion. Not too bad for what appeared to be a recipe with lots of ingredients.
Finding boneless lamb usually means a special trip, but I wasn’t feeling up to it. Instead, I decided to chance it and go to my neighborhood grocery store. They didn’t have any boneless lamb on display in the meat counter, but the butcher was nice enough to make up a package for me. That saved me a ton of time, and I was super grateful for it.
The Process
This rogan josh recipe was a little more work than most slow cooker recipes because there was some cooking involved before putting everything into the crockpot. I spent 15 minutes on prep work and 15 minutes browning the meat and cooking the spices first. Then everything went into my crockpot, and I got to drool over the delicious smell for the next 5 hours. Total time on this recipe was 5 hours and 30 minutes.
The directions were clear and easy to follow, but there was one typo that was a little confusing before I figured it out. Step 3 lists “chili pasta”, but that should be “chili paste”, referring to the degi mirch or cayenne/paprika mixture you may substitute for it (I used the substitute).
Also, I added slightly more water than is called for in Step 6. The 1 1/2 cups listed didn’t look like enough, so I added an extra 1/2 cup. That nearly submerged the lamb in my 6-quart slow cooker just as the recipe notes instructed.
